But I HATE Exercise!
I know what it’s like to hate exercise and also want to lose weight and see results at the same time! Nightmare.
Ever been to a HIIT class, a bootcamp or a weightlifting workshop and thought, “this is absolute misery” and never returned again?
Me too! We’ve all been there, but don’t take this as a sign exercise is not for you,
There’s a secret they’re not telling you…
You probably don’t hate exercise, you probably just hate that type.
If you’ve not found what works for you yet, don’t panic, keep searching.
The best type of exercise will differ greatly from person to person, but they will all have one core detail in common – it’s the one you actually stick to!
The most important thing to remember is exercise should be FUN!
Unless your goal is to be the next Ultimate Fighting Champion or to win The Universe Championships, both of which require you to build a very specific physique, any exercise is good exercise!
Exercise is a celebration of what your mind and body can achieve. It helps your heart get stronger, build muscle and burn calories. Instead of “earning” your meals, you’ll start to reward your efforts by fuelling your body with the right food choices to help you recover quicker and perform better next time.
You may have been to an intense circuit class, hated every second of it and felt like passing out by the end only to look around the room at everyone else smiling and cheering, proclaiming their undying love for pushing themselves so hard they might actually die from this. That’s ok, that class style is just not for you, (or me to be honest!) but that doesn’t mean you should write it off completely, just try another style!
Some people love training on their own, so a group class environment is not going to bring out the best in them, however others need the support from the people around them to keep going.
Avid runners look at me like I’m crazy when I say I’m not massively fond of the discipline myself. Being in shape does not necessarily mean I do “formal cardio”; there are so many other ways of raising your heart rate!
If you enjoy the style of boot camps and met-cons, good job! Keep going, you’re killing it! These are awesome ways of keeping active. But if you don’t… then don’t do it, ever, seriously like never ever.
If you persevere, you’ll find the style that suits you the best; you don’t have to prove anything to anyone else but yourself. Let’s face it, you get into shape for you; no one can help you do it, there’s no cheat codes or quick fixes. Don’t get disheartened, make a change.
If you don’t like running, that’s ok, it doesn’t mean you’ll always be overweight
If you don’t like group classes, that’s ok, it doesn’t mean you’ll never improve your cardio
If you don’t like lifting weights, that’s ok, it doesn’t mean you’ll never be strong
If you don’t like exercise, that’s ok, it doesn’t make you a bad person!
When it comes to exercise, do the things that you actually enjoy!
If you’re new to fitness, lose all those preconceived ideas about how you think you’re supposed to train. There’s no perfect way, there’s no one exercise type to rule them all, the only way you can go wrong is force yourself to do something you don’t enjoy because you think you should.
If you’ve already started your fitness journey, are you forcing yourself to train in a certain way because you think it’s “good for you” and now you have to keep doing it otherwise you think you’ll be labelled as a quitter?! If this is to reach a particular target, good for you, keep going! But if not, STOP IT NOW! Change it up for something that actually brings you joy and adds some fun to your training.
