motivate Archives -

What To Do When Willpower Isn’t Enough

Sun, 24 Jul 2016 20:40:29 +0000

Ever feel the rush of motivation after you set a new goal? No matter how lofty, new goals often come with an overwhelming sense that you can take on the world. You’re refreshed and committed, ready to tackle anything that gets in your way!

And then… life happens. Your motivation comes screeching to a halt, and your willpower takes a nose dive!
Nooooo!!!

Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to hop from point A to point B without hitting any motivation speed bumps? In reality, maintaining high motivation over the long term is hard.

You will likely experience some lows along the way. What can you do? How can you keep your motivation going as strong as the day you started?

First, you must understand how your habits impact your mindset. The habit loop consists of a cue or reminder, a routine, and a reward.

For any habit you have it starts with something that reminds you to perform a behavior. Once reminded, you carry out the habit in a routine way in order to reach some type of reward.

Example 1: Your alarm goes off at 6:00am for your morning workout (reminder). By 6:30am you’re at the gym for a tough workout (routine). After your workout, you move on with your day feeling energized and fantastic (reward)!

Example 2: You arrive home after a long day at work. You’re starving (reminder)! You immediately reach for any easy-access food in your pantry to nosh on, and easily over eat (routine). The immediate relief of having that snack acts as your reward, but afterward you feel awful. Where in this loop could you intervene to keep yourself on track?

When you understand this loop and each individual component (reminder, routine, reward), you can address each with strategies to keep you mind aligned with your goal.

STRATEGY = ACTION
We love doing and achieving. Developing strategies where we need them most helps keep us on track toward achieving what we set out to do. When you are mindful about your habits and behaviors, you can put effective strategies in place.

Being mindful means you are aware of your thoughts, feelings, and actions. Take the time to “check in” with yourself so that you can better understand your needs, how you operate, and what you should do next. As you develop more self-awareness, your reminders, routines, and rewards become much clearer.

When trying to figure out why your motivation just isn’t there, the very first next step is to stop and assess the situation before making any changes or giving up completely. Ask yourself the following questions to gain more insight.

1. Are there habits that you need to change?

Reminder, routine, reward. Can you identify each of these related to one behavior you need to change? This will help you narrow down what, when, and why your habits are throwing you off course.

2. Are you feeling a lot of life stress?

Sometimes work, social, family, and relationships require a lot more of our physical and mental energy than we think. If you’re feeling overwhelmed, consider giving one of these areas of life more attention, especially if it needs it. Willpower is a finite resource, and if all your mental energy is going toward one behavior, other behaviors can suffer.

3. Are your work, life, nutrition and training schedules too much to try to balance?

Do you know what time of day you have the most mental energy, or the most physical energy to train? Can you split your workouts so you’re spending less time in the gym? Can you prepare your meals in a more efficient way? Work on your time management skills to maximize your time and minimize the effort!

4. Is your training aligned with your goals?

Are you training to maintain your physique in a sustainable way for long-term fitness and health? Are you actively committed to losing body fat? Training can vary based on how much mental energy, flexibility, and rigidity you need to address different goals.

5. Do you have enough time to recover, feel good, and have productive training sessions?

Is it possible that you could you be overtrained or under recovered? If so, it may be wise to take a de-load week,
and reduce your volume, intensity, or both. You should also consider prioritizing sleep and restorative movement over highly intense workouts for a period of time until you feel like getting after it again.

6. Are expecting too much from yourself?

Are you frequently shaming yourself, telling yourself that you’re a failure or not good enough? It could be possible that your goals and expectations are very ambitious and not quite appropriate for your current ability level, time availability, or any number of other reasons.

You might benefit from evaluating your current reality and revising those goals. Sounds crazy, but setting some attainable goals creates habits of success!

Set the bar appropriately low and meet it 90% (or more!) of the time. This ensures you’re on the right track, and positively reinforces what you do well. Magic is in the mundane, and doing the little things will have big impact over time!

7. Is your self-talk negative?
Thoughts are things. The way you think about, talk to, and see yourself absolutely affects the results you’re able to achieve.

Instead of focusing on the negative, cultivate a positive mindset by practicing gratitude and giving yourself praise for the things that you do well. Give yourself some wiggle room for imperfection.

8. What’s your “why” factor for achieving the goal you set?
Understanding on a very deep level why you want to change will help you tap into why you put in the effort. Why it’s worth it to you. At times, we all feel insecure about any number of things: our appearance, our jobs, our relationships, and other areas of our lives.

Digging into why you do the things you do, what outcomes you really want to achieve, and discovering what is getting in the way will help you prioritize what is truly the most important goal on your horizon.

CHECK AND RE-CHECK
Asking yourself some tough questions might provide insight that can help you stay motivated over the long term.

Motivation and willpower will wane, and that’s totally normal. You don’t just set a goal and go. Motivations change. Even goals can change. Checking in with yourself and consistently re-evaluating your next will help you stay on track toward your goals.

Love yourself and continue to push yourself to greatness.

Push through the pain. Greatness is within us all.

