Why am I so lazy?

Options
jccst9
jccst9 Posts: 58 Member
in Motivation and Support
It's no secret why I don't get as much exercise as I should. I'm lazy! I use my 50-55 hour work week as an excuse to go home and veg out instead of going for a walk. I also find that when I want to stroll the neighborhood for exercise, it's a 95% probability that I won't go unless someone else goes with me. Co-dependency? Maybe. An excuse to blame someone else for my inactivity? Probably. Last night, instead of picking up my Shake Weight, I stared at it for a few minutes and proceeded to watch a rerun of "How I Met Your Mother" where a guy I went to high school played Jason Segel's brother. Why couldn't I do both?

I'm sure there's a lot of factors impeding my ability to lose weight on my own without resorting to surgical procedures or any kind of crazy diet pills. Why are you lazy? What do you do to combat it? I'm not quite at the hopeless point yet, but I'm just a few pushed-off workouts away.
«1

Replies

  • marycmeadows
    marycmeadows Posts: 1,691 Member
    Options
    I used to consider myself lazy.... Now I have to MAKE myself take rest days..... somehow I still find time to veg in front of the tv AND work out..... We make time and find time for what's important to us. Obviously working out/losing weight/living healthy is NOT important to you at this point.
  • princessage117
    princessage117 Posts: 171 Member
    Options
    Exercise begets exercise, eating healthy begets eating healthy, drinking more water begets drinking even more water......
  • Jexebel
    Jexebel Posts: 67
    Options
    You don't want a change badly enough yet. When you want it, REALLY want it, you'll do it.
  • princessage117
    princessage117 Posts: 171 Member
    Options
    Have your exercise clothes ready on your couch or bed when you get home, or change before leaving the office, you have to make it a habit
  • PhilyPhresh
    PhilyPhresh Posts: 600 Member
    Options
    I used to be the same way. I would get home from work and just want to sit on the couch because I was tired from working for 10-12 hours and I never wanted to get out and do anything. Now, I get pissed if I don't make it to the gym because I love it so much! lol. I will also sometimes go for a jog for the first half of my lunch break. I think this helps because I am not feeling all tired when I have only been here for 4 hours and taking a nice jog before lunch (especially on beautiful days) is amazing!
  • starcatcher1975
    starcatcher1975 Posts: 292 Member
    Options
    Best thing to do is just to start. Do something, anything. You're right- after a few more pushed off workouts you *might* not have the desire to do it anymore at all.

    I'm lazy (yeah, I admit that) so I force myself to exercise in the morning. I make myself get up early so I can get it done and over with and I don't have excuses to not do it. Now it's habit. I get upset if I don't get a chance to workout. (OK, this week isn't a great example but in almost 6 months this is the first week I haven't felt like doing anything so I think I'm doing pretty damn good) The only thing I can't do early is my weight training with my trainer. That I do right after work on Mon & Wed. Since I work at a university and he is a trainer at the fitness center on campus (which is free-bonus!!) I have no excuses for missing a session.

    However after this week I'll probably skip the trainer and just continue weight training on my own. Which will mean more early mornings for me, but the results will be worth it in the end.

    You have to want it. And you just have to start.
  • xaniza
    xaniza Posts: 250 Member
    Options
    I was lazy, then I stopped being lazy and lost a bunch of weight, then I started being lazy again. I'm having a hard time getting out of this funk!!! I think it might just be that I feel like I'm done, even tho I'm soooo close to where I really WANT to be, I'm having no problem accepting where I am right now.

    As far as not going to the gym or out for a walk unless someone goes with you, the biggest thing that I learned is that NOBODY wants it as much as you do. Not your best friend, not your mom or dad, not your brother or sister. When I figured that out, I dropped some lbs and my friends who had said they'd go with me and never did were jealous =)

    If you want it, you'll do it. Depending on how much you want it is how much effort you'll put in. Good luck!
  • ninerbuff
    ninerbuff Posts: 48,527 Member
    Options
    I'm lazy too. I just REFUSE to be overweight.

