Relationships August 11, 2016
Every woman’s been there – you started a fitness regimen that was working well for you and your lifestyle. You, surprisingly, even enjoyed working out! But then, life happened. You stopped going to your Thursday night spin class, lost sight of your goals and haven’t found enough inspiration to step back on that pilates reformer for quite some time.
Getting back into the swing of your fitness routine can be daunting and filled with a lot of empty promises for tomorrow. While muscle memory pretty much guarantees that you won’t completely fail, when you do get back in the gym, it’ll feel like your muscles suddenly have amnesia. For those of you struggling to get it together again, here is some advice to make your transition back to that gym grind a little smoother.
When you’re working with a busy schedule, it can be easy to move your workouts to the back burner. If you schedule your workouts ahead of time, you’re more likely to get excited and follow through with your fitness plans. When making your plan, Mayo Clinic suggests creating a balanced routine that allows you to go at your own pace and allows time for your body to recover. While it’s good to push yourself, it’s also important to listen to your body. If you haven’t worked out in a long time, you may need to start as cautiously as if you would if you were starting from scratch.
Instead of the familiar, dreadful dance of rushing home then rushing back to the gym only to realize you’ve left your headphones, pack all of your gym essentials in your bag (headphones included) the night before. To avoid the unnecessary exhaustion you feel just getting to the gym, keep your gym bag in the car if you need to.
A hot new outfit, cute shoes and even a high-end water bottle are nice ways to make your workout a million times more comfortable. When you look good, you’re inspired to work harder. Life Hacker says, “Whatever you do, make it fun.” Do whatever you have to to make sure you enjoy your work out. If having “fun” means splurging on a pair of trendy LuLus to make you look and feel beautiful on your next SoulCycle class, go ahead. You’ll thank yourself later.
There’s a reason leaving your headphones at home is so devastating for regular gym goers. It’s motivating to listen to the music that you love while working out. It gets you hyped up before your workout and it gives you a little extra umph when that voice telling you to stop creeps in. Huffington Post even reports that music is the “good kind of distraction,” one that helps bump your athletic performance by 15 percent. Additionally, a good beat can help you keep your pace because, as Brunel University London has found, the rhythm of your workout music stimulates the motor area of your brain. If you want, you can even do the same with movies, television shows or audio books. Use those to distract you from the fact that your leg muscles are already shaking. You can even make it interesting by not allowing yourself to see or hear your desired method of entertainment unless it’s at the gym.
This is especially important when you haven’t been active lately. Remember to stretch, get the blood flowing with a little cardio and get in the zone. Jumping into a workout without a warm-up increases your chances of injury and adversely affects your performance. The National Sports Medicine Institute says warm ups help prepare your body for exercises by gradually increasing your heart rate and circulation. This helps loosen the joints and increase blood flow to the muscles you’re about to work. According to the website, most warm up sessions last between 20 minutes to half an hour. This period gives the body “plenty of time to gradually get ready for physical activity and gives [people] time to prepare themselves mentally.”
Chances are, you aren’t on the same level you were before you stopped going to the gym regularly. Rather than going full throttle on your first time back, start slowly. Overtraining increases your likelihood of not going back to the gym, so remember what your mother taught you: slow and steady wins the race.
Your progress won’t be back at 100 percent after one workout. Changes to your body and fitness level takes time. Stick with your routine and you’ll start to see those chiseled abs making their way back to you. As Life Hacker reminds, “You’re not lazy, you’re just starting from zero.” Don’t discourage yourself by falling into the trap of “I’m just going to get lazy anyway” mentality. Richard Talens, co-founder of Fitocracy, tells Life Hacker: “To say that people don’t don’t exercise because they are lazy is actually backwards. Often times, people are actually lazy because they’re out of shape and don’t exercise!” So, when you start up again, don’t compare yourself to other people. Celebrate your own achievements and milestones no matter how long it takes you to accomplish them.
