It is not always easy to stay motivated to work out. There is always an excuse we seem to be able to conjure up. However, none of the common excuses should prevent you from training, especially given the benefits that you can receive from working out. Here are some of the most common excuses that you should stop making. We will also provide you with plenty of tips to help with providing motivation for strength training.
You don’t have enough time
The excuse of not having enough time for strength training is perhaps the most common of them all. Sure, it can prove to be challenging to set aside enough time to train. However, everyone can carve out some time for training.
Here are a few tips to help you find more time for strength training:
Get up earlier in the mornings. Even waking up just half an hour earlier will give you enough time to train at home, or an hour if you are close to a fitness studio. Once you have readjusted your sleep schedule, you will be able to go from doing this a few times a week to doing it every day. You may even find it easier to get up even earlier and enjoy other benefits of doing so.
Take inventory of your current daily schedule. What are you spending your time on? Is there any area in which you can make a change? You may be surprised just how much time you can free up when you do a status check on what you’re spending your time on.
You think training is boring
Whenever we do something that is repetitive, we can end up becoming bored with it, and strength training is no different. This holds especially true if you are training solo at the gym. However, working out does not have to get boring.
If you have gotten bored with strength training, here are some things you can do:
Find workouts you can actually enjoy doing and which keep you mentally engaged. Whatever that is, keep doing it! If you start noticing that what used to be an enjoyable workout becomes boring, it will be time to switch it up.
Switch it up between using machines, free weights, and other training options available at your local gym.
You can team up with some friends or family members who would be willing to go to the gym with you and train. You may find that you never get bored anymore once you’re able to interact and engage with others, while also getting encouragement.
Acquire brand new skills that will help you in your strength training sessions. Take a look at the schedule at your local gym and see if there is anything that catches your eye.
You are self-conscious about how you look
Do you find yourself feeling embarrassed when you are training at the gym because you see others who are more toned or jacked than you? If you do, you are not alone! It is a common issue people deal with when going to the gym. However, the thing is that nobody actually cares about where you are in your strength training journey. Also, the benefits of training on your mental and physical health far outweigh the feeling of temporary awkwardness you may feel.
To help yourself become less embarrassed about where you are at in your strength training journey, here are a few tips:
Go to the gym really early. You are less likely to come across a lot of people when you go earlier than most people.
Head to the gym alone if you think you will be too self-conscious of people you know rather than complete strangers.
Keep your eye on the prize. Focus on the goals you set out for yourself. Shower yourself with compliments about how you took the most important first step to a better you. Give yourself praise for the commitment you made to be in the best shape possible. The more progress you make towards your fitness goals, the more everything you are doing will be reinforced.
Wear headphones and play high-energy motivational music that will boost your confidence and energy levels.
You are too tired
Are you ever feeling like you simply don't have enough energy to exercise? This is a common problem for people who work all day and then are exhausted once they return home. If you do not have any energy, you will find the motivation to train to be lacking. However, given that most work these days involves an immense amount of mental work rather than physical work, you will actually feel great after going to get private studio training. Additionally, you will actually have more energy throughout your day due to improving your sleep quality, among other things.
If you feel you are too tired after work to go to the gym, consider doing the following:
Exercise and train in the morning before you go to work. You can tie this tip into one of the first ones we gave in this article, where we recommended getting of half an hour or an hour earlier. You can catch up on the day’s news while training if you wear some earbuds and listen to your favorite news stream, or just get a confidence and energy boost from listening to motivating music.
Get together everything you need for the gym before you head to work. That way, you will get to go to have a private studio training session right after leaving work instead of first going home and leaving once again to go train. This means getting a comfortable pair of shoes, loose-fitting clothing, and any other accessories you find helpful while working out.