    A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
    IDEA Fitness member
    Kickboxing Certified Instructor
    Been in fitness for 28+ years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition
  • ewoodward11
    ewoodward11 Posts: 4 Member
    Options
    Surgery and diet pills will not work. That is the easy way out. You have to want it and put in the work!
  • LiveLaffLoseLove
    LiveLaffLoseLove Posts: 104
    Options
    I am the same way... I sit on the couch and look at the things I COULD be doing and watch things I have seen 100s of times to avoid working out.... I also use the work too many hours and come home and continue to work (dinner, homework, kids, etc.). So I thought about the morning before work... well I hate mornings as it is, but the other morning I was wide awake laying in bed, listening to my son get ready for school and thought about the good 30 minutes I could get in before getting my youngest up and how cool it would be to post a great work out and continued to just lay there.... I think it is lack of motivation on my part. I need to feel inspired! How to get out of this rut????
  • lindalee0315
    lindalee0315 Posts: 527 Member
    Options
    I started exercising regularly a long, long time ago. With the exception of being pregnant and for awhile after my son was born, I exercised nearly every day. It was very hard to start up initially and very hard to re-start after I had gotten out of it regularly. What worked for me was my own personal mantra. It sounds hokey, I know, but when my alarm would go off and I would be tempted to hit snooze, I would say to myself, "Fit or Fat?" I would drag myself out of bed and exercise. After a couple of months, it became routine. I find it harder to force myself to exercise if I wait until later in the day. For me, I just hate taking two showers, reapplying all the cosmetics, redoing my hair, etc. If I oversleep now (like I did today), I repeat something one of my MFP friends wrote: "I really regret that workout. Says nobody. Ever." Good luck. Now, I have to force myself to take rest days. I hate not working out. You'll get there. You just have to find the formula that works for you.
  • itsuki
    itsuki Posts: 520 Member
    Options
    You can totally be both. When I get home, it's plop on the couch with video games and TV.

    I balance it, though, because before I get home I've been at the gym, and before I go to work I run. So I get my exercise in, but when I'm done, I enjoy my couch potato status. I'll go for walks and do active stuff for fun on the weekends, but after a long day (get up at 4, run, get to work by 8, work 'til 5, get to gym at 6, get home by 7:30), I've earned my laziness. :P
  • stardancer7
    stardancer7 Posts: 276 Member
    Options
    I'm lazy too--that's why I've decided to ditch all this fat. Don't want to have to carry it any more.
  • Esther50
    Esther50 Posts: 252
    Options
    I know where you are at. I was like that, in a way still am. It would be so easy for me just to go home and veg on the couch watching tv. This is why I don't go straight home, I go straight to the gym.
    By the time I am done and going home, I have a little more energy (weird even if I am tired from workout).
    I eat my dinner, clean kitchen etc, etc, etc. THEN and only then can I veg on the couch.

    I will say, I cannot, and I mean CANNOT go home first. Once I am home, I am home and going to the gym is out. So I never go home until I have had my workout.
  • Jellyphant
    Jellyphant Posts: 1,400 Member
    Options
    I used to consider myself lazy.... Now I have to MAKE myself take rest days..... somehow I still find time to veg in front of the tv AND work out..... We make time and find time for what's important to us. Obviously working out/losing weight/living healthy is NOT important to you at this point.
    Totally agree with this. Sucks but it's true. I definitely struggle with putting weightloss first. Just gotta get those priorities straight! :flowerforyou:
  • flobeedoodle
    flobeedoodle Posts: 176 Member
    Options
    "Many studies have found that people perform relatively poorly on tests of self-control when they have engaged in a previous, seemingly unrelated act of self-control." ( http://www.apa.org/monitor/2012/01/self-control.aspx )

    You are working 50-55 hour weeks, that's a lot. It's not surprising that you don't have any resources left to push yourself to work out after pushing yourself to work. It doesn't mean you have to give up; other studies have found the will-power is rather like a muscle that can improve in strength with practice. The article I quoted has some interesting suggestions for exercises to improve will-power. Learning about ego-depletion was a sort of bellwether for me; once I understood this mechanism explicitly, I began to be able to shape my own behavior more intentionally, and start working to become the person I want to be.
  • NorthWoodsLee
    NorthWoodsLee Posts: 92 Member
    Options
    Exercise begets exercise, eating healthy begets eating healthy, drinking more water begets drinking even more water......

    Exactly right. I was extremely inactive for years and could not get myself motivated to exercise, despite telling myself often that I'd get started "soon." But when I committed to changing my lifestyle permanently in late May, I started walking briskly, then soon adding other forms of exercise. Now I love to exercise and do something almost every day - run/walk/lift/swim/bike.
  • happythermia
    happythermia Posts: 374
    Options
    Here is what I did.
    I focused on my diet - period.

    I didn't like exercising, or sweating or moving for that matter lol! And when the weight started coming off, it was just sort of this weird natural progression into activity. But you've got to find an exercise you like. Eventually I'd like to get into weights, but I'm not into it now, so I just do yoga and walking.

    Take it all at your own pace! But don't give up :)
  • drmerc
    drmerc Posts: 2,603 Member
    Options
    I'm lazy too--that's why I've decided to ditch all this fat. Don't want to have to carry it any more.

    This
  • Ketomaniac9
    Ketomaniac9 Posts: 108 Member
    Options
    Im lazy as hell but I try to go to the gym for at least an hour 5 days a week.. I usually just go back home and plop on the couch and use the computer till bed.. I need to start reading books lol.

Categories