So you’re an average guy or gal that doesn’t love exercise and hasn’t quite found something you enjoy enough to stay consistent yeah? You exercise once or twice a week but it’s just meh, you don’t really care or put in much effort – you just do it because you think you should and maybe want some gainz. Or perhaps you’re in that vicious cycle where you go to the gym hard out for a while then life gets in the way or you get really busy watching a new TV show and forget it exists for a few months. You want to be one of those #fitchicks, #girlsthatlift or #jackedude that you see on Insta, but deep down you don’t think exercise will ever be for you.
What makes it worse is the fitness world is getting more confusing – and like you needed that. You’ve got all these enthusiasts like body builders, runners, yoga lovers, cross fitters, F45ers etc that claim their way of doing something is best. This makes it especially hard if you have goals like fat loss or strength gains etc. Like where the heck do you start? What do you choose?
Well if you hate running, you’d rather watch paint dry than go into a weights room & you have zero desire to ever do a clean and jerk (an Olympic lift common in crossfit) then that isn’t the best style of exercise FOR YOU. No matter how good a fitness regime claims to be, if you dread exercising a certain way you will more than likely fall off the wagon or be inconsistent no matter how much you’re told its ‘the best’. If you find something you truly like you have a much higher chance of doing said exercise for the rest of your life. In some cases this even opens the doors to different forms of training. My love of fitness started from distance running – I now train, do power lifting and couldn’t think of anything worse than running. (Not that I think running is bad – I just personally hate it.)
Once you find something you enjoy you’ll want to progress, learn and continue. It becomes less chore like. You get excited to workout, to push yourself, to be better than what you were yesterday.
Everyone is different and you need to spend time finding something you like – it could take months, years even and it will probably change many times throughout your life. Just because you lifted some weights and hated it, it doesn’t mean all strength training sucks. There are 100’s of different ways to utilise it and it’s super effective. So go explore!
Try different gyms, train outside at a boot camp, try yoga, cycling or group fitness – heck go try pole dancing! Once you find something you enjoy you’ll want to progress, learn and continue. It becomes less chore like. You get excited to workout, to push yourself, to be better than what you were yesterday.
If this still sounds awful, find an environment that you enjoy exercising at rather than the exercise itself. If you discover a really fun, social place to train it can be the difference that keeps you consistent. Whether it’s group training, a community gym, even an awesome personal trainer that you get along with well and can help you get to goals. Finding a place where you actually have to book in to sessions and not just go whenever ya feel can be a huge help too.
On the other hand you may never find something you truly enjoy doing. Some people just aren’t big exercisers. If you’re one of them and have always battled with working out consistently my advice is to set some reasonable, achievable goals that you‘ll still feel good about and stick to those. I’ve seen so many people dive in to hour long sessions 5-6 times a week only to get overwhelmed, crash and burn. Which stars that damn vicious cycle. START SMALL I TELL YOU.
For example 3 x 20 minute exercise sessions a week like a jog, some hill sprint intervals, or a home body weight circuit (Google or Pinterest some workouts, they knows heaps of them!) If you’re starting with twenty minutes – work your ass off and make those twenty minutes count! It’s pretty hard to make excuses for small amounts of training time as well. As time goes on build from here and perhaps give the above suggestions a whirl.
When you see results and heath benefits that come from exercise you might be like dayum I get it, this exercise thing is alright! And no I don’t mean just fat loss! You’ll see increases in energy, better sleep, happier days. What about being able to run without getting puffed? Being strong enough to pick up heavy things? Walk the stairs and not die?
Side note – if you have specific goals i.e get stronger, build muscle etc strength training and lifting weights is obviously going to suit you more than running and yoga. Again, there are lots of ways to lift said weights. If running a marathon one day is a goal then a lot of weight lifting doesn’t align a great deal. Keep these sorts of things in mind, because it is possible to enjoy exercise.
Originally published here.
