Our world today is filled with lots of distractions and it’s easy to get off track with your fitness. It’s easy to stop making it a priority when life gets busy and there are many competing priorities. It’s so important to remember to make yourself a priority though! Fitness is one of the foundations to our well being and should be an important part of your everyday. Here are some things you can do to help with staying on track with your fitness.
Set realistic goals for yourself
If you have something else going on in your life, don’t set a goal that you know you will never reach. This will have the opposite effect you’re looking for! What do I mean? If you just had a baby, this isn’t the time to be training for a marathon! Running is my thing. But after I had a baby, my goal was the couch to 5k. I had to work up my fitness level before I was at a place where I could accomplish that. During some of my maternity leaves, I trained for a few triathlons. My kids would always ask me if I was trying to win and I would let them know that my goal was to finish. That was an accomplishment to me at that time. I was competing against myself, not other people. It was about challenging myself to do my very best. If you are spending a good deal of your energy on something else for a temporary amount of time, having a goal of working out 3-5 times a week might be enough for you. It could be a fitness program or an upcoming race. You get to decide what feels right for you. Goals don’t have to be big, but they do need reasonable based on the amount of time and energy you have available to dedicate to them.
Don’t compare yourself to other people
Everyone has their own starting point and there’s only one way to improve. There’s no shame in wanting to improve yourself! Be proud that you’ve taken this step for yourself! If we go back to the example above, I started out with a couch to 5k program after having a baby. Actually, if you back up, I started out with a workout program specifically designed for moms wanting to get back into shape after having a baby. This was not where I wanted my fitness to be. I felt fat and out of breath but I knew that if I wanted to run a marathon one day, I was going to have to do the work to be ready for that race. I didn’t compare myself to other people I knew who had done this, but rather I stayed on my own track and did the work I needed to do to improve.
Don’t expect perfection
You might miss a day or two and that’s ok! If you aren’t giving yourself any grace for being human, then you are being too hard on yourself. Sometimes things happen in life that are out of our control and cause us to have to change our plans. Maybe you can make it up at another time and maybe you can’t. When I was training for my marathon, there would occasionally be days where I couldn’t fit in my scheduled workout. Sometimes I found some space to make them up, and other times I didn’t. If you are missing too many workout though, it may be time to reevaluate the amount of time and energy you have, to see if you’ve set an unrealistic goal for yourself that is causing you to self sabotage.
Get an accountability partner
If intrinsic motivation is something you struggle with when it comes motivation, get an accountability partner! This doesn’t necessarily have to be someone close to you, though it’s very nice to have someone supporting and encouraging you. Some examples are your significant other, your friend, and your personal trainer. Following a video workout program with a coach might be all you need. Joining an accountability group is another option.
Try different things
Try different things until you figure out what you enjoy and what works for you. Maybe you tried running and hated it. Maybe you tried going to the gym and hated it. That’s ok guys! Keep looking until you find your thing. Find something and/or someone that motivates you and run with it. I know someone who is motivated by money. He made a deal with a couple of co-workers that they would each lose a certain amount of weight before a certain date and if they didn’t, then they had to pay the others a large sum of money. That’s what works for him and that’s ok!
Use visual reminders
A couple of other things that help me are that I print out pictures of my fitness goal(s) and tape them to the wall in my home gym so that I can see them every day and be reminded of what I’m working towards. Visual cues are great for keeping things fresh in your mind. I am also blessed to be able to have a space in my home dedicated to working out. This works for my current lifestyle of having young children.
While you have to keep trying new things until you find what works for you, there are some common things that we can all do. Set realistic goals for yourself. Goals are very personal, so unless you’ve paid someone to set one for you, you should be the person coming up with those. You are the best person to know what you need. Don’t compare yourself to other people. We are all unique individuals so it would be like comparing an apple to an orange! You do you! Don’t expect perfection from yourself. Perfection is like a unicorn – make believe! They don’t exist! Let yourself be ok with that. Get an accountability partner. Most things are more enjoyable when you have someone to share it with, and when that person is helping you learn and grow, even better!
What other things do you do to stay on track with your fitness? Let me know in the comments below!