If you are like most people, your motivation typically peaks in early June, subsides when fall hits, then picks back up for a month or two in early January.  This is the workout cycle of millions of people across the globe.  With fall well under way, your motivation to hit the gym is probably starting to wane.  You worked hard all summer to show off that (almost) six pack, but what’s the point now you may be asking.

I’ll be the first to admit, getting yourself to work out on a Monday evening after work, when it’s dark by 5:30, drizzly, and cold out is a bit tough.  The dark, cold weather is definitely a buzz kill and can sap the mental motivation of even the most determined individuals.  To make matters worse, the longer the “break” you take from working out, the harder it will be to get back into the swing of things. 

In order to achieve the body and lifestyle almost all of us crave, we cannot be seasonal warriors.  Working out hard for 6 months a year is great, but it’s the 6 months you’re not working out that is going to really hurt you.  One step forward and one step back gets you no where.  There’s no point in working out hard for part of the year only to lose all the gains you made.  Then, you start right back over when you start working out again.  How would it feel to have a six pack next summer, as opposed to the almost there, still soft, sorry excuse for a six pack that you’ll develop after a couple of months of working out and laying off the breakfast burritos. 

By working your body hard and then laying off for a few months, you condition your muscles and system in such a way that making long-lasting gains becomes more difficult.  If this cycle is repeated long-term, year after year, for multiple years, you’re going to need to work twice as hard to get where you want to be.  Since you are having a hard time working hard 12 months a year as it is, you can forget about ever having the body and lifestyle you want.

That said, not all breaks are bad.  After 3-4 months of serious exercise, it is good to take a solid 2 weeks off and let your body fully recover.  Often times, you will find you are stronger post-break than you were before taking time off.  Your muscles really regenerate themselves and come back twice as strong.  There is however always the danger that your two weeks off turns into many more.  This is where self-discipline and determination come into play.  Don’t view your time off as a vacation from exercise.  View it is an important part of the process in toning and developing your body.  Keep your eating habits during this two weeks off and make the break work for you, not against you.

In order to keep your motivation where it needs to be through the doldrums of winter, there are several things you can do;

• Find indoor activities that you don’t typically take part in during the summer.  Start playing pick-up basketball at your gym once a week.  Get involved with group fitness classes.  Take up kick boxing.  The options are endless.  Bottomline, find something you wouldn’t typically do during the summer because you’d rather be outside.
• In your workout journal, write down monthly goals for October-January.  Each month, give yourself a different goal you want to obtain.  Maybe its lose 10 pounds in the month of November.  Maybe it’s bench 225 lbs. by the end of December.  It doesn’t matter.  Studies show that people who have concise, short-term goals will stay more motivated than those that are just aimlessly working out because they feel they have to.  Continually shoot for loftier goals and push yourself to complete them.
• Remind yourself why you are working out.  We all know how painful working out can be some days.  On days like that, remind yourself that you are working out today so that tomorrow isn’t in vain.  What’s the point of experiencing the workout pain and struggles every summer and new year’s if you are just going to allow it to fade away when your motivation levels sink.  Oft repeated, and a bit cliché, but absolutely true; one step forward and one step backwards gets you no where. 
• Take pride in the sacrifice.  When you are coming out of the gym all sweaty and the cold evening air hits you, take pride in knowing that you are out there doing something productive while other people are sitting around at home eating crap and packing on the winter pounds.  You on the other hand are determined, you are becoming stronger, both and physically and mentally…you are a machine!  Take time to appreciate your efforts and accomplishments. 

The more you “force” yourself to get to the gym, the easier it becomes the next time.  Elementary human psychology tells us that.  Tough it out on the “bleh” days and you will notice they become fewer and farther between.  Just think how good you are going to look this summer after having worked out for 12 months straight.  You are going to be a different person, both physically and mentally.  Employ a little self-discipline and the results will follow.

Look into any gym space, and you’ll see ears studded with ear phones connected to iPod’s, iPhone’s, and various mp3 players.  It’s not really a secret that music helps make the time in the gym pass by faster, and keeps your mind off things.  However, a study published recently took a look at the correlation between fast-paced music and athletic performance. 

