How to Start Exercising When You Have Zero Motivation

How Important is Exercise for Overall Health

You must have heard this before, and here you hear it again: exercise is very important for your health. In fact, I can’t emphasize how important it is. Personally, I’d classify it as important as food, water, and sleep. Yes, I find that important!

The benefits of exercise have been proven over and over. In fact, I recently learned that a study from Cleveland Clinic by Dr. Wael Jaber concluded that inactivity is more dangerous than smoking, diabetes, and heart disease.

How to overcome the exercise block

Like most good things in life, starting an exercise routine and sticking to it is hard and challenging for some. It’s much easier to sit back and relax rather than engage in vigorous exercise with all the exhaustion and sweat, isn’t it? But I beg to differ. After some time of following an exercise routine, it becomes natural or even recreational. Exercise itself makes you happier due to the release of endorphins in your brain. You may see players struggling to catch their breath, but in fact, they feel good about it. It feels good to challenge yourself so much that you may even injure yourself doing it.

Tips to start to exercise when motivation is low

There were days where I felt lazy or not in the mood for a workout, but since I know how valuable it is and I don’t want to fall behind on my routine or gain, I get myself to do it. The best technique that worked for me was to just do it. I convince myself that I’d only do a gentle warm-up just to get the blood pumping and call it a day. 20 minutes later I’m out of breath, covered in sweat, and crunched through a really intense workout, gaining all the benefits I could gain from this exercise session. I found out that physical activity is different from mental activity. If you feel lazy or not in the mood, it may be hard to concentrate or focus on mental or creative work, but with physical activity, as soon as your heart starts pumping, you are ready to go full speed ahead.

Start small and gradually increase intensity

Sometimes what is standing between you and exercising is mental blocks. You may not see its benefit; believe me, it adds up. So if it’s challenging to start working out, my advice is to take small steps first. After a short period you’ll find yourself exercising at a higher intensity or for a time you never expected yourself to do. Start with a five-minute walk or a few sets of squats and push-ups with your body weight. After a few days to a week, start adding up. It’s important to break those mental blocks. Slowly build the habit and make it part of your daily routine.

Focus on consistency rather than intensity

Fitness is a long-term game. It's not an activity; it's a lifestyle. So all those people promising you to build a Roman god's physique or lose weight in 30 days are giving fake advertising and promises. The most important factor in achieving your fitness goals and turning it into your lifestyle around is consistency. With consistency, you continue adding up benefits of exercise one step at a time, guiding your body to enhance and grow in the right direction. Until you find yourself completely changed, looking different and healthier.

Celebrate small victories along the way

As fitness is a long-time game, it’s always good to celebrate small victories to keep yourself going and motivated. Here are some ideas for milestones you can celebrate:

• Celebrate completing a month of an uninterrupted workout routine.

• Celebrate your first annual quarter of continuous exercise.

• Celebrate the increase in your number of reps or weight that you can lift.

• Celebrate the weight loss

Here's a tip for another thing that can help keep you on track. Keep a log of your progress or a calendar of days you exercised and have been active. Looking back at it will show you how far you went and what a loss it would be to stop or cut such progress. I kept a Google Calendar of my exercise schedule and crossed out every completed session. It helped and kept me going.

Find an Accountability Partner

Recruit a friend or family member to exercise with you

Although I find a fitness journey is best done by a solo traveler, yet there were times in my life where it was helpful and motivating to have a gym buddy or workout partner. If you're a social person, you'll enjoy having someone to exercise with or share progress and talk together.

Join a fitness class or group to stay motivated

If you are a people person, you will flourish in fitness groups or classes. The vibe, the community, and the connections you can make and people you may know or have in your life. Meeting these people can be the motive to get you to hit the fitness class and sweat together.

Use social media or fitness apps to track progress and share goals

Another way to use the help of others to stay motivated can be done through tracking apps and social media. Join fitness groups for tips and answers to questions you may have. Share the progress from your tracking app or calendar to celebrate your milestone achievement with other fitness peers.

Create a Positive Environment

Set up a designated workout space in your home

As it is important to develop exercise into a habit and a part of your daily routine, having a regular training corner can be a useful addition to your habit-building path. Choose a place suitable and comfortable to work out at. It has to be easily accessible and preferably with good ventillation. When building a habit, try to remove any blocks between you and your goal out of your way.

Choose exercise activities that you enjoy

Exercise isn't torture, and not all exercises are for everyone, and we're different. What works for you doesn't have to work for me. So choose the exercises you feel comfortable doing, at least at the beginning of your fitness journey. Feel free to challenge yourself or try new exercises when you're far ahead along the way.

