Exercise Vs. Continuous Flow Of Golden Time

I wrote about the question of when it is best to exercise and when it is best to make sure that one spends his/her most valuable "gold" energy and alertness on gaining what is of golden value.  

WHICH FIRST?

In one case, one might rationally choose to not take up a golden hour to do one's exercise, even though exercise is a gold activity.  In this case, one would first harvest the early morning alertness and energy, going "on a roll" of continuous (with brief breaks) maximum use of golden hours. 

In another case, one might rationally choose to exercise first thing in the morning, to both assure that it will not be subject to being bumped later as the day's interruptions descend upon one and to get a good boost to better launch one's day.  The "better launch" I am talking about here is the raising of one's mood (for as much as 12 hours), one's metabolism (for as much as 12 hours), one's functioning physically, one's energy for the day.  

THE RISK OF BEING DISPLACED

Let's say a person has trouble with self control and thus finds himself not going forward in utilizing the golden hours.  His coach might recommend doing the golden hours first, continuously, until 3 hours are invested, and then doing exercise.  So in this case, the exercise is at risk of being displaced, instead of having the gold time being vulnerable to displacement.  

CRITERION: SUBSTANCE OVER FORM

So, let's say, the person chooses to do what the coach recommended. 

But there is a danger here, in that the person might be trying to be obedient such that he gets stuck in the "form" of it (three hours golden first and then 1 hour exercise), but fails to weigh the "substance" of it.  The "substance", of course, is how well something works to produce the value desired.   The form is sticking to a particular way.  But ultimately the wise person always chooses "substance over form" - to get better results instead of sticking to a particular form (way) of doing something when it isn't working well at the time.  

The wise person notes whether he is getting the desired results.  If the first choice doesn't seem to be working, he might alter his choice of when to do the exercise.  He might try doing the exercise first and note the results.  

AND WHILE YOU'RE AT IT...

Further, he might ask "how can this "alert, high energy" time be even better utilized?

He might then say to himself, "well maybe I needn't take until 9 am to start the focused golden time or exercise.  Maybe I'll cut short my dawdling and wandering about in the morning and do all I need to prepare the night before so that I don't have to do it during my morning hours.  Yes, that's it, I will start at 8 am instead."  (Of course, the next level up in thinking would be to go to bed earlier, so that there are more unlikely to be interrupted hours in the morning because of the earlier start!)

Then, he might notice that after an hour or hour and a half of writing or planning or deep thinking/learning in some way, his brain and thinking get fogged over and unclear, slowed down as if in a muck.  At that point, it may be better to go do the exercise right then, in the middle of his golden hours, so that he, and his brain power,will be "renewed" and more capable of being used effectively for the other 1 1/2 hours.  

Anyway, the point here is fairly obvious.  In lieu of the unquestioned benefit of having a pre-set regular routine and habit, one may find it best to notice what is actually going on sometimes when the exceptions might come up - and then one needs to make a decision that is worthwhile spending the energy for, gaining the extra value of shifting to a better strategy in the moment.  

(In this case, the "no exceptions" rule (which is a good "form" way to operate), is adjusted to a "no exceptions unless it is worthwhile and wise and better to do the exception", That rule is held, implicitly, of course, in the value mindset person, as it is always the rational rule in the first place, The person in the "fixed mindset" might think it has to be the "no exceptions" rule that is ironclad as "the form" to follow.  And he might even add the illogical belief that "it is 'bad' not to follow the form" or that he is "bad" when he "falls short" of following the rule.   If the latter occurs, then one must notice the "bad" emotion and that therefore there must be a "bad" belief to correct, and then go through the correction process using the belief changing process.)