Like most things, the hardest part is often getting started. Starting a new health and fitness venture is no exception.
Whether it’s for the first time or after a long time, most of the time, it’s a challenge.
Challenging because it seems hard, challenging because it takes effort, challenging because you don’t know where to start, challenging because you don’t know how to start, challenging because it takes commitment (on multiple fronts), challenging because what if it ‘doesn’t work’*?
So, ask yourself this:
What activities do you enjoy?
Start there.
If you have forgotten what you enjoy, here might be some examples!:
Walking the dog
Tennis
Golf
Scuba diving
Weightlifting
Football (soccer?)
Ultimate frisbee
Horse riding
Salsa dancing
Table tennis
Trail running
Now, pick 2-3-times of the week you can participate in this activity. Pencil it in your diary like a Doctors appointment. You never want to miss a Doctors appointment.
Repeat this until exercise doesn’t seem so challenging and you have started to find a routine, then you can think about the finer details. See the next blog for more on what I mean here.
*Side note, I have put ‘doesn’t work’ in quotation marks because personally, I don’t think there is such a thing as ‘not working’. If you stick with the chosen activity, great. If you don’t stick with the chosen activity or it doesn’t give you the results you thought, you have learnt that this isn’t effective for you right now. You have also learnt how to start something, and things are always easier the second time around.