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I’ve been trying to build up a better-looking body for years.
I’ve tried everything – from the low-carb salad diets, to the 5am gym schedules, to the gym bro coming of age routine of GOMAD (Gallon of Milk a Day). Trust me, I’ve been there. And for a little while, it worked. I had the best body I’ve ever had in my life on these crazy diets and schedules.
That lasted for a little over 3 months.
After that, I fell off a cliff and just lost all motivation. I was hungry all the time (kudos to salad diets) , felt bored doing the same routine over and over again. Most importantly, I felt drained. Like, mentally drained, and tired on the inside. It didn’t feel like I was happy, focused, or even satisfied with what I did anymore because I became a robot – working out, day in, day out.
Working out shouldn’t be this difficult!
Over the next few months I stopped training so hard and lost close to 5kg of muscle mass. On hindsight, this was a burnout phase, where you work too hard and just crash and burn. But this phase brought about a different perspective to fitness – one where I realized that we might have gotten the motivations for working out all wrong. We’ve been taught to start with the end goal in mind all the time, but what about focusing on the immediate, positive experience of exercise?
Putting this all into words:
Don’t workout just because you want to look better or be healthier. Instead, focus on how working out makes you feel.
In the coming weeks I came up with a few quick and easy ways to stay motivated in our workouts revolving around this way of thinking. The methods I’m using aren’t just for people who already exercise regularly and looking for more motivation, but for people who’d like to start a full exercise routine as well!
1. Think about how you feel immediately after exercising
Do you feel more productive after your morning run? Does the quick 10-min walk-round-the-block session help you clear up your mind and focus on the day ahead?
These are the key questions to ask yourself immediately after you exercise. Start by recognizing how your mood, thoughts or even the rest of the day is affected by exercising, creating a strong positive association with your feelings and the workout itself. In fact, we know that the more energy and better mood a person is in, the more energy and performance they bring about to the roles they play, rubbing off that energy to everyone they meet throughout the day. Feeling better isn’t just a selfish thing about yourself only, it’s really about fueling you up for the things that really matter in your lives.
So the next time you do some kind of exercise and realize that hey, I don’t actually mind doing this again, stop and ask yourself; why do I like this? Has it helped me clear up my mind? Has it made me feel just happier all around? This can be such an powerful way to think about exercise!
Working out should make you feel good about yourself, not just make you look good.
2. Set short, achievable goals around how you feel
Consider this: A person whos workout goal is to lose 5kg in a month, versus the person who just wants to workout to have a productive morning. Which of these goals feel actually achievable and ready to get you off Netflix to put on your running shoes?
If you’re just starting out a new exercise habit, significant weight loss as a goal may seem incredibly difficult, almost impossible. On average, we burn between 300- 400 calories doing a 5km run (depending on speed, weight and terrain/weather). That’s just enough to burn off that 1 or 2 Krispy Kreme donuts you had a few hours before. Given how easy it is to intake calories versus how much we spend them, diet and other factors play a much bigger role in weight loss against how much we exercise. The payoff for weight loss may take much more time, and mental willpower to achieve.
Focusing on these short term, immediate benefits also help you see the payoff for working out much quicker, breaking down your long term goals into very achievable mini goals that build up eventually. Once you start a full blown exercise habit, you’ll find the long term goals much easier to achieve!
3. Take progressive steps in your exercise routine
Sticking to an exercise routine is like climbing a ladder! We often start off planning a whole month’s work of exercise with huge, lofty goals with hopes of crushing fat and gaining guns of steel in the shortest amount of time. That’s a recipe for burnout. Don’t jump from zero to hundred in a few days, Do take small, progressive steps in increasing the intensity of your exercise routine.
The American Council of Exercise recommends an increase of no more than 10% in exercise duration PER WEEK for those just starting out a cardio-based exercise routine, until you’re able to hold about 30 mins of continuous exercise. That means, if you’re able to run for 10 mins straight/ session on the first week, you should only increase that to 11 mins of running each session!
That’s a lot more doable isn’t it? Small gains like these add up, and eventually we’ll find ourselves at the top of the ladder looking down at the small steps it took to get there.
The fitness industry has been touting the beach body 6-pack abs, toned legs and ripped biceps for years. Too much has been said about how exercise will make us look, but way too little has been mentioned about the way our actual mood and lives change by doing exercise. If you’re into your exercise routine for the long haul, start thinking about how exercise makes you feel instead. Set short, productive goals around those feelings. At the end of the day, you’ll be surprised at how far you’ve climbed to get there!