I want to tell you how easy it is to workout every day.
But before I begin, I want you to do one thing. I want you to grab your car keys and go out to your garage, carport, or driveway and get into your car.
Put the keys in the ignition and turn. If your car normally works, there should be no surprises here. Your car will start.
Now here’s the important part.
While the car is running, I want you to think about all the possible places you could go to at that moment. The post office, the supermarket, Miami, Cancun. When you have a running car, you can go absolutely anywhere. All you need to do is get it started, then you can decide from there.
When people start an exercise program, the most important skill to develop is to learn how to get started. Just turning the key is often the most difficult thing to do.
Have you ever been overwhelmed by exercise or your exercise program? Maybe you thought you didn’t have enough time to exercise 30 minutes a day. Or maybe you knew that you needed to workout for an hour and all you had was fifteen minutes.
I bet you I know what happened. You put working out off for the next day. I know, because I’ve done it too. The danger of this is that suddenly it is a week later and you still haven’t found the one hour you needed to exercise. This is how many good intentioned people fail with their exercise programs. They think too far in advance and never find the ideal situation for their ideal workout. They get overwhelmed.
Imagine if you could replicate the action you took when you started your car–find a key that would instantly get you going–and apply it to exercise. Could you see how easy that would be?
It would start by, first, not even thinking about the type of exercises you want to do for the day. Forget about “I’ll do 20 min of cardio today,” or “I’ll pop in the gym to do some chest and abs.” What you need to do is simply get a key. Something that will get you moving.
For many people it is a single stretch or exercise that they can do. Once they’ve done the ONE exercise then they can decide where to go from there. Just the same as the possibilities in your car… you can take your workout where ever you want to go once you’ve started.
It’s basically a mind trick.
Your body wants to exercise. In fact, it always wants to exercise. We are naturally and always in motion. Our minds generally out-think our instinct and then we end up on the couch for 4-6 hours watching the USA movie marathon. All the while knowing how much your body wants to move.
So we trick our bodies, by using our key exercise, and once we’re moving we have the option to move more.
Sometimes you won’t move after and you’re body will turn off again and that’s OK. On the other hand, many times you will get going and you will have great workouts.
Why does this work?
Because you’ve put your body in motion. Any motion creates a reaction. Once you are moving then you can decide if you want to continue.
When you never make it to the starting blocks–never get moving–you never have the option to continue or to stop. Just like the car metaphor, I used earlier. If you never start your car, how the heck are you going to get to the grocery store?
When it comes to exercise, it is very easy to out-think your goals. We get into our cars, hope we’ll make it to the store and never turn the key to physically get moving.
It’s really that easy. Find a key. Turn it. Get fit.
When you are overwhelmed about time and energy, you’ll never, never get started. Let your key start you up and succeed with your health and fitness.
Kevin Gianni is an author and founder of LiveAwesome.com, the no-fluff resource for foods that promote weight loss, optimal health and motivation expert interviews for the busy person [http://www.liveawesome.com/enter].
Visit LiveAwesome.com [http://www.liveawesome.com/enter] today for a free report, “How to Organize the Kids, Work, Laziness and Your Health and Still Get the Results You’ve Always Wanted!”
Kevin is also the co-author of “The Busy Person’s Fitness Solution.”
Click here for In-home Connecticut personal training [http://www.yourlifestylefitness.com]
