…other than health & look.
1. Going out
As a lazy creature, I tend to waste my time when at home. On the flip side, those 2 hours I spend for swimming is never something I regret later.
2. Making habits
This is one of the things I recently learned – habits are more important than not clearly specified “motivation”. Doing something as a routine spills the sense of being organized over other areas of my life.
It even sounds cool when I can’t go for a beer because “I go swimming as always”.
3. Podcasts
40 minutes of walking to the pool and back home makes perfect time for podcasts. I have to spend this time anyway, but my mind is unengaged whatsoever. As a fresh fan of this medium, I can’t say no.
Sometimes I’m not in the mood for podcasts – in those times music works as well.
4. Time to think
I’ve always found my thinking processes during the swimming very productive. Physical effort stimulates mental activity, I guess.
For example, the idea to write this blog post came straight from the pool.
5. Better sleep
To be honest, I’m not so sure how physical activities around 1 hour before going to bed affect the sleep health. Anyway, after swimming I very rarely have enough energy to stay active much longer. Rather I fall asleep immediately.
There are people who advise to go sleep before you get tired, but this idea has never been close to my heart.
6. Feeling progress
After all, are you really aging if your performance is better from month to month?
7. Part of something bigger
OK, I can swim quite a distance – and still feel the buffer before reaching the plateau. What’s next? A triathlon? Who knows. The idea doesn’t sound that impossible. It’s not going to be this or next year, and would take a lot of effort, and I may be terrible at other disciplines, and so on.
But that’s fine – the bottom line is that it’s good to see the finish line far ahead.
8. Useful skill
It may be only me, but I’ve always considered ski jumping as a very artificial sport. The skill they measure seems kind of detached from reality.
Swimming skill is on the other side of this axis.
Apologies to all the ski jumpers :(.
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PS. As a bonus, on the way to the pool I can buy my favourite drink, which is not available anywhere in my borough. Sometimes it is a decisive factor.
I’ve always enjoyed music during swimming. It seems that 60min is a perfect time to check a new album or dust off some oldies. Why not try waterproof headphones? Anyway, can’t deny it, no 9 on your list must be “Chest”.
Waterproof headphones are on my radar, I’m going to test some day for sure, however I heard that the quality is rather poor.
And yes, swimming makes a huge difference in terms of chest, especially that I’ve always been rather chubby. I will include it in “8 next reasons…” :).