Listen to music or podcasts to stay motivated during workouts

Correlate exercise with something nice. Enjoy your exercise time. Listen to a podcast you've been saving for later, or listen to your favorite music, or to a motivational playlist. I've seen people doing their phone calls in the gym. I don't know how they do that with all the panting, but they seem to enjoy it, so why not?

Reward Yourself

Set up a reward system for reaching exercise milestones

Rewarding yourself correlates your progress to nice things. It helps deepen the habit in your system and make it enjoyable, and it rewires the brain to do more to get such a reward. Building a rewarding system can help. Write a list of rewards you would love to give to yourself or would love your supporting peer to give or celebrate with you. Link that to your "realistic" milestones. If you wish to lose. For example, if you wish to lose 50 pounds, reward yourself for every 10 or 15 pounds you lose, and the biggest reward comes when you lose the whole 50 pounds. Setting small milestones or steps towards your big milestones helps you continue.

Treat yourself to something you enjoy after completing a workout

Celebrate small wins. Treat yourself for completing your workout. Sometimes, taking a short break to relax after a workout gives me enough time to recover from the effort and enjoy the achievement. Maybe even texting a friend about the challenging workout you just had is a form of sharing, getting support, and celebrating with someone. Having a good meal and rest after a workout can be a reward too, although it comes naturally. Your body needs to refuel and rest to rebuild.

Use positive reinforcement to create a habit of exercising regularly

It can be very rewarding when you hear comments from those around you, telling you you've lost weight or you've gained or toned muscles. But this doesn't mean that a reward should come from other people. Fitness is you nurturing and looking after yourself. Reward yourself. Do something you've always wanted to do but feared because you weren't fit enough. Go on a hike or to a far-away beach. Go camping or engage in something that requires physical activity you wouldn't have done before, because now you are fit enough to do it. Now you can! And it's all thanks to you taking steps on the right path to being fit and healthy.

Seek Professional Help

Consult a personal trainer for guidance and support

When you're first starting, especially in a gym, it's better to do that with a personal trainer. A personal trainer can assess your physical and fitness abilities to tailor a program that fits you. A personal trainer will also guide you on the right way to execute an exercise, give you tips on how to enhance or advance your workout, and help you avoid regular mistakes or injuries. He or she will also keep you motivated, track your progress, and fix any weaknesses you may have.

Talk to a therapist or counselor if lack of motivation is due to underlying mental health issues

If you're feeling a big resistance to exercise, it might be due to mental health issues. In fact, exercise is prescribed by psychology and physiology doctors alike. I met a person or two who had mental illnesses and were actually able to get off their medication just by exercise, after consulting their doctors, of course. Don't hesitate to talk to a therapist or a counselor; they may tell you ways to overcome any mental obstacles keeping you from working out and find the right triggers and motivation techniques for you to get you active.

Consider hiring a nutritionist to create a balanced diet plan to support your fitness goals

Nutrition and exercise go hand in hand. Your diet plays a major role in the results you get out of your fitness routine. Educate yourself about nutrition and consider hiring a nutritionist to design a diet plan that fits you and supports your fitness goals. Nutrition is a whole topic on its own, but to cut it short, don't follow crash diets, and don't deprive yourself or cut any foods. A good diet is all about eating in balance.

Conclusion

Summarize the key points for starting to exercise with zero motivation

• Start now.

• Take it in small steps.

• Track your progress.

• Celebrate and reward yourself.

• Share with friends, partners, or peers.

Encourage readers to take the first step towards a healthier lifestyle

It's very easy to take the first step. Here are some options to get you started:

• Put on a comfy shoe and go for a 10-minute walk while listening to your favorite music or podcast or while having a phone call with a friend.

• Get up now and do 10 bodyweight squats, 10 push-ups against a wall or a desk, and 10 doorframe pulls, or doorframe rows, as they call it.

And congratulations, you've taken your first step on the fitness path.

Provide resources for further information and support on starting a new exercise routine

If you wish to know more, the Fitness Roadmap course helps beginners and people with busy schedules to start their fitness journey just by working out at home. The course has exercises explained with animations and diagrams to explain every move along with flexible workout plans to easily fit exercise sessions into your daily routine. A nutrition guide to align your nutrition with your fitness goals, with tips and techniques to build the habit of exercise.

Being active is one of the great things you can do for yourself. Start your fitness journey, enjoy it, and enjoy the outcome from it. It's a different lifestyle that works for you. Your health and well-being are important, so take the first step towards a healthier lifestyle today.

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