Over the past couple of months I have been struggling to find the motivation to workout. Yes, I’ll admit it. This Beachbody Coach has been putting in the time but not nearly the amount of effort needed to get results. I’ve been thinking about what happened to cause this shift in my mindset as the previous 4 years it was given I’d be putting in the effort. I came to the conclusion that it all started after my elbow injury last fall. It really put a damper on my spirits. It hurt to do everything from throwing a softball to picking up grocery bags. When the season ended in late October I tried my best to keep up with my workouts but the pain was too much. I scaled back on working out to 3 days a week in November while preparing to do the Ultimate Reset in December. When Beachbody said it wasn’t coming out until March of this year I was kind of bummed. I still did the 3 days a week working out in December while getting prepared to do P90X2 start on Jan 2nd.
While I did finish P90X2 in 100 days I was not thrilled about my results. I was eating like I was putting in 100% effort when I was probably only at 60%. The pain in my arm was too much to do certain moves. Forget pull ups and any amount of heavy weights when doing curls. During P90X2 and the following month I lost interest in working out. I don’t know if the arm injury is what caused it but it got me thinking about what my motivation to workout really is. I get lots of emails a week from people who are over weight or out of shape and it’s because they lost their motivation or let something else take over their workout time. Was my arm injury becoming my first excuse? In the weeks following the Ultimate Reset I’ve been thinking about what my motivation to workout really was. It occurred to me that it’s changed so much over the past 10 years.
What Were My Motivations To Workout?
High School – Never really worked out. Just played sports.
College – Did what I thought was working out and stayed active.
My One Year Hiatus After College To Colorado and Germany – Ran a ton so my legs were in shape to ski every weekend.
2 Years In The Real World – Worked out at the gym to burn off some stress and to stay in shape. Ran a lot also because I was motivated to do the Detroit Marathon.
Introduced To P90X – Motivated by the challenge of doing something new.
After P90X – Motivated to see how many pull ups and push ups I could do over another two rounds of P90X.
Introduction To Insanity – Considered it another challenge.
After completing Insanity my motivation started to change towards doing the programs to see what results I could get and also to do them so I can recommend them as a Beachbody Coach. My business was established by this point so working off stress was not a motivation. I was done running marathons and my amount of reps had reached its peak in just about every workout. My motivation to keep in shape in the winter months was because I didn’t want to be dragging ass when I went out west with my buddies on our annual snowboarding trip.
In the past 3 years I was asked to play in a couple of softball leagues. It grew from playing double headers one night a week to the occasional three nights a week and am now playing tournaments once or twice a month on the weekend. My motivation the past two years was to get in the best shape I could possibly be in so I’d be an asset on the teams and help us win championships. Last summer I was probably in the best shape I’ve ever been in after finishing the Insanity Asylum workout. Our softball team ended up winning two of four championships with a runner-up.
Where The Motivation Is Lost
Once you hit your goal its easy to go back to your old ways unless you have a list of goals to continue to hit. I did not have another goal set up after helping my team win those championships so I’ve been slacking on the effort. I don’t see myself ever not working out but I’m seeing how its important to keep setting bigger health and fitness goals with small attainable ones between them. Its kind of like when people do awesome with P90X but they don’t know what to do after P90X so they put all of the weight back on. They had nothing to motivate them to keep on going.
Where My Motivation Is Not
Working out just to workout has never been a motivation of mine. It’s just not my thing. However, I do enjoy the benefits of what working out and taking care of myself brings. Better health, enjoying the activities I do much more, being able to still do the things I like to do, and never having to buy new clothes (I hate shopping) because my sizes have been about the same for the past 6 years. Working out to look good does not motivate me either. I look at it as an effect of me working towards some other fitness goal.
You Set Your Motivation Goals Or It Will Set Them For You
After I decided to take it easy on my arm my motivation became to not workout so I didn’t re-injure my arm. And that’s what I did, not workout so I wouldn’t hurt my arm. I put on some weight in that 5 month time period all while trying to not workout so I didn’t re-injure my arm. Realizing it now this should not have been my motivation. Instead I should have been focusing on working out everything else I could at 100% effort. My arm became the “I don’t need to workout because I’m already with somebody” or “I’m big boned” or “I’ll go buy a new bat (golf club) and it will do all the work for me” or one of the hundreds of other excuses people give to not take care of themselves. They are called excuses but couldn’t those also be their motivation? In the end I had let my arm injury set my motivation and goals for me and I didn’t even know it.
Moving forward I know I’m gonna have to keep setting new goals that motivate me to want to keep on pushing. I know I can’t just workout to stay in shape to enjoy the sports I play. Those are now gonna have to be a by-product of a new and bigger health and fitness goal. So now all I need to do is figure it out.
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