packs being passed up to camp crush me like a bug. Instead, two fellow rafters got on either side of me and essentially passed the heaviest packs to each other while making it look like I was helping, thankfully allowing me to save face.
I was mortified. I literally could not pull my own weight.
That fact drove home a searing kind of shame: I was young, healthy, and able. Why could I not keep up with my fellow adventure travelers?
It was that night in the fire line that I made myself a promise: I was going to get in shape—get strong and healthy, nimble and quick—as soon as I got back to New York.
FIT, FAT, AND FEARFUL
True to my promise to myself on the river, two days after I returned from my rafting adventure, I marched myself down to a brand-new Equinox Fitness club that had opened up not too far from my lab. This gym was beautiful and had everything—a big facility with yoga and Pilates studios, workout rooms, personal trainers, fancy locker rooms, a sauna, and a pool. And it was only a fifteen-minute walk from work. It was perfect! I signed up immediately. The membership adviser sold me on trying out a personal trainer because a free training session came with my new membership package. I was determined to do this right so I marched straight up to the board on the wall with all the trainer profiles and carefully tried to choose the one who looked like he or she could get me into shape the fastest. Five days later, I had my first session with my new personal trainer, Carrie Newport.
Carrie was a relatively new trainer at the gym looking to build up her clientele. Turns out, she was the perfect trainer for me. Always bubbling over with information from the latest personal training seminar, she was enthusiastic, knowledgeable, creative in her workout design, and well organized. It was so much fun to train with her two to three times a week. The best part was that I quickly started to see results in both the increased weights I could handle and the higher number of reps I was able to complete in our sessions as well as in the shape of my body. Muscle mass grows if you work out regularly and if you push yourself hard. To supplement my training sessions with Carrie, I started taking advantage of the great fitness classes at the gym too. They had especially good dance teachers (there are so many fantastic dancers in New York and we get them as teachers in the gyms), and I also enjoyed the cardio, strength-training, and step aerobics classes. I tried them all!
When I look back on this time, I realize how many old habits I broke and how many new habits I established in one fell swoop as soon as I got back from that trip to Peru. All the books on breaking habits say it’s so difficult to do because habitual behavior is ingrained and unconscious and therefore very difficult to change. But my sudden change from non–gym goer to regular gym goer didn’t seem hard to me at all. Why? The first key factor was that I really had a profound revelation that night on the banks of the Cotahuasi River. That realization opened my eyes for the first time about my fitness level, and I was determined not to again be the weakest one on any future trip, which completely shifted my motivation to work out. The second key factor that was critical is that on top of the expensive gym membership, I hired a regular trainer to work with me one on one two or three times a week. I like to get my money’s worth, and that kept me extra motivated to get the most out of each personal training session. It was really Carrie who got me over the hump and helped jump-start my new habit of going to the gym on a regular basis. Her style of combining copious amounts of positive feedback and encouragement with fun and varied workouts along with a bubbly personality made the workouts so enjoyable—I loved them. The last key factor during the first year or year and a half after Peru was that I quickly started to see the fruits of my labor in terms of clear
I was mortified. I literally could not pull my own weight.
That fact drove home a searing kind of shame: I was young, healthy, and able. Why could I not keep up with my fellow adventure travelers?
It was that night in the fire line that I made myself a promise: I was going to get in shape—get strong and healthy, nimble and quick—as soon as I got back to New York.
FIT, FAT, AND FEARFUL
True to my promise to myself on the river, two days after I returned from my rafting adventure, I marched myself down to a brand-new Equinox Fitness club that had opened up not too far from my lab. This gym was beautiful and had everything—a big facility with yoga and Pilates studios, workout rooms, personal trainers, fancy locker rooms, a sauna, and a pool. And it was only a fifteen-minute walk from work. It was perfect! I signed up immediately. The membership adviser sold me on trying out a personal trainer because a free training session came with my new membership package. I was determined to do this right so I marched straight up to the board on the wall with all the trainer profiles and carefully tried to choose the one who looked like he or she could get me into shape the fastest. Five days later, I had my first session with my new personal trainer, Carrie Newport.
Carrie was a relatively new trainer at the gym looking to build up her clientele. Turns out, she was the perfect trainer for me. Always bubbling over with information from the latest personal training seminar, she was enthusiastic, knowledgeable, creative in her workout design, and well organized. It was so much fun to train with her two to three times a week. The best part was that I quickly started to see results in both the increased weights I could handle and the higher number of reps I was able to complete in our sessions as well as in the shape of my body. Muscle mass grows if you work out regularly and if you push yourself hard. To supplement my training sessions with Carrie, I started taking advantage of the great fitness classes at the gym too. They had especially good dance teachers (there are so many fantastic dancers in New York and we get them as teachers in the gyms), and I also enjoyed the cardio, strength-training, and step aerobics classes. I tried them all!
When I look back on this time, I realize how many old habits I broke and how many new habits I established in one fell swoop as soon as I got back from that trip to Peru. All the books on breaking habits say it’s so difficult to do because habitual behavior is ingrained and unconscious and therefore very difficult to change. But my sudden change from non–gym goer to regular gym goer didn’t seem hard to me at all. Why? The first key factor was that I really had a profound revelation that night on the banks of the Cotahuasi River. That realization opened my eyes for the first time about my fitness level, and I was determined not to again be the weakest one on any future trip, which completely shifted my motivation to work out. The second key factor that was critical is that on top of the expensive gym membership, I hired a regular trainer to work with me one on one two or three times a week. I like to get my money’s worth, and that kept me extra motivated to get the most out of each personal training session. It was really Carrie who got me over the hump and helped jump-start my new habit of going to the gym on a regular basis. Her style of combining copious amounts of positive feedback and encouragement with fun and varied workouts along with a bubbly personality made the workouts so enjoyable—I loved them. The last key factor during the first year or year and a half after Peru was that I quickly started to see the fruits of my labor in terms of clear
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