It’s all good and well working up some rhythm and consistency to your exercise regime for improved health and fitness, but there are just some of those times when inspiration to keep going can prove really hard to come by. Even the most committed of gym rats or fitness freaks loses a bit of motivation along the way, at some point in time, and whenever that happens there are fortunately some neat little tricks you can effect in order to get back on the bike and keep exercising. Health and fitness through exercise is after all a lifelong commitment which should be incorporated into your lifestyle, so when motivation is indeed hard to come by, by no means should this derail your overall commitment to maintaining good health through exercise and fitness.
Keep Your Regime Fresh
If you keep your exercise regime fresh, it’ll be hard for it to get stale in the first place. A lot of motivation to keep exercising gets lost to a certain amount of staleness creeping in as a result of your body and mind being subjected to the same old every day. The best way to keep your regime fresh is to perhaps draw up a new programme on a monthly basis, give or take a few weeks on either side.
Schedule Regular Breaks
This is extremely important, quite simply because your body and mind need to recover from all the exertion they’re put through and you simply need to stop and process everything once in a while. You cannot just keep going forever and ever — that’s how you burnout and that’s how you suffer setbacks which prove rather difficult to get through.
Incorporate Competitive Cardio
Even if you have specific fitness goals such as perhaps building some muscle mass, in order to avoid falling victim to those un-motivated slumps that inevitably come around every so often, you’ll need to take a break from your regular exercise programme and engage in a form of exercise which is completely different. This means you’d even stop taking your regular dose of supplements such as your protein powder in addition to turning your attention to a different form of exercise, like perhaps ditching the weights for a bit and playing football, rugby, basketball, etc. You can even do an obstacle course race if you wish, or something like a triathlon if you’re really up for a completely different challenge. Perhaps even yoga will do.
Get a Gym-Buddy
There’s nothing like a fellow exercise enthusiast to keep you motivated and push you to stay on course with your exercise regime, even if your training programmes aren’t the same or even remotely similar. Having someone to call you up when you’ve not been to gym is sometimes all one needs to get some motivation where none seems to be forthcoming.
Work towards a Goal
Perhaps the ultimate motivation for any health and fitness freak is having a goal to work towards and I’m not talking about a general goal such as staying fit and healthy. A definitive goal such as an upcoming obstacle course race or a competitive team sports match is what I’m on about, which will in a sense force you to stay in shape.