Researchers gave the volunteers popular music to listen to while riding a stationary bike.  On the first ride, the music was played at its normal pace.  In following rides, the researchers slowed the pace of the music by 10% for some, and increased the pace by 10% for others.  The volunteers were not told anything about the pace of the music.  Interestingly, their performance on the stationary bike changed. 

When the pace of the music was decreased, the peddling and resulting affects changed as well.  Physical exertion dropped, heart rates dropped, and mileage dropped.  Many volunteers reported they didn’t care for the music.  The other group of volunteers, which listened to music with only a 10% increase in pace, peddled faster, covered more miles, sustained a higher heart rate, and reported to enjoy the music they were listening to.

While the fast pace group didn’t claim that the workout seemed any easier, it does seem that the faster pace allowed them to push through the workout and exert more physical effort.  A case can be made that the volunteers with the fast pace music accepted, and even preferred to exert a greater degree of physical effort. 

Clearly, the goal of cardiovascular exercise is to raise and sustain a heart rate in the targeted zone.  Whether you want to train aerobically or anaerobically, raising the heart rate and keeping it in that particular zone is key.  This study demonstrates the power that music possess in helping you reach that goal.  Use it to your advantage!

With all that said, you want fast-paced music on your playlist.  A subsequent study by Dr. Costas Karageorghis, an associate professor of sports psychology found that the most effective workout music contains a tempo of 120-140 beats-per-minute, or B.P.M.  With that knowledge in hand, you want to find songs that fall into this range of BPM.  How do you determine beats-per-minute you may be asking.  First off, you can do it the old-fashioned way; count them in your head.

If that’s too much work for you, you can take the easy way out. Check out BPM calculator or BPM Assistant (for you Mac users).  These simple downloads will calculate the BPM of a given song.  From there, you can store the BPM in the ID3 tag of the music file.  iTunes will allow you to then sort your music by BPM, allowing you to pick songs that fall between 120-140 BPM.

The way in which you order the songs in your playlist has a crucial part in all of this as well.  First off, it really depends on the type of workout you are doing.  If you are going on a distance run, you may want to consider slowly building the BPM in each song.  This way, when you are nearing the end of the run, and are running on gas fumes, your mind will receive that extra boost of motivation from very high BPM songs.  If you are going for a serious lift session, you may want to include only songs that fall into the upper range of the 120-140 BPM scale.  This will give you explosive, sustained motivation throughout your heavy lifts. 

When you are exercising to reach a goal, i.e. lose 30 pounds, prepare for that triathlon, etc. every little edge you can give yourself matters.  If something as easy as increasing the tempo of the music helps you raise your physical exertion just 10%, the differences in gains made will be dramatic.  Think about it for a second; what if you could burn 10% more calories each time you worked out?  Burning an extra 60 calories, 5 days a week, 52 weeks a year, translates into an additional loss of 6.25 pounds of body fat over the course of a year.  Think about that.  Simply bumping up the tempo of your music will cause your body to work that much harder than it typically would.  A “free” loss of 6 pounds of body fat is nothing to sneeze at.  The tempo of your music will subconsciously dictate the tempo of your intensity.  Use this phenomenon to your advantage and make the best gains you possibly can.

“I’m fat”. “I don’t know what I’m doing”. “I have more rolls than a bakery”. “Everyone else is perfect”.

These are all common thoughts that go through many peoples’ heads when they think about entering a gym for the first time in a while. People convince themselves of a hundred reasons why they can’t go to the gym. If these thoughts are something you are all too familiar with, you need a new perspective on things.

#1 Everyone will look at me!

Don’t be so full of yourself. No one really cares what you are doing in there. Perhaps people will give you a casual glance over because you are a new face in the gym, and new faces tend to stand out to the regulars, but that’s all it is. Just a glance to see if they recognize you. Or perhaps, if someone is looking at you, it’s because they are new themselves and have no clue what they are doing. People often look around the gym to see what other people are doing to get workout ideas for themselves. Unless you are in a ultra-intense bodybuilding gym, no one is judging you. There is a sort of camaraderie amongst gym goers.

#2 I don’t know what to wear!

Most people in the gym are not decked out in the spiffy yoga pants and $60 workout tops. Sure, there certainly are people like that in the gym, but you know what? The hardcore gym goers laugh at them. There’s no need to get all fancied up to workout. Just throw on a pair of shorts and t-shirt and you are good to go. You are there to get in shape, not sport the newest fashion trends.