You feel too lazy
Are you finding yourself feeling too lazy to get into regular strength training? If so, you are giving up without even giving yourself a chance to make progress towards your fitness goals. Here are a few ways you can shake off laziness and get going to the gym to train:
Plan out your day so that you are going to the gym when you have more energy. Ideally, you will be heading to your strength training session in the morning when you are full of energy after having a good night’s rest. You can also identify other times during the day when you both have time to go to the gym and when you feel a higher level of energy.
You don’t think you’re athletic
If you feel you aren’t athletic or fit, you may be using that as an excuse not to train. However, those should be the reason you do go and train! Even if you have become inactive over a long period of time, it will never become too late to get into strength training.
Here are some tips for what to do if you believe you aren’t athletic enough to start strength training at a fitness studio:
Avoid overdoing it at the gym. Start off with some basic sets instead of trying anything too complex or going too heavy with the weights. Starting off slowly will help your body get used to the elevated level of activity you are going to be engaging in.
Find a private fitness studio that has personal trainers who will help you feel comfortable and safe training without any judgment. A personal trainer can make you feel relaxed and at ease regardless of what your level of athletic ability is.
Stop paying attention to what other people in the gym are doing! You should not care that you aren't a bodybuilder or Olympics-level athlete. All you need to do is focus on the progressive changes you are enjoying mentally and physically and forget everything else.
You’ve tried and failed
Everyone who has ever been successful in anything had first failed, and usually more than once! Failures are elementary to the path of success. If you have found yourself trying to work out and weren’t able to either keep it up or reach your fitness goals, don’t worry! You can still succeed.
Here is what you can do if you have tried and failed in the past:
Start slowly and build upon the work you put in earlier. When you work towards your fitness goals incrementally, you will have a better chance of reaching them. Your body needs to first get adjusted to the new heightened level of physical activity and exertion you are putting it through.
Underpromise and overdeliver. This will help increase your confidence in your workout progress. Also, keep your goals manageable and attainable. You can start off with shorter strength training sessions, around 20-30 minutes, and only a few times a week every month at the most. From there, you can work your way up.
You can’t afford gym fees
Another excuse that is sometimes made is the belief that gym fees are unaffordable or too high. However, simply looking at the upfront price does not give you the entire story.
Consider your gym membership or hiring a personal trainer as an investment in yourself. The physical and mental benefits are legion and massive. You will see improvements in everything from better sleep, greater confidence, and an improved mood to becoming stronger, healthier, and fitter. When you look at it like that, a gym membership is actually a bargain. Also, consider how many fewer unhealthy snacks and vices you will be spending money on once you start going to the gym to train.
You don’t feel supported by your friend or family
Some people feel that if they are not supported by their friends and family, they lose the drive to go to the gym and train. They want to receive validation for their life decisions because it makes them more secure in any big decision they make. However, living life by seeking the approval and support of others could result in missing many great opportunities. That is why this is an excuse that is best left to overcome.
Here are a few tips for how you can avoid feeling the needing to be validated:
Encourage your friends or family to go to the gym with you. Look up articles and information online that detail all of the remarkable mental and physical health benefits that come from strength training. This should incentivize them to go. In fact, they may learn a thing or two they had no idea they could benefit from by working out.
Open up conversations with your friends and family about going to the gym and working out. Share the ambitions and goals you have for training with them and see what sort of input they provide. You can also ask them to at least hear you out and consider the benefits you can receive from strength training and regularly going to the gym.
Conclusion
It is perfectly alright if you are lacking the motivation for strength training. Everyone has experienced it at some point – even those bodybuilders you see at the gym! Making excuses is easy to do, and we often feel justified when we are making them. However, they are not always based on legitimate reasons to avoid working out and strength training. In fact, most of the time those excuses break down when you look more closely at them.
Now that you know what some of the most common excuses people use to avoid working out are, you can see that there are plenty of ways to overcome them. You should now feel like you can overcome the hesitation you may be feeling and book a training session with a personal trainer or get a gym membership. You will soon see that it will have been one of the best investments in yourself you have ever made.