Crystal aka Barbell Barbie. NY

References:

https://www.muscleandstrength.com/articles/maintaining-motivation-without-willpower

http://www.fitnessmagazine.com/weight-loss/tips/motivation/think-yourself-slim/

http://danielplan.com/healthyhabits/maintainyourmotivation/

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29 Smart Ways to Motivate Yourself to Work Out

Wed, 04 Nov 2015 22:15:50 +0000

29 Ways to Motivate Yourself to Exercise

“Hard Work, Dedication, I’m a one man army. The world can go against me, I’m still come out on top.” I have god on my side”

-Floyd Mayweather

It’s 4:15 a.m on a Monday morning. Yes, I said it! 4:15 am. I’m up and getting dressed to go to the gym.

How do you find motivation to exercise when you just don’t feel like getting off your butt? I ask myself this question every now and then, and I have the feeling I’m not the only one.

There are a million ways to motivate yourself to exercise, actually, but these are a few that have worked for me. And trust me, I’ve had days when I’ve struggled with exercise. Most recently, logging my exercise, reading magazines, books and websites, and rewarding myself.

Here’s a couple of smart ways to stay motivated to smash the gym and attain the ((GAINZZ))

How you feel after a workout. I always feel great after a good workout. It’s a high. And I let that motivate me the next time: “Don’t Stop keep pushing and your body and mind will change.”

Time for you. While many people make time to take care of others (kids, spouse, other family, co-workers, boss), they don’t often make time to take care of themselves. Instead, make your “you” time a priority, and don’t miss that exercise appointment.
Calories burned. If you count calories (and it’s really one of the most effective ways to lose weight), you know that the more you exercise, the more calories you burn — and the bigger your calorie deficit.
Having fun. Exercise should be fun. If it isn’t, try a different kind of activity that you enjoy. Zumba, Spin, Kickboxing, Running, Dancing, Volleyball, Hockey, Baseball. I can keep going!!! But As long as you’re moving, that is all that matters!!
How you’re going to look. Imagine a slimmer, fitter you. Now let that visualization drive you.
Magazines. It motivates me to read fitness magazines. Not sure why, but it works.
Cover models. Sure, they’re genetically freaky, and probably Photoshopped to look perfect. But for some reason, looking at how good a cover model looks helps motivate me to work harder. ((( Gisele Bulchan))
Blogs. I enjoy reading blogs about people who are into running, or losing weight. It can show the ups and downs they go through, and you can learn from their experiences. ((Kara Corey Fit Life))
Success stories. I find the success stories of others incredibly inspirational. If a fitness website has success stories, I’ll almost always read them.
Forums. Do a monthly challenge, or join another forum (( Workout 2.0)) full of like-minded or like-goaled peopled. Check in daily. It really helps!
Rewards. If you exercise for a few days, give yourself a reward! A week? Another reward. Do it often in the beginning. Clothes? Shoes? Detail the car??
Fitting into new clothes. Wanna look good in a smaller size? Work out!
Being attractive. That’s always a good motivator, as I’m sure we all know. So when you look in the mirror and your naked you like what you see!
MUSIC!!! I get a rush when I exercise to “I am a Beast” South Paw Remix! Ride that rush to complete the workout.
Stress relief. Wound up after a long day at the office? Get out and work off that stress. It makes a world of difference.
Time for contemplation. I love, love the quiet time of exercise for thinking about things. Most of this post was written in my head as I exercised.
A workout partner. Best thing I’ve done. They will hold you accountable and push you to failure!
An exercise class. Sign up for a class, perhaps with a friend, and you’ll be motivated to get there and work out.
A coach or trainer. Worth the money, just for the motivation. Push your limits! NEVER SETTLE!
An exercise log/graph. For some reason, writing it down is extremely important. Really. Do it for a week and you’ll see what I mean.
Your before picture. You often don’t realize how far you’ve come. Take pictures.
A 5K race or triathlon. Just sign up for one, and you’ll be motivated to train.
The dread of feeling “yuck” from not exercising. I hate how I feel after not exercising. So I remind myself of that when I feel tired.
Living long enough to see your grandkids … and play with them.
The scale. It’s not motivating to weigh yourself every day, as your weight fluctuates. But if you weigh yourself once a week, you’ll be motivated to have it keep going down, instead of up. Combine the scale with the measuring tape, and measure your waist.
Reaching a goal. Set a goal for weight, or your waist measurement, or a number of days to work out, or a number of miles to run this week. Setting and tracking a goal helps motivate you to complete that goal. Make it easily achievable.
Posting it on your blog. Tell people you’re going to lose weight or exercise daily, and report to them. You’ll make it happen.
Motivational quotes. I like to print them out or put them on my computer desktop.
Books. I just bought a strength-training book as a reward. It makes me want to hit the weights!
Others commenting on how good you look. When someone notices the changes in your body, it feels good. And it makes you want to work out more!

Your Friend and Coach,

Barbell-Barbie.NY also known as Crystal

http://zenhabits.net/31-ways-to-motivate-yourself-to-exercise/

https://www.christywright.com/2015/09/7-ways-to-stay-motivated/

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