Spring Cleaning My Fitness

My recent trips to Canada and South Africa as well as a pretty great Christmas have seen me come to the not surprising revelation that I need to get out of my current rut and get my butt into gear so that by this summer I haven’t turned into some sort of gelatinous blob that is barely describable as human-shaped.

Freezing cold winters have a way of making me just slouch under my kotatsu after getting home from work and one day becomes one week and one week becomes one month, and before you know it you have fallen into a routine of almost always sitting and chilling in front of the TV rather than trying to be active. Of course winter can be tough to exercise in when you live in the countryside: there are no nearby gyms and running outside can be dangerous with icy roads that are better suited to sledding than jogging.

And for me the toughest thing about trying to stay on the move in winter is just finding the motivation to do so. You’re constantly surrounded by students and teachers who are coughing and sneezing and caught in the throes of full-blown influenza, conditions that do not inspire you to head out into freezing cold snow to jog and do your best to avoid the cars that are slipping along the icy roads with gay abandon as their drivers are blissfully unaware of any and all pedestrians.

That said, I have tried my best to at least keep on the move during the day when I’m at school. I choose the longer way to walk to the vending machine if I buy a drink or I park further away so that I can walk a bit longer. Hopefully small changes like this add up and help to survive the winter without ballooning from too much food and drink and too little exercise.

At least the onset of spring and the coming summer months mean that I can finally head outside every day after work for regular runs, something that I miss for the cold and depressing winter months here in Japan.

• Personal