10 Great Exercise Motivation Techniques To Lose Weight

How do you find motivation to exercise when you just don’t feel like getting off your butt? So you’ve begun an exercise program to get in shape and loose weight. Congratulations! You’ve taken a big step towards making big improvements in your life. Even the most exuberant fitness enthusiast loses sight of his goals every once in a while.

There are a million ways to motivate yourself to exercise, actually, but these are a few that have worked for me. Here are some of the best exercise motivation tips I’ve successfully used. Hopefully, you’ll find them useful too.

The Best Motivation Techniques for Exercise

  1. Get a workout partner: having someone to train with can keep you on track with your exercise program. It’s a bit harder to back out of an exercise session because you just don’t feel like it when you know someone is waiting for you.
  2. Calories burned: If you count calories (and it’s really one of the most effective ways to lose weight), you know that the more you exercise, the more calories you burn and the bigger your calorie deficit.
  3. Reward Yourself: Planning rewards for your small and your large exercise accomplishments can help keep you going even when you don’t feel like working out. Remembering to keep specific, set goals for yourself and give your goals a time line. Rewards for large and small achievements help you to celebrate your success and work toward the next goal.
  4. Exercise first thing in the morning, every morning. Folks, if you’re really serious about this exercise thing, then get serious about it. People who exercise 6 to 7 days per week first thing in the morning are much more successful at exercising consistently than those who do the 2 or 3 day thing.
  5. Schedule: People who set specific times to exercise are much more likely to accomplish their goals over time. This obviously is important for very busy people. It’s really much better for everybody this way. But more importantly, a schedule is motivating for you and should be closely related to your goals, which we discussed above.
  6. Wear Fabulous Workout Gear: Whether you are an avid fitness queen, or trying the gym for the first time, what you wear to workout truly does impact how you feel about the experience and how motivated you are to continue.
  7. Put your favourite music on: Songs that make you feel like getting up and dancing are a great exercise motivator. Make a selection of your favourite tracks and put it on at your workout time. Don’t listen to those special songs any other time. Save them for the workout time. That way, you have something to look forward to.
  8. The scale: It’s not motivating to weigh yourself every day, as your weight fluctuates. But if you weigh yourself once a week, you’ll be motivated to have it keep going down, instead of up. Combine the scale with the measuring tape, and measure your waist.
  9. Fantasize – when doing cardio exercises, like on an elliptical trainer or treadmill, you can role-play in your mind. Imagine yourself running the Marathon in the Olympics or cross-country skiing through snow-covered woods. It’s your fantasy, so go wild!
  10. Train for a local 5K or 10K walk or run in your area. This can be great motivation to exercise on a regular basis. I’ve seen many people transformed from couch potatoes to lean, mean, exercising machines because they decided to enter and train for a competition like this. Don’t think you can’t do it…You can!

Read through these ‘motivators’ and if you have a motivation to exercise idea that works for you, a tactic that gets and keeps you fired up. These strategies will help you through the difficult times and inspire you to give your all in the positive moments of physical activity.