Gym Motivation: Mental Attitude for Beginners

How many of you know someone who made a new year resolution, who decided to get a gym membership and get fit.

But then eventually, QUIT!

Why?

Because they lost their MOTIVATION! They burnt out mentally!

I too was one such person.

Getting fit ,going to the gym and working out is a mental game, rather than a physical one. There are things you need to know when you decide and start going to the gym. Only deciding to get a healthy lifestyle is not going to get you one. Deciding only gets you in the game, you have to play the game now. You have to have a specific mindset if you want this to work. Fitness is not a destination, its a way of life.
Here are three things, to help you keep that fire alive:

1. Find your WANT

Almost every one of you has a capable body to do whatever you want. Each one of you is capable of researching on nutrition, diet, and exercise. But all the research is going to go to waste if you don’t find a purpose to do what you are doing. You won’t apply your knowledge because you lose motivation without a purpose.

Before you start your journey physically, you must fuel yourself the right reasons, the right fuel to sustain the entire journey. Without the right reasons, you start focusing on ups and downs of daily activities and lose focus and motivation to continue. When you lose sight of the purpose, you get demotivated. You need to find that purpose you can stick to. To successfully change your lifestyle, it’s the WANT factor that matters.

Question yourself, why do you want this change?

Your want can be anything like losing or gaining weight, getting a good physique, getting in shape for an event, getting fit to get health back, preparing for a marathon, improving your looks or visual appeal, proving a point, for your family or friends, etc. Find your want, your reason to workout and you are halfway through. Your want has to move you. It’s the single most important factor.

You can have more than one wants and your wants will change with time, so it’s important to evaluate your wants once in a while.

2. Get educated, Research!

For every other field in life, you studied, researched and learned. Life is all about learning. Fitness is a vast field. You need to educate yourself and take time out to do your own research, only then will you appreciate it. You cannot set realistic goals without knowing what they should be. If you are a logical person like me, you cannot expect to stay motivated and get results if you don’t know what you are doing and why you are doing. I have provided a list of resources for you to have a head start, the rest is up to you.

• Scooby’s Workshop- A great website and bunch of YouTube videos on exercise, forms, nutrition, diet and basically all the stuff you need to start out. I highly encourage you to explore and read the articles on the website. Also, check out the tools for custom fitness plans.
• Scott Herman Fitness- Great workouts routines, motivation and logical reason why you have to do what you have to do.
• Guru Mann Fitness- A great source by a fitness model and trainer from Indian origin. Has some great stuff.
• Tarun Gill- Relatively new, but he’s the real deal. He covers up even the taboo topics in the fitness industry. Highly recommended.
• Passion4Profession- Good for workout routines with timing.

3. Visualize your end Goal

Visualization is an important personal development tool. When you are clear about what you want, picture yourself achieving your goals. Performing or rehearsing an event in the mind trains it and creates the neural patterns to teach your muscles to do exactly what you want them to do. Envision yourself achieving your goals vividly to remind yourself of your objective and what you need to do to reach it. Watching the mental imagery of the final you, what you want to become, helps you focus on your goals and motivates you to work hard and stay committed to workouts.

There are a bunch of different factors like keeping a log, having a partner, etc, that come into play. But my aim here is to give you a strong mental start not what you do after you get comfortable.

Fitness is a mind-body connection of invincibility when both are synced. If you can stay strong mentally and give a valiant effort, day in and day out, nobody can stop you from becoming the person you want to be! This might not be as easy as it sounds but it’s worth it! You have nothing to lose, everything to gain!