4 motivational tips to help you exercise
You know all about the benefits of exercise yet you still can't bring yourself to do any.
You know it could make you happier, encourage your brain to grow stronger, protect against chronic disease and help you maintain a healthy weight, but you still choose to skip the morning sweat session and sleep for an extra hour instead.
Everyone needs a little extra motivation to move sometimes. Fortunately, there are science-backed tips that could help get you started.
1. Stop focusing on the unpleasant beginning
As with most things in life, taking the first step is the hardest part of developing a regular exercise regime. It's like writing the first line of that annual report. By focusing on the long task ahead we psych ourselves out before we even get started. What we should be doing, is thinking about how great we will feel when the report is done and sitting on the boss' desk.
And while reports are inherently unpleasant (in my book), exercise can feel pretty good once you get started.
Eric Barker, author of the blog Barking Up the Wrong Tree, quotes a recent study of 279 adults, which found that participants significantly underestimated how much they would enjoy exercising because of a myopic focus on the beginning of exercise.
By increasing the expected enjoyment of exercise, the short-sighted tendency could be harnessed and even overcome, resulting in an increased intention to exercise.
The results were consistent for both group and individual exercise, as well as moderate to challenging exercises and included workouts ranging from yoga and pilates to aerobic exercise and weight training.
2. Form a strategy
Now that you've got your head in the game it's time to think about your game plan. And this could be as simple as talking to a mate about your exercise goals for the week.
If you really want to get serious about fitness, you'll need to go beyond mere conversation. It's worth writing down your goals and coming up with strategies to achieve them.
Barker quotes Heidi Grant Halvorson's book, Nine Things Successful People Do Differently.
"Half the participants were asked to plan where and when they would exercise each week (e.g., "If it is Monday, Wednesday, or Friday, then I will hit the gym for an hour before work"). The results were dramatic: weeks later, 91 per cent of if-then planners were still exercising regularly, compared to only 39 per cent of non-planners."
So why does writing things down means you are more likely to do it? Because commitments that are made actively have more staying power than those that are made passively, writes Barker.
3. Make it fun
You've heard of the saying "work hard, play hard", but what if those two things could be merged into one and hard work could become enjoyable?
Barker uses an interview with Jerry Seinfeld from Lifehacker to illustrate. When asked about how he developed the discipline to write every day, Seinfeld said he made the task into a game.
"He told me to get a big wall calendar that has a whole year on one page and hang it on a prominent wall. The next step was to get a big red magic marker. He said for each day that I do my task of writing, I get to put a big red X over that day," said Seinfield.
"After a few days you'll have a chain. Just keep at it and the chain will grow longer every day. You'll like seeing that chain, especially when you get a few weeks under your belt. Your only job next is to not break the chain."
4. Listen to your favourite music
Listening to your favourite jams is a great way to boost morale when you're working out, even if you've been holding plank for five minutes.
How? By taking you to your happy place.
Otherwise known as "context dependent memory," Alex Korb, a postdoctoral researcher in neuroscience at UCLA, says "one of the strong effects of music comes from its ability to remind us of previous environments in which we were listening to that music."
"Let's say college was the happiest time of your life. If you start listening to the music that you were listening to at that time, it can help you feel more connected to that happier time in your life and makes it more present," says Korb.
Pumping out supersets to "Eye of the Tiger" won't just make your workout more enjoyable, it can actually improve your performance too.
One study examined 15 participants who listened to preferred and non-preferred music while cycling at high intensity to investigate the effect on their performance. When listening to preferred music the participants were able to exercise for a longer distance, while those listening to non-preferred music tended to perceive more discomfort caused by the exercise.
What motivates you to get moving? Let us know in the comments below.
Written by Neela Shearer. First appeared on Stuff.co.nz.
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