Flexing the Mental Muscle

For the last three months I have participated in the Fitocracy Arnold 1% challenge.  The jist of it is you do 15 Arnold workouts and you get a badge each month. Do three months and you get a the  a special badge.  The strange things that keep me motivated. But I really wanted those badges even when I didn’t want to do the challenge workouts.

My running togs for today.  It is hard to ignore them there.

Exercise is not always fun like we wish it was.  Bad days happen, lack of motivation happens but what can keep you going is your brain.  The mental muscles can play an important role in keeping you in going when you no longer want to.  Let’s go back to my challenge.  Month number three hit and I was over it. I wanted it out of my way so I can work on more important things in life like doing a chin up.  But I kept up at it and that was all mental.  I knew the routine exercises, doing them was not an issue, wanting to do them was the issue.

Exercising and staying consistent with it means you need to flex that mental muscle and develop discipline. No one jumps out of bed everyday ready to go all the time even when you love doing something.  But what you can do is change the mental part of the equation in my case getting some badges from Fitocracy was a major motivation to keep going on something I was bored with.  What motivates you?