Exercising Judgment
Occasionally, I think about things unrelated to PR… case in point: since my ACL reconstructive surgery in December, I have spent a lot of time thinking about exercise and what I will do differently when I am rehabilitated. I met with a job candidate yesterday and we got around to talking about the time of day we like to exercise. 
I am not a morning exercise person, but I aspire to be one and admire others who can get up in the dark and drag themselves to the gym. The candidate mentioned the book Spark, which discusses why your brain is able to absorb much more two hours after working out. I also did some preliminary research on why it's better to exercise in the morning. Here are just a few reasons that support my soon-to-be way of life:
- More than 90 percent of people who exercise on a consistent basis do so in the morning. Slackers like me exercise in the evening and often miss gym-time because of late work nights, meetings with clients and/or friends and more simply, dinner.
- Exercising in the morning "jump starts" your metabolism and keeps it elevated for hours. That translates to burning more calories all day long just because you exercised in the morning.
- Research has demonstrated that exercise increases mental acuity. On average it lasts four to ten hours after exercising. This is what Spark delves into by presenting the scientific suppot.
The other article I recently read (and I’m only slightly embarrassed to include it in this post) was in US Weekly and it discussed Bethenny Frankel’s opinion of the people who exercise hard at the gym. I’m paraphrasing, but she said that those are the people who have a horrible relationship with food. I couldn’t agree more, Bethenny (mostly because I am usually the one pounding away on the treadmill). Instead, she encourages calmer exercise – yoga, for example.
So, I know it doesn’t matter either way – to me, success means that I actually worked out. I don’t care if it’s in the morning before the sun comes up or at night when most people are sleeping. I also know that everyone prefers a different form of exercise – some people like “calm” exercise and others, like me, prefer to relieve stress on the soccer field while perhaps slide-tackling a few ladies in the process. In my world, success is actually getting to the gym or working out.
But…I am curious:
A. Are you a morning or evening exerciser? And:
B. Are you a hard, sweaty exerciser or are you a calm, glistening exerciser? 
