Exercise has its benefits. The challenge of exercising every day is to make it a habit. It sounds easy enough. Although you may feel it’s hard to do when you first start. Fortunately, it can get easier in time. So why is it so hard to start and stick with it?
Why is Exercising Every Day Hard?
Exercising every day is a habit, and adopting a new habit can be difficult. Bad habits form because they are easily and quickly reinforced. Conversely, good habits may take days, weeks, or longer before we begin to enjoy the benefits. New habits require dedication and discipline until it’s automatic. Unfortunately, the human brain wants immediate gratification, which bad habits readily supply.
This is why it’s easy to procrastinate. It frees up time to do something more immediately rewarding than a critical task, which instantly spares effort and risk. For example, staying up late to watch movies, play games, or engage in social media provides constant gratification even though you know you should get adequate sleep.
Exercising every day goes against behaviors programmed in your genes to conserve energy. However, you can do it like many others have. Thankfully, once it’s a habit, it becomes almost automatic, and your brain likes doing things automatically because thinking requires energy.
Tips to Make Exercising an Everyday Habit
Set a Goal
Goals are essential to help you strive for a purpose or desired outcome. When you don’t have a goal, you will lean towards behaviors that give you instant gratification. You should start by creating goals that encourage you to exercise every day, such as walking a number of steps or exercising for a certain amount of time, even if it is as little as five minutes.
Make Exercising Every Day Part of Your Daily Routine
You likely have a daily routine, a series of behaviors that you do automatically throughout the day. Each of your habits is probably triggered by something around you. For example, waking up could mean getting a cup of coffee or changing into comfy clothes when getting home from work. Those triggers cause actions that provide you with a reward, such as drinking your coffee or feeling comfortable.
Ideally, you set yourself up for success by creating a trigger in your daily routine that tells your brain it’s time to exercise. If you struggle to find time, exercising daily will be difficult. If you have difficulty creating a trigger to exercise, the next best thing is to schedule time in your calendar.
Make Exercise Fun
Exercising every day requires you to enjoy it. Unfortunately, many people believe that you must do certain types of exercise, like running or lifting weights, to succeed. Unless you like running or lifting weights, forcing yourself to exercise for the sake of exercising is a recipe for disaster. On the other hand, finding an activity you enjoy will help you look forward to exercising.
Make Exercising Social
Exercising with friends or family can increase your chances of exercising every day. Not only can exercising be more enjoyable, it can help you stay motivated and accountable. If you plan to exercise with others, you’re more likely to show up and exercise.
Track Your Progress
Record every time you exercise, weigh yourself, or do something relating to your fitness goals. Today, it’s very easy to track your progress automatically with an app and a fitness tracker, smart scale, or other wearable. Tracking your progress can keep you motivated and help you stay on track.
Also, it is a complete history of your journey. Not only can you see how far you’ve come, but it may help you identify areas to make minor adjustments. If you make adjustments, your journal can help you quickly see if they helped or hindered your efforts. As a result, tracking your progress may help you reach your goals faster.
Reward Yourself
You’ll more likely reinforce your habit by rewarding yourself whenever you hit a milestone or accomplish something new. Rewarding yourself could be an acknowledgment, a massage, a new outfit, or a night out with friends. Regardless, celebrating small wins can help reinforce your behavior and keep you exercising every day.
Taking a Break From Exercising Every Day
You certainly can strive to exercise every day. However, pushing yourself can lead to burnout, sickness, and injury. Listen to your body instead of following a strict schedule or doing what your fitness tracker tells you.
Your body will tell you whether you need to recover from illness, fatigue, and soreness. It’s okay to skip exercise to recover. However, don’t skip too many days in a row unless you’re injured or sick, or you’ll begin detraining.
The Takeaway
Exercising every day can help you stay healthy and strong throughout your life. Forming an exercise habit can be challenging. However, there are things you can do to help you succeed, such as scheduling exercise sessions, finding activities you enjoy, tracking your progress, and exercising with friends. However, don’t forget to listen to your body and take breaks to rest and recover.
FitTrend’s mission is to help you along your self-improvement journey, promote an active lifestyle, and help you achieve your goals. Our journal can help you track your workouts, weight, mood, calories, and more. Also, FitTrend allows you to connect supported gadgets to your account to make it easier for you to update your journal automatically. Create your account today and start using FitTrend for free!
Disclaimer: No content on this site should ever be used as a substitute for direct medical advice from your doctor or other qualified clinician.