#3 Everyone else is in way better shape than me!

First off, how is this a reason to NOT go to the gym? People may be in better shape because they go to the gym……that’s why you’re going, right? In all honesty though, most people at the gym are just about average. Everyone is in there trying to better themselves. Very few people will look down on another person trying to better themselves, no matter what their physical appearance may be.

#4 I won’t know what to do!

This is a valid concern, although something that is very easily taken care of. Look up exercises, have a Share It Fitness pro build you a specific workout for your goals, read fitness blogs like this one, search the internet, etc. In today’s world, it’s easy to find information on how to workout. Just be sure you are getting qualified, respected information before you jump into any workout plan. Enter Share It Fitness.

#5 I won’t know anybody there!

Most people don’t go to the gym to socialize. The ones that do often end up getting very little done, and are quite often the joke of any serious gym goer. You don’t need to know anyone to work out. Throw on your headphones and get to it. It’s really that simple.

#6 Everyone is looking at me!

Really, trust me on this one…They are NOT looking at you.

1. All or nothing – thinking

You see things in black-and white categories. If a situation falls short of perfect, you see it as a total failure. When a young woman on a diet ate a spoonful of ice cream, she told herself, ‘I’ve blown my diet completely.’ This thought upset her so much that she gobbled down an entire quart of ice cream!

2. Overgeneralization
You see a single negative event, such as a romantic rejection or a career reversal as a never-ending pattern of defeat by using words such as ‘always’ or “never” when you think about it. A depressed salesman became terribly upset when he noticed bird dung on the windshield of his car. He told himself, ‘Just my luck! Birds are always crapping on my car!’

3. Mental filter
You pick out a single negative detail and dwell on it exclusively, so that your vision of all of reality becomes darkened, like the drop of ink that discolors a beaker of water. Example: You receive many positive comments about your presentation to a group of associates at work, but one of them says something mildly critical You obsess about his reaction for days and ignore all the positive feedback.

4. Discounting the positive

You reject positive experiences by insisting they ‘don’t count.’ If you do a good job, you may tell yourself that it wasn’t good enough or that anyone could have done as well. Discounting the positive takes the joy out of life and makes you feel inadequate and unrewarded.

5. Jumping to conclusions
You interpret things negatively when there are no facts to support your conclusion.
Mind reading: Without checking it out, you arbitrarily conclude that someone is reacting negatively to you.
Fortune telling: You predict that things will turn out badly. Before a lest you may tell yourself, ‘I’m really going to blow it. What if I flunk?’ If you’re depressed you may tell yourself, ‘I’ll never get better.’

6. Magnification

You exaggerate the importance of your problems and shortcomings, or you minimize the importance of your desirable qualities. This is also called the ‘binocular trick.’

7. Emotional reasoning
You assume that your negative emotions necessarily reflect the way things really are: ‘I feel terrified about going on airplanes. It must be very dangerous to fly.’ Or ‘I feel guilty. I must be a rotten person.’ Or ‘I feel angry. This proves I’m being treated unfairly.’ Or I feel so inferior. This means I’m a second-rate person.’ Or ‘I feel hopeless. I must really be hopeless.’

8. “Should statements”
You tell yourself that things should be the way you hoped or expected them to be. After playing a difficult piece on the piano, a gifted pianist told herself, ‘I shouldn’t have made so many mistakes.’ This made her feel so disgusted that she quit practicing for several days. ‘Musts,’ ‘oughts’ and ‘have tos’ are similar offenders.  ‘Should statements’ that are directed against yourself lead to guilt and frustration. Should statements that are directed against other people or the world in general lead to anger and frustration: ‘He shouldn’t be so stubborn and argumentative’
Many people try to motivate themselves with shoulds and shouldn’ts , as if they were delinquents who had to be punished before they could be expected to do anything. ‘I shouldn’t eat that doughnut.’ This usually doesn’t work because all these shoulds and musts make you feel rebellious and you get the urge to do just the opposite. Dr. Albert Ellis has called this ‘musterbation.’ I call it the ‘shouldy’ approach to life.

