Many people are suddenly thrust into having to workout from home. If you are accustomed to attending fitness classes or using a local gym, the Safer at Home protocols that have people having to fend for themselves and take control of their own fitness has been challenging. If you’re seeking motivation to workout from home, we have some advice!
Never Miss a Monday
If you’re looking for some Monday workout motivation, dedicating yourself to the “never miss a Monday movement” is a good way. There are many reasons you should commit to this.
First, if you start the week with a workout, you are more likely to work out for the rest of the week. Mondays are like a clean slate. Second, it becomes a habit. One of the easiest ways to never miss a Monday is to find yourself an accountability partner. Sure, meeting someone in real life is a great way to stay focused; but, your accountability partner can be virtual.
Working out on a Monday can also help you to kickstart your week of better eating. There is something about that clean slate again, and knowing you are painting your picture in a positive light. Monday morning workouts lead to healthier choices for the day, and often for the rest of the week!
Weekly Goals
Setting weekly goals for yourself can help you to find accountability and may prove helpful in meeting your fitness goals. This can be as simple as, “I am going to work out four times this week” to more specific goals. For example, perhaps you are going to run twice, do HIIT training once, walk once and try something new on the fifth day.
Your goals might pertain to overall wellness. Going back to the idea of Monday Motivation and how it can help a person to stay accountability to healthier eating for the upcoming week, you might commit to using an app such as My Fitness Pal to track your eating for a week.
Monthly Goal
For some runners, a monthly goal is a great way to stay motivated. In one local women’s running group in the city of Marinette, Wisconsin, they set monthly goals to help keep people moving. For the month of May, it is simple: work out wearing the color of the day and post a picture with the #runtherainbow. Some women are running, some doing online workouts. Workouts can be thinking outside of the box such as taking a hike or walking with friends.
The point is, the monthly goal is just to move wearing the assigned color. Participation in this challenge has been incredible!
An Accountability Partner
Your accountability partner may be someone you meet with to run. Maybe it’s a person you do virtual workouts with. How does that work? You could meet via Google Hangout or Facebook to do the same workout at the same time. Ever heard the expression misery loves company???
Your accountability partner could be in the form of a virtual coach who sends workouts and listens to your daily feedback. Some individuals respond well to daily feedback, as well as enjoying the vision a coach has for them.
Accountability Tools
There are tools to help hold yourself accountable, as well as holding your group accountable if you are working with an accountability partner. Strava, for example, is a workout tracker and you can use it to see one another’s workouts. People set challenges to see how many miles they have run, for example, in a given week.
Apple Watch has a setting where you can share fitness tracking with friends. This is a way to send kudos to one another when goals are met. You can even challenge one another to a virtual competition.
Average Joe Speaks Up:
Meaghan Nana-Sinkam, for example, states that, “I have a lot of internal motivation, but like having a coach to tell me what to do for specific goals. I would see a workout and certain paces and think they were unrealistic but then usually I could hit the paces. So a coach can see more capability in me than I can see for myself sometimes.”
Daphne Matalene, Kim Lations & Christina Xydias work to keep one another motivated. Currently they are doing a pushup challenge. They text daily updates on where they are at regarding program completion. These ladies also meet periodically and discuss training. All three of them had been in deep training for spring marathons that were cancelled due to Covid-19, and had to recalibrate their training. They meet periodically in Zoom sessions to discuss mileage, shifting training, and life in general. A visit to their Zoom session may include topics ranging from weekly mileage, free fitness apps and favorite wines to enjoy while “safer at home.”
Honore MacCoy-Patty and Bryan Board – meet as virtual training buddies. They check in daily to motivate, commiserate and kick each other in the booty as needed. Ironically, the duo has never met in person. They realized they had similar home life situations and worked well to motivate one another toward goals they felt they might not otherwise have achieved.
Fat and Frustrated – Gosh, this might sound terrible, but hear me out. Larry Wapnitsky works with a group that calls themselves Fat and Frustrated. The chat through Facebook messenger and discuss struggles of workouts and life, as the two impact one another. They talk about the workouts they did, as well as the ones they did not do. Wapnitsky says the group keeps them all grounded.
Tammy Sephany states that her local gym has a social media page where members are holding one another accountable. They post and cheer one another one and the virtual support keeps her moving forward!
Struggling?
If you are struggling with motivating yourself to workout from home, try some of the tips here. Start small: set yourself a weekly goal. Make it attainable. Then, reach out to find an accountability partner. You will probably find other people in the same boat. Find resources, such as free online videos or apps, to help guide your workouts.
Listen to the Average Joe’s and remember: you are not in this alone, unless you choose to be.
Sources:
Seven Reasons to Never Miss a Monday
Four Ways to Motivate Yourself to Workout
Five Tips for Staying Accountable