Resources / Book of the Month

If you’re anything like I am, you know you should exercise but find it nearly impossible to drag yourself to the gym after a long day’s work.  On the weekend you arise with the intention of going, but soon get caught up in the hundred little chores that you put off during the week.  Before you know it, you’re watching Saturday Night Live with a bowl of chips and your planned workout is a vague, yet annoyingly persistent, memory.

Enter Chris Bergland with his great book, The Athlete’s Way, which comes just in time to help you ride the wave of Olympic fever to your own fitness regime.  Bergland, who is a world-class endurance athlete with a neurosurgeon father, offers a practical, 8-week plan to help regular people like us use exercise to enhance brain function.  And that, ultimately, leads to a better, happier life.

Don’t mistake this for one of those flash-in-the-pan celebrity diet programs.  While Bergland does talk about food and sleep and other components of health, his real focus is physical fitness – how you can get it and how you can keep yourself motivated to maintain it.  The Athlete’s Way is really about finding your inner athlete and then using exercise as a way to balance your brain chemicals to help you become happy, healthy and productive. It works. 

Or at least it worked for me.  I find myself enjoying my workouts now in a way that I never have before.  I’m a convert and suggest that Bergland’s program might work for you too.  It sure beats feeling guilty every Satuday night.

--BONNIE