I’m 39. I am overweight, but not in a way that has impacted my health. I started lifting weights a few months ago, after never having managed to stick to an exercise routine in my adult life. It’s quickly became surprisingly automatic to want to do it.
The things that have helped me have centered on altering my mental stance:
1) What do you do or want to do in life that would benefit from any sort of changes in your body? This could be anything from chronic pain, to being able to play with kids or pets, to mental energy level, to getting sick less often, to sexual performance, to a whole bunch of other things. If you can tie some form of exercise to a real goal, one that is actually intrinsically motivating for you, that can help. Ask what kind of physical capabilities would actually help with that thing, start small, and go from there.
2) Mary Poppins was right. In every job that must be done, there is an element of fun. You find the fun and snap! The job’s a game. In the past I always tried to focus on cardio and maintaining a calorie deficit to lose weight, and it never felt motivating. Strength training, for me, had much more of a numbers-go-up aspect that I was able to latch onto. It kind of intrinsically demands a steady but not overwhelming schedule in order to be effective. And it was also very nice to be able to see almost right away how much less my heart rate on my Fitbit went up during various kinds of activities.
I’m 39. I am overweight, but not in a way that has impacted my health. I started lifting weights a few months ago, after never having managed to stick to an exercise routine in my adult life. It’s quickly became surprisingly automatic to want to do it.
The things that have helped me have centered on altering my mental stance:
1) What do you do or want to do in life that would benefit from any sort of changes in your body? This could be anything from chronic pain, to being able to play with kids or pets, to mental energy level, to getting sick less often, to sexual performance, to a whole bunch of other things. If you can tie some form of exercise to a real goal, one that is actually intrinsically motivating for you, that can help. Ask what kind of physical capabilities would actually help with that thing, start small, and go from there.
2) Mary Poppins was right. In every job that must be done, there is an element of fun. You find the fun and snap! The job’s a game. In the past I always tried to focus on cardio and maintaining a calorie deficit to lose weight, and it never felt motivating. Strength training, for me, had much more of a numbers-go-up aspect that I was able to latch onto. It kind of intrinsically demands a steady but not overwhelming schedule in order to be effective. And it was also very nice to be able to see almost right away how much less my heart rate on my Fitbit went up during various kinds of activities.