6 Steps To Getting Started!
If the only workout you’ve done over the past few weeks is beating yourself up for being lazy, it’s time to forgive yourself and move on. Remember every day is a new day and a chance for a new start. So let’s look at how to get up, create a new realistic fitness routine, something we can maintain and keep motivated about after the first week.
1. Try to focus on your good points.
The urge is to focus on your future goals, for example a fitness goal, dropping a dress size or even the weight loss. But, you also need to look at what you like about yourself now! Reaching your goals will enhance you as a person and make you better, maybe even happier but they will not create a whole new you!
So don’t obsess about the areas you want to improve, for example weight! Dropping a dress size has little to do with weight loss and lots to do with fat loss. Stop obsessing about your weight, you should be working out for the health benefits that exercising provides:
Slower resting pulse
Healthier blood pressure
Feeling more energized
Less joint pain
A feeling of wellbeing (both mental and physical)
Better sleep
When my clients come in after a long day and are tired or maybe had a rough week on nutrition, we focus on the positives! The old client may have made an excuse and not turned up at all, the old client would have had a bad WEEK on nutrition not just a bad evening!
2. Time for a few selfies.
To track your progress you MUST take a starting point picture or two. Remember you see yourself every day and sometimes you will not see what everyone else sees. My clients are asked to take some selfies or let me take some of them in workout clothes. We take measurements and compare them every month. Ideally make the clothing tight, you could even throw on a sports bra and shorts. Get out the phone and take a video or some still shots of your body from several angles.
3. Planning is the key.
You want to create new habits and so planning is important! Remember it’s a new routine and some days it will go wrong but that’s okay! Some things that will make it easier are:
Set the alarm a few minutes earlier
Pack your lunch the night before
Plan the workout routine you’re going to do
Pack your exercise kit (remember the shower kit if travelling to the gym)
Look at each week ahead of time and book in your workout sessions
Advance preparation and planning will remove time consuming decisions and possible excuses that may hold you back.
4. Baby steps.
If you haven’t exercised in a while, start slow and small; you can’t jump back in where you left of a year ago. First thing to think about is what will I enjoy doing? It could be spinning, dance, gym or even boot-camps. The best exercise is the one you enjoy doing, you’re more likely to keep doing it. Believe it or not, it is supposed to be fun. Get friends and family involved, everything is better if shared (except food of course!)
For your first week back, try to commit to 3 sessions of 20 minutes, it could be walking or you could join a gym. Add a single nutritional change for example something small like not drinking any fizzy drinks or eating more vegetables in your meals. Keep them small and achievable so you’ll be motivated by your daily victories.
5. Scared of the gym? Everyone was!
The gym can be a scary place at first, add to that you’re overweight and new to the whole exercise idea - you might think people are staring or judging you. This is simply not true. Most of the time, they are (should be) focusing on themselves and their workouts. The main thing that will give you confidence when using the gym is education. Most gyms will conduct an initial consultation and offer a personal program for you (if they don’t offer, ask about a program). They should also show you how to complete each exercise safely using the correct form. To build confidence though, you can start with the cardio machines and build up from there; this will enable you to improve your Cardio Vascular (CV) strength and endurance. There will always be a matted area where you can take some weights or complete bodyweight exercises quietly and out of the way.
If you still feel the gym is a no-go area, then consider getting a Personal Trainer. All Personal Trainers give (should!) free consultations; they can come to your location or they may have a studio. During the consultation get to know the trainer, ask them questions and ask to see their qualifications. If you’re around the Salisbury area, give me a call J
You should always get more results, faster with a Personal Trainer and a good nutrition plan (Healthy eating, No Diets!). Remember though a Personal Trainer cannot do the work for you, they can only educate and train you, what you do in-between the sessions is the important part!
6. Be ready for failure.
If it is worth doing, it won’t be easy, that’s a fact! Nothing in life worth doing is easy; they all take effort and commitment. Every journey has a start and an end; some people even say the journey itself is more important than reaching the end. With fitness and nutrition this is also true. If you took a magic pill and suddenly everything was fixed, you would have the desired ending but have no idea how to maintain it and like with countless diets and other quick fix schemes you will end up back at the start and usually in a worse condition that you were originally. Life will get in the way and things will go wrong, well that’s life!
Accept that you will trip up every now and then but learn from it; identify how to prevent that situation from happening again. Sometimes when you trip, all you can do is get up, dust yourself off and move on.
The Time is Now!
