The Unrelenting Focus: Motivating Yourself to Exercise
You may have heard of it before, but people will always try to promise themselves that they will finally take the time to exercise. While some of them are able to do so, most may end up returning to their habits, thus, losing a sense of that promise in the first place.
That said, there may be methods that you can take to ensure and motivate yourself to exercise. If you are curious to know what they are, look no further than our examples below.
1. Set Your Goals Early On
Setting specific, measurable goals is one key to staying motivated. Goals should be specific and measurable. For example, you can’t simply say you want to exercise more; you need to specify how much more. If your goal is to get in shape, then you should set a goal to run for 45 minutes three times a week. Vague goals like “I want to be healthier” don’t do much good. Nor does it help to shoot for the sky and set a goal to run a marathon in a month.
Goals should also be challenging but realistic. If you’ve never worked out before, it wouldn’t be reasonable to expect your body to debut in a marathon within a month. And it isn’t realistic to think that walking for 30 minutes every day will get you a beach body over the summer. These types of unrealistic goals can lead to discouragement and cause you to give up when you fail.
Keeping track of your progress toward your goal is another key strategy for staying motivated. Technology can help some people in this area by providing hard data and encouragement.
2. Develop a Game Plan
It’s easy to get sidetracked by unexpected events. For example, you may miss a workout because of an emergency or other unexpected event. However, most cases of poor time management cause you to miss workouts. To fix this problem, you should plan ahead. Think of exercise as an important appointment.
If you intend to go to the gym, pack a bag with your exercise clothing and accessories the night before. If you intend to go to the park, go there early in the morning or late at night when there aren’t many people around. Keep in mind that the more convenient it is for you to work out, the more likely you are to actually do it.
3. Add Some Level of Fun to Your Exercise
Turning exercise into a game is easy to make fitness more enjoyable and increase the chances of sticking with it. Some fitness apps, for example, turn fitness into an adventure, and music is a potent form of entertainment during exercise. Research supports that music can enhance the enjoyment of even very strenuous exercise and make it easier to stick with.
The right music can keep you feeling energized throughout the workout and make exercise seem less of a chore.
4. Determine Your Instant Gratification
Long-term benefits are important when you’re trying to motivate yourself to begin an exercise program, such as quitting smoking or losing weight. However, simply knowing about these benefits is not enough to get you started. Instead, you should focus on the immediate benefits of exercising, such as being better able to sleep at night, having a more positive mood, being able to think more clearly, having less pain, and being more patient.
You can determine the short-term payoff of exercising for you by noting when you feel tired or irritable, or in pain and then considering whether exercise might help remedy those unpleasant feelings in the long run.
Jumpstart Your Workout!
No matter what you are doing, you always need to push yourself to take action. Exercise is no different. The options that can be used to motivate yourself to exercise may depend on your preferences. However, there are still benefits that you can enjoy today when you start to exercise.
Take note of these tips, and use what you can from them to help you stay motivated all throughout.
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