As you age, getting off those few extra pounds is more challenging, and you also lose valuable muscle tone. However, it’s time to get into a new happiness habit. Are you prone to setting ambitious goals about your health, but you never seem to follow through? Then it’s time to learn some easy tips to help motivate yourself.
You’ve heard the saying “go big or go home,” but that doesn’t always apply to everything in life. Developing a new habit requires work and a lot of effort on your part, as no one likes to make changes because it’s hard. How often have you looked at a new recipe and thought it looked good until you saw how involved it was to make it?
People like to take the path of least resistance, so you have many things in life you can consider failed attempts. The good news is that today is the perfect time to start things out differently. You can change your motivation and do all you want to accomplish.
When it comes to your fitness goals, they become of the utmost importance as you age. Your health and vitality count on you to do more than ever. Even if you only walk on the treadmill for three minutes today, it’s still more than you did yesterday.
According to an article on Your Brain at Work, the brain automatically perceives changes as threats and distress, so you want to take the easier path. However, once you adopt a growth mindset, you won’t feel near the resistance.
Ten Ways To Motivate Yourself To Exercise
You’re ready for change and want a better body and improve your health, but you struggle with finding the motivation to begin. Here are some simple ways to motivate yourself to be a better you.
1. Make It Fun
If you find that working out is like pulling teeth, then you’re not doing the right type of activities. There are all sorts of workouts that you can enjoy. Some people can’t imagine riding a stationary cycle or running on a treadmill daily.
However, you can find it’s easier to motivate yourself when you find something to do that you love. The more you hate something, the harder you will have to force yourself to do it. However, it becomes less of a dreaded chore when you learn that you can have fun and lose weight and tone.
2. Remember Slow and Steady Wins the Race
Part of why so many people lose their motivation is that they start ready to tackle the battle of the bulge but lose interest. When you run a marathon, they train you to keep a steady pace as you won’t be able to endure if you use all your steam on the first lap.
You must apply the same analogy to your workouts. You need to set the pace and go slow and ease your way into it. First, if you’re not used to this much physical activity, you can certainly cause more harm than good.
3. Motivate Yourself by Tracking Your Progress
It’s essential to keep a fitness journal to chart your progress. When you start, take your weight and measurements, and write them down. Then about every week, you should update your information. This will allow you to see where you were, and where you are now, and visualize where you’re going.
It’s easy to become frustrated, and you will have difficulty motivating yourself should you become downhearted. So, chart your progress to keep your motivation where it needs to be.
4. Set Goals to Motivate Yourself
Before you even start this journey, you need to set goals. Do you want to lose 20 extra pounds, or maybe you have 100 pounds to lose? Perhaps the issue isn’t extra weight at all, but instead you need to tone your body. Whatever your goals, you need to define them to set your objective.
Then, once you hit the small and long-term goals, you need to reward yourself. If you’re on a fitness journey to lose weight, you will probably need to get some new clothes. There’s no better way to reward yourself than with a great outfit. It will also give you the self-motivation you need to complete the rest of your goals.
5. Get a Workout Buddy
Staying motivated is hard, especially when life throws kinks into your plans. Thankfully, a workout buddy can make exercising more straightforward and more fun. Whether walking around the neighborhood or taking a spin class, having a buddy by your side is always beneficial.
Another great thing about this partnership is that you can encourage one another when you feel down and out and want to give up.
6. When You Fall, Pick Yourself Up
So, you ate a candy bar on the way home from work or stopped at the ice cream place and got a cone dipped in chocolate. It’s not the end of the world that you had a little slip-up. It’s very important what you do when you have these little moments of weakness, as they can define you.
Many people think that they can’t get back up once they fall off the wagon. However, learning to get back up and start fresh tomorrow makes the difference. When you go into the gym to work out, you’re not seeing perfect people who are strictly regimented to change.
Consequently, you’re seeing real human beings that are subject to failures. These people are here because they kept going no matter how many times they messed up.
7. Hang Reminders on the Fridge and Cabinets
Have you ever seen people write sticky notes and put them on the refrigerator or the cabinets? These are little motivational reminders in the spots where you need them most. In your moments of weakness, you might be tempted to get into the cabinet or the refrigerator and splurge.
However, these little reminders posted, in just the right places, will jog your memory and remind you of how far you’ve come. Since workout programs come with eating healthy, you can motivate yourself by putting little quotes or positive reminders around your home or office.
8. Visualize the New You to Motivate Yourself
Many people have pictures from their younger years that they look at and wish they were back to that size. Why not hang this picture on your refrigerator so you can look at it daily? Maybe a bulletin board at work would be a good location for you to see it frequently.
Each time you walk by this picture, it’s a reminder that you once looked like this, and you can get that way again with a bit of work.
9. Be Flexible, and Don’t Be Too Hard on Yourself
Every day will not go according to plan, and even though you want to work out each day, it’s not always going to happen. Don’t be so hard on yourself; beat yourself up with negative self-talk when you stumble and fall. Instead, use the power of positivity to motivate yourself to continue the journey.
10. Use the 3 x 10 Rule
So, you set your goals and find they’re too ambitious. It’s okay to change things a bit. If you can’t do an everyday workout, try using the 3×10 rule.
This is where you dedicate three days a week, and ten minutes each day, to physical activity. If you cannot motivate yourself to work out every day, start with three days and then work your way up to more. Do what you can do, and don’t pressure yourself to go too far or too fast.
Final Thoughts on Ways To Motivate Yourself To Exercise
The things that cause the most work in this life are the ones that are worth working harder to achieve. Motivational speaker and mentor Patrick Bet-David names ten things that are so challenging to obtain, and number four he lists as health. Trying something new and failing is effortless, and you automatically revert to your old ways.
However, he reminds folks that the steps you take now and the things you do to improve your health will help dramatically as you age. You owe it to yourself, your family, and those around you to take a giant step forward to enhance your body. The great thing about working out daily is that you’re not only making changes to your body but also affecting your mental health.
According to the National Library of Medicine, you’re automatically increasing those feel-good transmitters in your brain when you’re working out. When your dopamine, serotonin, and norepinephrine levels are out of balance, it can cause depression, anxiety, and other mental health disturbances.
You can be a happier and healthier version of yourself one month from now if you can change your mindset and motivate yourself for change. Are you ready? It’s time to get in shape, feel great, and tone those muscles.
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