Have you ever noticed how over-enthusiasm in the initial stages of training over time is replaced by a loss of strength, energy, and motivation? The reasons may vary: from banal boredom and monotony to constant pain, lack of visible results, and hatred of the sport. Let’s figure out how to restructure behavior and what to consider, so that training is not a compulsion, but a pleasure.
The Process Is More Important Than the Effect
People come to the gym to achieve a specific goal: losing weight, improving flexibility/endurance, building muscle mass, etc. Gyms appeal to long-term and mostly external goals such as slimness, muscle relief. But it’s important to understand the following.
External goals are for the short term. Insufficient motivation leads to the fact that a person “goes off the track”, not having time to achieve the desired goal. Sufficient motivation leads to the fact that the person again “gets off track” after the goal is achieved. And then the fat comes back, the relief disappears, the muscles don’t look as spectacular, etc.
Intrinsic motivation is meant to last a long time. To maintain it, understand and realize that with training the quality of life improves, and the body just needs movement, exertion. You can develop such intrinsic motivation if you reward yourself for the work done. As a reward, these can be a pleasant company of like-minded people, awareness of the health of the body and the body, a feeling of pleasant fatigue, a cheat meal, etc.
Don’t Choose Sports You Don’t Like
Both in life and in sports, motivation drops markedly when performing tasks that we categorically dislike, creating stress. If running, for example, is like hell for you mentally and physically, try other activities. Fitness, Pilates, yoga, dance, gym, and more – it’s not hard to be active in sports today.
Don’t Expect an Exceptional Love of Sports
It’s not always possible to love a high-stress activity completely. Sports should be enjoyable and help achieve the desired effect.
For example, going to the gym in general may be enjoyable because of the variation in exercises for different muscle groups, but that doesn’t mean that barbell exercises and cardio should be equally unstressful. Praise yourself for your efforts and be proud of the new weight you lifted or the competent technique of the new exercise.
Be Grateful to Yourself and Your Body
Aggressive motivation like “Get it together, wimp!” or “You have to, no matter what!” is not always good or helpful with a certain personality.
Much depends on past and present experiences: the degree of training, the level of stress and strain in the main job, the environmental situation in the place of residence.
Take all this into account and control your inner motivator. Don’t berate yourself if the training went less than you expected. Analyze your condition before and during the exercise, find out what caused it to happen, let your body recover and continue exercising.
Double Pleasure
When you combine several goals, the result is a lot of fun. When you start exercising for yourself, and then incorporate proper nutrition into your life, and then attract friends/acquaintances into your circle.
That way you’ll motivate others to exercise, and you can see them more often than usual. Isn’t that a nice place to meet, and also for the benefit of your body?
Proper Preparation and Planning Is the Key to Motivation
If you plan carefully, it’s harder to refuse to work out. Put sports on your to-do list for the day, pack your bag, prepare a bottle of water or sports drink, and fill your player with your favorite music. Any preparation is good for motivation and saves a lot of time.
Try to shift your priorities, and in the rotation of taking care of family, work, live casino games, and friends, don’t forget about yourself. If your schedule has 2-3 evenings taken up with sports, over time your acquaintances will get used to it and accept it, and will not encroach on the time “for yourself”.
Progress Is Individual
Different health/endurance scores and training speak for themselves: some people work beyond their abilities, while others don’t work hard for the same result. That is, one person works out for two years for minimal relief and tone, and a beginner catches up with him in a few months.
This situation shouldn’t upset you if you understand a few simple truths. Different age, experience in the sport, metabolism and genetics – no people are exactly the same, and no time frame for achieving results is exactly the same.
If you see slow but progress, you like your chosen type of physical activity, don’t give it up. The effort will pay off in the long run.
Home Workouts
If circumstances such as having a child / financial limits / constraints don’t allow for long trips away from home, no one bothers to organize a workout island in the apartment.
In the same way, you can add to the classes in the gym at home. Hand-made tools allow you to perform a lot of exercises for pumping the same muscle groups as in the gym.
Allow Yourself to Work out at Your Own Strength
This is more of a psychological aspect. For example, you are tired after work, your body is stressed and signals that you are not ready to work out. “Trick” it by promising yourself to train a little less intensely than usual. More than likely, the workout will go at the same pace as before, it’s just that your brain will fixate on the information of a more relaxed class. How it works: instead of doing 5 laps of interval exercise, you promise yourself to do only 3, and then spend the remaining time in the shower and dinner. But by the end of 3 laps you feel like you still have energy and you can “finish” the evening as usual.
Music and Videos Are Good Helpers
Music is all about mood, relaxation, and motivation. Especially in the case of rhythmic workouts like cardio: just tune in to the beat to “disconnect” from the outside and concentrate on the result and the process. The same goes for videos of people exercising, talking about exercise techniques, etc.
Don’t Forget About Good Nutrition
Exercise is not an all-powerful pill. Without a careful attitude to what you eat, you can lose motivation: train as hard as you can, but be an adherent of an unhealthy diet and, accordingly, not see results. We have already told you about the principles of proper nutrition, here we will give recommendations for those who are fed up with boring food and want to diversify it.
New shades of dishes will allow you to look at boring combinations in a different way:
- Besides olive oil in salads and side dishes, you can add sesame oil and cook with coconut oil.
- Don’t forget about lemon, which goes well with salads and seafood.
- Tomatoes + basil = excellent sauce for pasta and meat dishes. Fish and meat dishes can be supplemented with a sauce based on natural yogurt, cucumber, garlic with cilantro / dill.
- Make homemade sauces, such as mayonnaise made from chicken or quail yolks.
- Marinate foods. For example, in soy sauce (meat / vegetables), red wine (meat), red onion with spices and natural herbs (meat / vegetables / poultry).
Unusual healthy foods:
- Spinach for a salad, as a side dish or as an ingredient for a smoothie.
- Broccoli for garnishes or as an addition to omelets.
- Celery for salads and juice.
- Mangoes for cottage cheese desserts, smoothies, salads.
New ways of cooking:
- Baking, which preserves the aroma and flavor and juiciness of the dishes. The good thing is that the dishes do not need to add oil – it’s enough to use foil, bags, and parchment.
- Braising, which preserves more vitamins and minerals;
- steaming, preserving the maximum nutritional value of the products.
- Drying for mushrooms, fruits and vegetables is good for stocks for the winter.
Staying motivated in sports, as in any endeavor, is important and can be done. Provided you do what you love, what you believe in, what you are good at.
