The Gorgeous Workout Planner That Keeps Me On Track

I am not an athletic person. But I AM a person who tries to get some kind of exercise every day. It helps mentally, physically, and just makes me feel better. It took a very long time for me to get here, but all those years of rheumatologists telling me that exercise was crucial to keeping my aches at bay turned out to be TRUE (WTF). 2020 was the year I discovered, loved, evangelized, and depended on Peloton. I can honestly say that Peloton got me through this past year, and I’m not the only one.

But in the past month or so I’ve been having a hard time balancing my chronic illnesses (and all the limitations that comes with them) with exercise. The obnoxious thing about exercise for chronic illness is that if you don’t do enough, you get a flare and feel awful… and if you do too much, you get a flare and feel awful. And no one can tell you what that balance is! It’s different for everyone! My problem was that I found something I loved, and I loved that I was getting stronger and feeling great, but then I kept overdoing it. Then I’d have a flare, I wouldn’t’ be able to exercise, I’d miss it and be desperate to get back to it, and then I’d get overeager, overexert myself, and the cycle would begin anew. What I needed was a PLAN.

I started looking up workout plans, how to balance and schedule a week of exercise, and even specific Peloton workout programs (I found the three above plans by spending about 10 seconds looking at “Peloton Workout Plans” on Pinterest). Nothing was just right. I wanted flexibility and guidance. My body feels different every day (I imagine everyone’s does?), and I want to be able to say, “I’m doing a 45 minute intervals and arms ride Wednesday” and then wake up Wednesday morning and say, “You know what? Today is more of a 10 minute low impact, 20 minute slow flow yoga day.” I found some blank planners, and of course I had that moment of, “Well I could make this” and then discovered that it would take me FOREVER (idk what I’m doing) and I am not interested in that kind of time investment. So I turned to Etsy, and I found EXACTLY what I wanted.

This workout planner from Love and Paper Design Co is perfect. It’s a print that you put in a frame (they will supply one or you can get your own, more on that later), and then write out your weekly workout plan on the glass with a dry erase marker. There are nine designs to choose from, but there’s also an option to choose a different design, which I did. I sent a message asking what other options there were, and I got a response within a half hour that I could choose any image on Shutterstock. ANY IMAGE. I was honestly overwhelmed with choices, I felt like I couldn’t possibly handle that kind of freedom, so I limited myself to an hour of searching, and then chose three potential designs. I sent them along, and got mockups of all three.

I chose the dark floral one, but I wanted more opacity on the squares so I could see my notes better, so I got mockups of different opacities. I was astounded by how much effort this seller put into this (the whole time I was worried I was asking too much and being too picky) and how quickly this whole process was. At this point we were like, 40 hours out from my initial message asking about custom options. Once I finalized my order, it shipped out, and that was the longest part of the whole process - waiting for it to arrive. But even that was pretty quick, I’m just enthusiastic and impatient. It arrived in some VERY secure packaging. wrapped in protective plastic, then put in a rigid cardboard mailer, then in another plastic bag for shipping. Perfect condition and ready to pop into a frame.

You can get a frame through the shop, but I wanted something thinner, so I got my own from Target. I chose this frame, which has a thin border and comes in three finishes. I am a planner (obviously), so I mocked up each frame to see which one I liked best. I went with black, and it’s perfect.

Now I can plan out my week’s worth of exercise, but change it at any time if I need to. I use an ultra-fine marker, but I could change that, or the frame, easily any time I want. I don’t have to print out a new page every week, or stick to anything I plan. It’s truly exactly what I was looking for. And did I mention it only cost $20? TWENTY DOLLARS! An absolute bargain. A STEAL.

An only tangentially related note: My leaderboard name is (partially) in Polish, and once I saw someone in a class whose name was like “PolishNurse” or “ProudPole” or something, with a Polish flag, so I high-fived them thinking, “Oh, they will get a real kick out of my leaderboard name!” and THEY DIDN’T HIGH FIVE BACK. Hurtful. Rude. A betrayal of the culture they claim to hold so dear.