Motivation won’t do the work for you!

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Motivation won’t do the work for you!

I am going to tell you something you probably don’t want to hear. But I believe once we come to accept it and get it out of the way we can get on with things. Exercise is not pleasant and chances are it will hurt. If it’s meant to be good for us then why is it so painful? The simple answer is that exercise doesn’t have its benefits (apart from you feeling awesome at the time) in the moment of doing but in the moments after when our body starts to recover from the trauma you put it through.

You see the human body has no idea you’re exercising and trying to do something good for it. No, it actually thinks you’re trying to kill it. That’s where one of my favourite quotes come from “what doesn’t kill you … only makes you stronger”. A little pain is ok and providing you administer it safely you will be surprised at how well your body will adapt to the stress and be better off for it.

A few effective rules of exercise that I think everyone should follow:

  • There is no such thing as ‘cardio’ or ‘weights’. There is no difference.  Your cardio system powers your muscular system and the only way to get your ‘cardio’ is by mechanical work of your muscles. Basically what I am saying is do something different that is going to challenge your muscles. After all if it “doesn’t challenge you, then it doesn’t change you”!
  • Eliminate unnecessary exercise. You don’t need to be doing hundreds of variations of something. Minimise your exercises but maximise your efforts on the basics, remember quality over quantity is always important to get maximum benefits from your training.
  • Don’t train every day. Your body needs time to recover and adapt to the ‘stress’ you put it through. You won’t get fat, weak or unfit if you have a day off. If anything you will be stronger for it.
  • Chase the intensity not the clock. Your body has no idea what time it is or how long you have trained for. That is all in your head. Your body recognises intensity of effort. What you are doing in an hour try and do in half.
  • Slow the weights down. Don’t rush through the reps or swing and bounce the weights everywhere. Smooth and controlled movements for maximum efforts. Plus it is much safer and will save your joints.

We don’t come with a life time warranty … take care of your body, it’s the only place you have to live.