yorke,
I’m the master of not doing PE when I really would benefit from doing so.
Gains you lose come back faster than starting from scratch. I know it’s hard to get the motivation when there are so many distractions around, but the key is to realise that you are easily distracted and make small steps towards making an effective PE routine a habit. Start small, say do 10 minutes of PE a day for a week (in bed before sleep, or in the morning upon waking are good times to start with). Then the next week add in a little more on top of that, then the next week add a little more.
Your first objection will probably be “but 10 minutes isn’t going to do anything, I might as well wait until I have more time and start then.” This is wrong on several grounds:
1 - Waiting and doing no PE is LESS effective than doing even small amounts of PE
2 - Your aim is not to do a massive routine, but to slowly integrate a routine into your new and hectic lifestyle.
3 - PE is a long term project, and you have to retrain your brain to think in a long term way to be successful at it. Train yourself to be content with not getting results today, knowing that the cumulative effects will pay off in the future. This won’t happen in one day and you’ll have to keep reminding yourself of it for a while until you ‘naturally’ think that way about your PE routines. Incidentally, this is the attitude that successful businessmen and investors adopt, so you are actually teaching yourself a valuable life skill by doing this!
Think of your routine as a virus and PE as a body. A virus doesn’t wait until it’s multiplied 10 billion times before it attacks a host, it gets stuck into some cell, fortifies its position and then begins to expand its empire. This is how you get PE into a busy college life full of distactions.
As for the privacy issues, early morning and late night are the best times where you’ll be interrupted least. In the shower is another time to get some manual work done, as well as when you take a piss. You could also look into traction wraps and ADS techniques, which are a useful supplement to the more intensive work you do. And definitely get a lock for your door!
Good Luck
SS4