When I started thinking about the concept of It Doesn’t Count (see my last post), I realized I say those words to myself much more than I like to admit. They frequently pop into my head when I’m doing chores—like cleaning house. If I scrub the stove, it doesn’t count because I haven’t mopped the floors. If I vacuum, it doesn’t count because I haven’t dusted. If I scour the entire kitchen from top to bottom, it doesn’t count because the cabinets still need to be organized. Since I never have the time or inclination to clean the whole house all at once, my efforts never count because something is always left undone. You get the picture.

I don’t like feeling frustrated and annoyed at myself, which is inevitably what happens when I tell myself it doesn’t count. The words certainly don’t light a fire under me to do more. In fact, they usually have the opposite effect, making me want to escape with a game—or ten—of online Scrabble and some chocolate chip cookies.

Lately I’ve tried taking a different approach. It seems to help. Whenever I catch myself saying it doesn’t count, I add, but at least . . .

Let’s take exercise, which I talked about in the last post. I just came back from a walk with the dogs. I’d planned to run but was too tired, and I caught myself thinking it doesn’t count. So I added, but at least the dogs had a walk. Since I think it’s really important for Baxter and Freddie to get a brisk walk every day, I felt good about having taken them out (and I even got a little sweaty to boot).

So the next time you catch yourself thinking it doesn’t count, talk back. Take it from me. You’ll feel a lot better.

Finding the time to exercise is a challenge for me. I work very long hours, so I either have to get up at 5:00 am to fit in a workout before I leave for the office or muster up the energy—and ignore the fact that I’m starving—to go out for a run when I get home at 7 or 8. Neither solution is ideal, which means my fitness often takes a back seat to other more pressing needs—like sleeping and eating.

My dilemma is hardly unique. So many time-crunched, sedentary workers struggle with the same problem that the health section of the Post devoted an entire front-page spread to exercises you can perform at your desk. Anticipating the objections people might raise, it rated the moves on “silliness,” among a few other factors.

But it didn’t speak to my main concern, which is one that comes up a lot when I try to fit heart-pumping or strength-building interludes into my packed schedule—the It Doesn’t Count factor.

This morning, for instance, I’d planned to take advantage of a later than usual start to my workday by getting up at 5:30, taking the dogs out for an hour, and doing a strength workout. But I ended up hitting “snooze” five times instead. By the time I dragged myself out of bed, it was too late to follow through with my plan. I could only manage to squeeze in a brisk, forty-minute walk with the dogs.

As I write about this now, I can see how unrealistic my expectations were. Forty minutes of walking raised my heart rate and cleared my brain for the day ahead. And I did it in the rain (bonus points for effort!). So why did I think it doesn’t count?

Negating our accomplishments is a by-product of the unreasonable standards many of us aspire to and the nasty little word, “should.” When we do less than we think we should have done, we feel disappointed in ourselves, and our inner drill sergeant screams, “ It doesn’t count!”

Whether it counts or not is, of course, entirely a matter of perspective. I keep a yoga mat and resistance band in my office, and I used them religiously last year when I was going through physical therapy for a back injury. Because I was allowed only 15-minutes of prescribed exercises each day, I never doubted that my silly desk pushups, chair dips, and resistance maneuvers counted. And I had far more muscle definition then than I do now, when the mat gathers dust behind the file cabinet because it doesn’t count unless I’m doing thirty minutes of lifting with heavy weights.

Telling yourself it doesn’t count can undermine your best intentions. After all, if it doesn’t count, then what’s the point? In the next post, I’ll talk about how to make it count. In the meantime, I plan to dust off that yoga mat.