9. Labeling

Labeling is an extreme form of all-or-nothing thinking. Instead of saying ‘I made a mistake.’ you attach a negative label to yourself: ‘I’m a loser.’ You might also label yourself ‘a foal’ or ‘a failure’ or ‘a jerk.’ Labeling is quite irrational because you are not the same as what you do. Human beings exist. but ‘fools,’ ‘losers,’ and ‘jerks’ do not. These labels are useless abstractions that lead to anger, anxiety, frustration, and low self- esteem.
You may also label others. When someone does something that rubs you the wrong way, you may tell yourself: ‘He’s an S.O.B Then you feel that the problem is with that person’s ‘character’ or ‘essence’ instead of with their thinking or behavior. You see them as totally bad. This makes you feel hostile and hopeless about improving things and leaves little room for constructive communication.
10.Personalization and blame

Personalization occurs when you hold yourself personally responsible for an event that isn’t entirely under your control. When a woman received a note that her child was having difficulties at school, she told herself, ‘this shows what a bad mother I am,’ instead of trying to pinpoint the cause of the problem so that she could be helpful to her child. When another woman’s husband beat her, she told herself, lf only I were better in bed, he wouldn’t beat me.’ Personalization leads to guilt. shame, and feelings of inadequacy. Same people do the opposit. They blame other people or their circumstances for their problems, and they overlook ways that they might be contributing to the problem: ‘The reason my marriage is so lousy is because my spouse is totally unreasonable.’ Blame usually doesn’t work very well because other people will resent being scapegoated and they will just toss the blame right back in your lap. It’s like the game of hot potato – no one wants to get stuck with it.

From The Feeling Good Handbook by David D. Burns, M.D.

Kyle Maynard is an individual from Suwanee, GA who was born without his arms or legs.  He’s spent his life struggling to perform basic tasks that we all take for granted every day.  He also happens to be the owner of a CrossFit gym.  Appropriately, the name of his gym is “No Excuses CrossFit”.  Kyle has obviously overcome great stuggles in his life, but to see his determination and willpower on film, is truly amazing.

How easy would it be for a guy in Kyle’s shoes to simply blame the world for his problems and sink into a depression?  That is just not the type of person Kyle is.  Not only that, he finds time for fitness.  Kyle is practically the picture of good health.  Everything he does to stay in shape is done without the use of his arms or legs.  He modifies his workout in a way that allows himself to stay active and challenge his body.

Look at Kyle and use this as motivation.  When going to the gym seems too hard, think about Kyle.  This man goes through enormous struggles  just so he is able to workout.  Everyone else is easily able to workout, they just choose not to.  We are all only given one life on this planet.  Why not live that one life as happy and healthy as we possibly can?  Staying fit and active, and eating right, is the formula to making the most of your one life.

We all know exercise isn’t always fun.  But if you can develop the mental toughness to grit your teeth and bear down on days you aren’t feeling up to it, not only will those days become fewer and farther between, but you will keep yourself on the track to success.  We all know how easy it is to fall off the wagon; a couple missed days here or there turns into a week, which turns into a month, which ends up killing all the progress we fought so hard for.

Find motivation all around you and let it light your fire.  Keep Kyle and his struggles in the forefront of your mind the next time you are thinking about skipping out on a workout because you are too tired, lazy, etc.  Every workout puts you one step closer to reaching your goals and keeping your body and mind healthy for years to come.

(1) Live In The Past. Even though it doesn’t actually exist anymore, dwell in it. If at all possible, repeat the mistakes you’ve made in your life over and over again in your mind. Remind yourself that no-one else makes mistakes, just you.

(2) Think About Missed Opportunities. In order to waste EVEN MORE of your time and energy, think about all the things you think you’ve missed out on, remembering to make them seem better than what they actually were. Remember that job you didn’t take, that girl you broke up with…….what if…………….

(3) The Grass IS Greener On The Other Side. Of course it is! Look at all those other people’s lives, they haven’t got their troubles or challenges, they’re perfectly peaceful and happy in every way. Try to remember this from the moment you wake up.

(4) Remember All The Times You’ve Been Mistreated. Replay these occasions over and over again in your mind. It serves absolutely purpose other than to bring a painful past event right smack into the present and experience it all over again – result!

