Enjoy Exercise!

Why Exercise?

We all know that exercise is good for you. It has so many benefits, aside from losing weight. Exercise combats health conditions and diseases, including but not limited to: metabolic syndrome, heart disease, many types of cancer, and type 2 diabetes. Exercise also boosts your mood and improves your mood. Physical activity stimulates various brain chemicals that may leave you feeling happier, more relaxed, and less anxious. It also improves sleep, helping you fall asleep faster and sleep deeper. To see and take advantage of many of the benefits, you need to make a long-term commitment to exercise and to staying active. This may be difficult for many, perhaps because they have not found an exercise routine that works for them that they enjoy!

Change How You Feel About Exercise

When exercise feels like a chore or is used as punishment, it’s tough to stay committed. No one likes doing chores; exercise starts to drain your energy and interest in the exercise program when you see exercise as a chore. This leads to the eventual abandonment of the initial commitment and maybe a bad experience getting into an exercise routine.

A change in mindset is necessary to help with your view exercise. Many people think of exercise as something they need or should do. Instead, start to think of it as something you get to do. Creating an affirmation around this to say and remind yourself of this can be helpful. Try, “I enjoy getting the opportunity to exercise every day.”

In addition to feeling that you should exercise, seeing exercise as a punishment for what you eat can also add a lot of negativity. Exercise is good for your mental and physical health; we have already gone over all the benefits! Should you exercise if you’re going to indulge a little that evening? Of course! However, switching it up and choosing to exercise because you get to indulge a little is a better way to think of it!

Choose The Right Exercise For You

Now that we’ve (briefly) gone over the mental blocks of exercising let’s talk about the more practical things to ask yourself and keep in mind when choosing an exercise routine.

Where do you want to exercise?

Nowadays there are many different places to work out! You can work out indoors or outside. First, decide which is more appealing to you, than investigate the type of exercise you can do in either.

If you think you’d like to work out outside, hiking, biking, and other outdoor activities are a great place to start. Also, some people offer exercise classes outside at local parks in fair-weather areas. If you’d like to work out inside, you can work out at home or the gym. If you’d like to work out at home, you can set up your own space and create your workouts. There are also a lot of programs that offer virtual exercises or classes that you can do from home.

If you’d like to work out at the gym, first make sure you choose a gym you feel comfortable going to. If you don’t feel good going there, you will avoid it. The gym should be pretty close to home and convenient for you to get. If the gym is far out of your way, you will be less likely to go. Also, look at what the gym offers free weights, machines, group fitness classes, nutritional support, or personal training. Wherever you choose to exercise, it should make you feel good!

What is convenient?

We talked about where you exercise being convenient; whether that be at home or in a gym, it shouldn’t be too much of a hassle to get there and get going.

It’s also essential to think about the time when considering a workout regime connivence. There are exercise programs that offer workouts at different lengths. If you have around 30 minutes a day but want to go to the gym and lift weights, choose a program that combines exercises (usually upper and lower body) to get the most out of the 30 minutes.

You can also choose to take a class that runs during a specific time frame. If you only have 45 minutes, take a class that is that long; once the class is over, you know you’re done, and you’ve gotten to the most out of that time. Also, consider travel time to the gym when deciding how much time you can devote to your exercise.

What would you find fun, or what are you good at?

Determining this is so important, you have to have some fun when exercising, it doesn’t have to be all serious.

If you think dancing would be fun, try taking a Zumba or another type of dance-based exercise class. If you’re competitive and find that fun, maybe a super intense group fitness class like Cross Fit would be a good place to start!

Also, think about what you are good at. Perhaps you were a great gymnast when you were younger; a pilates or yoga class would be great because you also have the body awareness to get the most out of that class. Maybe you were an athlete and have played sports, find a rec team or league that plays the sports you enjoy! There is no right or wrong exercise or physical activity as long as you like it and feel like you can succeed. This creates positivity around exercise, and you’ll be more likely to stay committed!

Do you want to work out alone or with a group?

When exercising, who you surround yourself with helps with motivation, even if you work out alone.

People who work out by themselves usually like alone time. It’s a chance for them to focus on themselves with no distractions. If you value your alone time and want to create your workouts, this would be a great choice.

On the other hand, people like the social aspect of going to the gym and working out with a friend or class. For these people having others with them can make it more enjoyable, and it adds an element of camaraderie. It may also motivate people to work and push a little harder when exercising when the person next to them is working hard. Lastly, working out with a group helps with accountability. People are looking for you to be at the gym or in class, and they miss you when you’re not there. Exercising with a group is a great way to make friends and ALWAYS makes things more fun. Either way, there is no wrong way to exercise, alone or with a group!

What are your goals?

Why are you exercising? What do you hope exercise will do for your health and wellness? All of these questions are important to think about!

Is one of your goals to increase your muscle mass? Running outside and doing a lot of cardio does not align with this goal. You would want to choose some resistance training, whether lifting weights or doing bodyweight exercises. If you’d like to improve your flexibility and balance, taking yoga, pilates, or barre would help you achieve this goal.

Or if you’d like to be able to pick up your grandchildren and move around without getting tired and winded. Finding a program that focuses on functional training and movement would be a good choice for you. No matter what you choose to do, it would help if you were mixing up your exercises to avoid doing the same thing all the time. An optimized routine balances cardio, resistance training, and restorative exercises.

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