Strength training after 50: the exercises that matter most

I asked an expert whether what I was noticing was real or whether I was simply paying attention to something I would normally have ignored. "Honestly, both," she said. "And that is not a bad thing. Paying attention is most of the benefit."

If I were starting again I would be less ambitious. The biggest mistake I made was trying to do it perfectly, which meant that the first time I slipped I felt as though the whole thing had failed. It had not. It just needed a lighter touch.

It had stopped feeling like a chore and started feeling like part of the day

Would I recommend it? Cautiously, yes. Not as a transformation, because it is not one, but as a small, pleasant adjustment that costs almost nothing and gives back a little more than it takes.

A month on, I am still doing it. Not every day, and not with any particular discipline, but often enough that it has become mine. That, in the end, is probably the point.

What I would do differently

I should say at the outset that I was sceptical. I have read too many articles promising that one small change will transform your life, and I have made too many of those changes, and my life has remained stubbornly the same.

But there is something to be said for actually trying a thing rather than reading about it, so I did. For a month. Properly. What follows is an honest account of what happened.

The first few days were, frankly, difficult. Not dramatically so, but in the way that any new habit is difficult: you keep forgetting, and then remembering, and then feeling slightly annoyed with yourself.