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Low motivation, how do I fix it?

SummerHime853

Hey yall, I’m a young girl and have stopped going to the gym for a few months. I like how muscles look and how my body feels, I even have a black card membership at my gym—but I just can’t get myself to go most days. No matter how much macho dojo motivation I watch. I’m at a good weight right now, but I’d love to be around 115-120 w/ lean muscle. Rn, I’m 135. How can I push myself further?

Replies

claireychn074

Find a friend to go with you so someone always nags the other? Go straight after work so it becomes a habit: join a fun class.

Personally if exercise isn’t enjoyable then I won’t do it. You need something you actually want to do.

ninerbuff

Motivation is TEMPORARY. You have to have a CONSISTENT ROUTINE and just make it a priority. Think about it: How much motivation do you need to brush your teeth? People that have good oral hygeine prioritize it. People that don't have bad teeth and bad oral hygeine.

Create a plan and just stick to it no matter how much you may want to just skip. Even a bad day in the gym is better than no gym at all in most cases.

ACE Certified Personal/Group Fitness Trainer

IDEA Fitness Member

Kickboxing Certified Instructor

Been in fitness for 45 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

AnnPT77

One option: Find a way to work out that's more convenient, practical, even enjoyable. Some possibilities:

Work out with a friend on a schedule.
Take a class so there's a social dimension as well as a workout.
Do a bodyweight strength routine at home for more flexibility.
Find an active VR or video game you enjoy that works on your physical goals (yes, it'll probably deliver results slower than the gym would . . . but faster than skipping the gym does).
Do something else non-gym that requires/develops strength. Rock climbing, rowing, whatever. (Most of any muscle mass I have above average for my demographic - and I do have some - came from rowing, mostly boats. It was very slow strength/muscle gain, but I love doing it, so I do it often, and have for literal decades.)

As a young woman, if you can find a way to think of this as exploring to find active things you can enjoy, that will make you stronger and fitter, and that you can continue in the upcoming decades to stay healthy and strong long term . . . that would be a good orientation, IMO. I wish my young self had been that smart, honestly.

Best wishes!

f8wyww52wv

Going to the gym when you don’t feel like it—that’s the real win.

kptrying

Going with others can be a good thing - but they also can be a reason (over time) that you don't go. I've found that having friends that go with me less inspiring because they can have less motivation than me. Perhaps you can set a goal of how many times a week you want to go. Make a plan to tag going to the gym with something you do every day - in the morning - after lunch - when you get home - and go to the gym right after that event on the days you want to go. Don't think about it as just black and white - if you want to go a certain number of days - try to name the days and keep it in your schedule. If you have to miss on Tuesday - perhaps you can choose to go on Wednesday instead. Try to keep that commitment to yourself. It gets easier the more you do it.

AnnPT77

@SummerHime853, maybe this won't resonate with you, but I thought of your post when I read this article:

https://spacedaily.com/t-psychology-says-the-people-who-stay-genuinely-fit-deep-into-their-60s-and-70s-arent-the-ones-with-the-best-genetics-the-most-discipline-or-the-strictest-routines-theyre-the-ones-who-quietly-decid/

I don't know much about that site admittedly, but I think the article is thought-provoking about why "motivation to work out" fails so often.

A few relevant quotes:

Most people who start exercising are motivated by appearance. This isn’t a criticism. It’s just an accurate description of what fitness culture sells and what most of us buy. The before-and-after. The weight loss. The visible arms by summer.
The problem isn’t the goal. The problem is the shelf life of that kind of motivation.
A systematic review of the research on exercise and self-determination theory, published in the International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity, found a clear pattern across dozens of studies: intrinsic motivation, meaning the kind that comes from genuine enjoyment, personal meaning, and a sense that movement reflects who you are, is a substantially stronger predictor of long-term exercise adherence than extrinsic motivation like appearance goals or social pressure.

The person who exercises consistently for 35 years because they genuinely like how it makes them feel is going to arrive at 70 in a categorically different physical state than the person who did aggressive boot camps in their 30s and 40s, burned out, stopped, and restarted the cycle four more times.

(Just for the record, I was both those people: Episodes of hopeful but short-term exercise when younger, but mostly inactivity; finding truly happiness-generating activity in my 40s.)

. . .discipline, for most people, is not a renewable resource. It depletes. It wavers. It doesn’t survive grief or illness or the accumulated exhaustion of a complicated life. What survives those things is meaning. What survives is the quiet, internal sense that moving your body is part of staying inside a life you don’t want to start opting out of.

If any word of that speaks to you at all - maybe even if not - 😉 - I encourage you to read the article. (I'm not compensated in any way for linking it, BTW.) There are good things in there about how to think about the impact of our exercise mindset and activity choices on our quality of life.

At 70, my current age, this article better describes what I tried to say above than I could ever do. The life impact of figuring this stuff out really well is huge IME. That's hard to see when young, pretty stark IMO in retrospect when old. I profoundly bless the coach who got me moving and routinely enjoying movement - finally, later than ideal - in my 40s. It transformed my life. I'm not sure I'd even be alive now - talking health, not self-harm - without that. For sure, my current life would be more unpleasant at 70 by far, less functional, less capable and independent, if I hadn't stumbled into that piece of luck.

Please think hard about these issues, and how you want your total life to be. It's hard to think about, I know, but I promise that it's important.

Best wishes!