I HATE IT WHEN NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTIONS CROWD THE GYM

By Andrew Coakley

With the Christmas holiday of travel, family gatherings, presents and feastings behind us, the resolution-making traditionalists, who have made a vow to get in shape for 2024, have begun their rocky journey of a “start and stop” trek in gyms around the country.

This is the week I dread going to the gym. Everyone and their Mama are in the gym and the place has turned into a mad house. Somewhere between opening presents, gorging themselves on holiday feasts and reflecting on the end of the year, mixed with trepidations and uncertainties about the new year, many people have placed getting in shape at the top of their resolution list.

Somehow this vow makes it among the top three resolutions list every new year. Right there, smacked between “becoming a better person” and “try to get rich” is the vow to “get in shape”, which includes eating better and exercising. This seem to be a universal language when it comes to new year’s resolutions. Maybe the vow to get in shape makes the top three on the list because when reality sets in, many of us realize that the first two resolutions live more in a fantasy world than in our reality.

But getting in shape is something all of us can actually do. Or at least attempt to do. We have the power to make this resolution a reality. I finally made the decision to brave going to the gym for the new year and the place is packed with lots of new faces and even more returning faces of people who had disappeared only months before. Yet, here they are again, back on the treadmill of a promise to themselves to do better this year, knowing full well that like the treadmill they’re on, that promise will go nowhere.

People seem to be wall-to-wall, everywhere you turn. Hasn’t anyone told these people that Covid-19 is still lurking out there? Although I’m sure it’s in here, somewhere amidst all these people who are invading my personal space. Where is my mask? I knew I had a few in my gym bag from the time when Covid was rampant. I dug deep into my gym bag looking for one, with intentions of putting it on, but the dark spots on the light blue, surgical looking masks seemed questionable. However, given the amount of people in the gym and recent reports of a spike in Covid, I would rather take my chances with a moldy mask. But I’m sure people would notice the dark spots and would begin looking at me suspiciously.  

So, I deferred putting on the mask. I would just have to take my chances.

The music is loud, and the conversations are louder. Even with my headphones on, it seemed as if people were talking directly to me. That’s how close we’re bunched up. Unable to hear the music properly and comfortably from my iPod, I decided to pause the music, but keep my headphones on. I wanted to give the appearance that I was focused on my workout and should not be disturbed by anyone trying to draw me in on their conversation.

But I was unwillingly a part of their conversations, thanks to the combination of loud music from the gym speakers and people trying to talk over the music. I didn’t want to be nosey (or did I?), but from what I gathered, two of the ladies working out on a machine next to me were having relationship problems and the men in their lives apparently didn’t have much room for messing up again in 2024.

“This is a new year, I’m not putting up with that mess,” one of the ladies vowed. I’m sure that made her resolution list.

A group of guys hogging up the Smith Machine were taking turns doing triceps pull downs, while joking and reminiscing about how many lies they had to utter over the Christmas holiday, as they played several girls at one time. Oh yeah, some of them also discussed the possibility of taking some sort of steroid this year to get more ripped. Two of them opted out of the idea.

I would have liked to move to another machine, but when the gym gets crowded like this, the idea of freely moving from one machine to the next goes out the window. The wise thing to do once you get a hold of a machine is to do all of your sets one time before you move. Once you leave that machine, even for a second, a gym trainer with a group of six or more people will grab that machine and your hopes of finishing your set disappears. When it gets this crowded, I hold off going to the bathroom until I finish a complete set on a machine.

No, it’s not a healthy thing to do, but these are the measures you must take when the gym is filled with people who have made a vow to themselves and to the universe that they will get in shape this year.

By the time I was able to quickly grab another machine for my other exercise, I had interestingly found myself next to a group of four elderly looking ladies, who seemed more content with talking than exercising. I quickly learned from their conversation, that they were untrusting of several people whom they worked with at their respective jobs. They all agreed that they worked with “a bunch of snakes and wicked people, who would throw you under the bus the minute your back is turned”. I couldn’t help but think if the people who they were talking about were somewhere in another gym (or in this same one) talking about how they didn’t trust any of the ladies working out on the side of me.

Ahh, the drama of gym conversations.

This uptick in gym membership and the influx of crowds during the second week in January has become more of a tradition. A vicious cycle. Anyone who has been in the gym for more than two or three years has seen the trend. It’s a tradition that even gym owners have become accustomed too. And boy do they take advantage of it, posting up flyers and posters of gym rate specials at the entrance of the gym and in every room of the gym, including the bathrooms.

These flyers were up from December, reminding people to take advantage of three- and six-month specials. After all, that feeds right into the resolutions made by so many people of trying to save more money in the new year.

I cut my work out short, because I had to spend too much time standing around waiting for machines and workout spaces to open. I grabbed my gym bag and left not satisfied with the amount of work I was able to put in. But I didn’t beat myself up over it too much. In fact, by the time I got to my car and left the parking lot of the gym, I smiled to myself because I knew that the month of March was not too far down the road.

What happens in March? Well, if I wanted to be dramatic, I would say that sometime between the end of February and the beginning of March, aliens, or the body snatchers invade the planet and take people away, because people seem to disappear from the gym as quickly as they had arrived.

By the month of March, the crowds dwindle down and breathing room in the gym becomes a thing again. You see, this is part of the gym cycle. The New Year’s resolution makers flood the gym in early January, determined to achieve their new goal. They’re pumped. They’re hyped. They’ve bought a year’s supply of energy drinks and salads piled in their refrigerator. These people are focused on getting the body they want in 2024.

However, reality sets in around the end of February and they realize that the weight which took them years to put on was not going away in just a few short weeks. They realize that getting in shape is not an overnight thing, but more of a lifestyle. It’s a long-term, lifelong commitment a lot of people refuse to make. They want that “quick fix” result. But there is no such thing.

They accept their “body truth”, admit to themselves that they at least tried and by the beginning of March, they make the decision to dump the gym and decide to tackle a different item on their resolution list.

Not everyone gives up in March. Some continue to hold on, determined to reach their goal. But by April, those not totally committed give up the dream and they too disappear. Very few stay all the way through. The cycle revs up again in late May, as people who want that “beach body” flock to the gym once again, with a commitment to achieve their goal by June or July. That influx is short lived, as people begin travelling for vacations and forget about their goal of getting in shape.

By the time summer vacations are over and school reopens in September, going to the gym is far from the minds of many people. There’s too much going on; too much to deal with. By December, as the Christmas season hype floods the stores, the radio and television airwaves, the decorated buildings, the gym becomes even emptier, as most people prepare their hearts, minds and their stomachs for the festive season.

Only the gym rats remain in the gym, soaking in the emptiness, the easy use of any machine and the quietness of the gym, with only the machines and the loud music from the gym speakers making noise. Committed gym members bask in these times. They don’t take them for granted and use every day of their membership.

Because they know when January comes around again, the crowd of resolution makers will be back, and the cycle of madness will begin again.