On any given day, I can come up with incredible excuses for why I need to skip a workout. And because of my profession, I get to hear some real doozies from other people as well. The top ones usually revolve around:
Kids
- “I feel guilty leaving the baby”
- “Junior stubbed his toe last night and needs me to hold him today”
- “I don’t have a babysitter”
- “I’m breastfeeding and don’t want to lower my milk supply”
Work
- “I have to work late all week, and I have to sleep on the weekends because I worked late all week”
- “I travel a lot”
- “I work really hard”
Health
- “I’m too stressed out”
- “I’m too tired”
- “My _________ hurts”
Random unavoidable incidents
- “Someone broke into my car last week”
- “My cat is sick”
- “My mother-in-law is staying with us for a month”
While all of these could be legitimate excuses for wanting to skip a workout – ESPECIALLY the last one (smile) – they’re actually only reasons to reschedule your workout, at most. Rescheduling means that you will make up the time that you’ve promised yourself right away vs. just eliminating that workout altogether.
I recently read an article where a celebrity trainer provided 7 tips for staying motivated to exercise. Here are her tips along with my commentary on how to effectively apply them:
- Make workouts a fact of life. Exercising should be as ingrained into your life as brushing your teeth or taking a shower. You don’t have to love it. Just do it, and the love (or maybe just “the like”) will follow.
- Keep it personal. Set goals that are personally motivating for you. If you couldn’t care less about the Peachtree Road Race, don’t make participation in that event the focal point of your training regimen just because your best friend wants you to run with her.
- Get selfish about your exercise time. Women especially seem to have a hard time with this one. Intellectually, we all know that we’ll be better mothers, wives, employees, etc. if we are healthy, but we have a hard time tying the need for exercise back to our overall health. Protect your workout time as if it was a much-anticipated afternoon nap…or a spa package…or a cabana boy – depending on where you are in life.
- Have a dedicated workout area. “You don’t need a lot of space to be effective…a corner of the family room will do, with a bin for dumbbells, workout DVDs, and a fresh towel.” I definitely agree with that! Given that we specialize in in-home workouts, I can attest to the fact that lots of space is not necessary.
- Find a workout buddy. Being accountable to someone else is especially important when you first start, or re-start, an exercise program.
- Ease in…Give yourself time to get accustomed to a new routine.
- …but don’t get too comfortable. Keep setting the bar higher and higher. Don’t get into the rut of a routine you can do in your sleep. That type of lackadaisical workout will permit you to check exercise off your to-do list, but you won’t actually see any results.