(5) Worry About Possible Future Mistreatment. When done with step 4, move to worrying about more of the same in the future. The great thing about our minds is that they don’t know the difference between a real and an imagined event. If you want to feel like shit, create imagined scenarios in your mind that you don’t like, you don’t have to wait on it actually happening. They say a coward dies a thousand deaths – BE THAT COWARD!

(6) Focus On What’s Missing In Your Life And Don’t Be Grateful For What You Already Have. Yes, some people are starving to death in the world, some have lost loved ones in war or to disease, bla bla bla…..YOUR protein STILL hasn’t arrived from Amazon.com!!!!!

(7) Are You Beginning To Age Quickly!? Probably not but you should believe you are, after all, the worry will cause more lines and wrinkles – a self-fulfilling prophesy is just what you need.

(8) Think About Financial Ruin. Hey, there’s a credit crunch on and even if you aren’t personally affected, think about how you could be anyway….

• I could lose my job
• I could lose my home
• Imagine if I was that guy who lost everything last week

Stuff like that works great!

(9) Gossip & Bitch About Others Constantly. You don’t believe in Karma – what goes around does NOT come around. Treat others like crap – relax, you’ll be the first person in history who doesn’t get their comeuppance.

(10) Believe That Your Situation Is Hopeless. Whatever it is, you CANNOT change it so don’t even try. No, no-one in the history of mankind has EVER overcome a similar situation and no-one in the whole world is prepared to lend you a hand. You’re trapped so accept it.

Practice these steps for a week and you’ll change your life!

P.S. If you’d like to be happy, just do the opposite

Article Via MuscleHack.com

Every now and then we like to spotlight particular readers who have made significant gains in the battle of weight loss.  Anyone who has attempted to lose serious amounts of weight knows about the roller coaster ride that ensues.  Good weeks, bad weeks, and everything in between are to be expected.  By highlighting particular individuals who are winning the battle, it is my hope that it provides you the motivation and encouragement to never give up the fight.  No matter where a person is in their battle, the fight is never over.  Getting the weight off is the first goal…the second goal (which is actually a lifestyle change, more than a short term goal) is to keep the weight off. 

Without further adieu…

Stats:
 
29 years old
480 lb – heaviest
397 lb – current weight

Why did you get started on a journey to healthy living?
 

Well May 2009 I was laid off from my job as a Construction Project Engineer. I found myself in a very deep hole emotionally. I hated my life and more than anything I hated the way I looked. My weight had taken so much away from me, it affected every aspect of my life and I had hit rock bottom. I knew that if I didn’t make the necessary lifestyle changes that I would never have the life I wanted no matter how hard I worked at my career and personal life. My official start of my new lifestyle began in Sept 2009.

 
How did you do it?
 

First thing I knew I had to do was get my diet in order, and when I say diet I mean my food menu. I am in no way on a “DIET”. The changes I have made are lifestyle changes. With that being said I hired a Registered Dietician to teach me how to put together healthy, simple, and appealing menu plans. That was one of the best things I could have done for myself; my RD is amazing. She supports me in every way possible. I visit her about every 2 months, we usually record my weight and body fat% and also discuss my menu plans and make any needed changes.
 
Second thing I knew I had to do was start working out. I joined a gym and slowly started working out. In the beginning I would walk for about 30 min and find myself exhausted. Today my workouts can range from 1-3 hours, my energy and endurance levels have gone through the roof. I started out only doing cardio but I soon added weight lifting into my routine, which has made a huge difference.
 
So to answer your question I am doing it by good old fashioned healthy eating and hard work in the gym.

What is your motivation?
 
My motivation is that I want to live my life without having to worry about how my weight will affect every aspect of it. As an obese person there is nothing I can do without taking my weight into consideration. I want to get married and have a family one day. I want to be successful in my career. I am 29 years old and I feel like I havent started my life. All these things keep me going.

 
 
Do you still have work to do to reach your goals? If so, what is your plan ?
 

I do still have work to do to reach my goals, my goal weight is around 230 pounds. My plan is to keep doing what I have been doing. Eating right and working out hard.

Thanks to Al for sharing his story with us.  If you want to follow Al on his day to day battle, check him out at his blog, Sweating Until Happy.