today's tired thoughts

i'm so tired. if i wasn't so tired maybe i'd find a more interesting way to describe this feeling. maybe that's taking the coward's way out (i'm back to admonishing myself for cowardice for lack of ambitious attempts in the last few days' posts—this is at odds with another part of me that champions my ability to show up with whatever capacity i have on any given day, even if that's sub-ambitious). 

anyway, today's post will not be ambitious in a way that satisfies the former. i'd just like to ramble a bit and attempt to capture some thoughts. no more, no less. 

as i said, i am very tired. it's a heavy sort of tired, but pleasantly so. i've been fending off a nap since 5:30pm (it's now almost 11pm). my muscles ache, especially my legs, increasingly so as the day progressed. and the hunger! i've been insatiably hungry all day, even after i just ate a meal. 

yesterday, i lifted weights. for the week prior, i had not lifted weights, as i had been sick with a cold. before i got sick, i had an inkling that my recently increased tiredness was a result of the few weeks of lifting i had been doing, but i couldn't say for sure. i don't have a very long-ranged sense of my day-to-day physical condition—my chief concern is the present, and the rest sort of falls away, including whether i've had a headache in the past three days. 

but now, returning to lifting after a week off—i can truly feel the difference. without my noticing, my body had reverted to some previous baseline. one single day in the gym and i feel a major difference in my body. this hunger and tiredness were definitely not there 24 hours ago. 

when i'm trying to build a new habit, it feels disheartening to have to take a break very early on. i'm afraid the break will grow and grow, until the attempted behavior change is just a long-forgotten destination in the rearview mirror. 

with exercise, however, this is the second time i've started to build a habit and taken a break early on...and the break has actually been helpful to feel the difference in my body between doing the habit and not doing the habit. the stark contrast cements my determination to keep going, rather than the break convincing me to just give up. 

feeling a difference in my body is exciting, and a little bit scary. i've never been strong, never really been In Shape. i don't know what that version of me will feel like, will be like. maybe it won't feel much different than this change i'm feeling today; maybe it will just feel like the me of today rather than the me of two days ago. but maybe i'll feel wildly different; i don't know! 

getting stronger feels big and important. i'm excited to keep going. even though i often don't feel like going to the gym, it feels really good to go anyway, to conquer something hard, to become someone i've never been before.