Registered With A Gym Today And Now On A Workout Routine

Not the actual image, this image is from University of Oxford

Last week I moved to Gbagada. It is proving to be one of the best decisions I have made this year. Everything I need is a walking distance away: market, supermarket, banks and, even, a gym. And today I registered with a gym. Costs N10,000/month and I paid an additional N2,000 new registration fee.

Why did I suddenly join the gym? It is equally a mystery to my girlfriend.

It took just 10 mins to go from the thought to finding the closest gym and paying the membership fee. And the trigger was that I was searching online for what exercises I can do in addition to my regular push-ups. I was leaning towards buying dumbbells. Then I came across a forum page where someone asked a similar question and the answer people gave was that no amount of body-weight exercises even mixed with dumbbells can come close to the full body building you can achieve from using a gym and that subscribing to a gym is well worth the money. So I gave up trying to stick to body weights and immediately searched online for a gym in Gbagada. Amazingly, there is one on the adjacent street. I called and went straight to register, then went to buy the kits (proper clothes) I need.

I even made a new friend and possible business partner. He just moved back to Nigeria about a year ago to start an innovative fintech company. He is a gym rat and looks like a gym instructor. He helped me figure out what machines to start with and how to use them. We also talked a lot about business. He was into the deep side of investment banking in the UK for many years and I got lost in some of our conversations. 

In case you are wondering where I would get time to go to the gym, I have no worries about that. I am naturally gifted at doing consistently what most people find hard and finding extremely hard what most people find easy. I once consistently did push-ups five times weekly for over a year; despite changing jobs, travelling to over seven states for work projects and spending a month in Cotonou to practice French in that time period. I have been brushing my teeth with my left hand everyday for the last seven years, and it started like a joke. Even this daily blog post writing started in 2013 and I didn't even believe I would succeed this long. It is human relations I find extremely difficult.

I almost forgot this too -- I used to also swim almost weekly for over six months and the pool was very far from my home (40 minutes drive away) plus I paid per each swimming session.

I am not worried about making good use of the gym membership, rather I am worried that I will add up useless muscle mass and look like the extra slim version of hulk.