I think I can say that I am a pretty lazy person. One of the goals that I set for myself this year is to take advantage of the recreation center we have at UCSB and try to exercise more often. I personally walk around everywhere and don’t have a skateboard or a bike so I get sort of lazy making the walk from my apartment in Isla Vista to the gym. I know I’m not the only person who has decided that their new goal this year to be more active! Being active isn’t only good for you physically but it’s good for you mentally as well. With some of these tips below, I feel like you’ll be able to better motivate yourself to be active!
1. Get a gym buddy
It is easy to give yourself excuses about not making it to the gym, but if you get a gym buddy and work towards a common goal, you won’t feel so lonely and will feel more motivated to accomplish what you are doing. Having a gym buddy is super beneficial because you can discuss your results or what that is that you’re going through and they understand you. They might also motivate you to be active more frequently which is great!
2. Make a bet
This sounds sort of funny, but one way that my roommate last year motivated herself to go to the gym more was by setting a bet with another close friend of ours. This bet required her to go to the gym three or four days a week and whoever lost the bet first would either lose money or would have to buy the other person dinner. It might sound lame but if you are really competitive, this could motivate you to be more active!
3. Get/use your fitness trackers
Recently, I got a Fitbit Alta and I can definitely say that it has motivated me to at least move around every hour. You can set your own goals in the application. but usually the pre-set goal is walking 10,000 steps everyday. For each hour of the day where you’re not sleeping, the fitness tracker will vibrate and tell you to “take a stroll” so you can at least get 250 steps for that hour. When you do get 10,000 steps, it shows some confetti and has a mini visual celebration on the screen of the device. I feel like it’s a small but good motivation! You can also get badges and compete with your friends. This can also sync with other applications like Achievemint which I will talk about more below.
4. Get the phone app Achievemint
I first saw an ad for this application and decided to download it out of curiosity. This app basically pays you to be active! You will have to sync your health applications with it so they can give you points! When you accumulate 10,000 points, they give you $10 to spend! You get points for logging in your exercise and sleeping habits, food and water consumption, tweeting and you can even get offers for studies! If you are moving around during the day, why not get this application and get some free money? This application is downloadable in the app store!
5. Improve your Health and Try New Things
From talking to my friends, I learned that we should stay active because that helps with our aging and some medical conditions like osteoporosis which is sort of inevitable. Even though we can’t stop it from happening, we can improve the situation by being active! For example, you might not be the biggest fan of running but you can always try other activities like weight lifting and yoga which is also beneficial. Finding an activity you like is good because it makes what you do more enjoyable too! This way, you will dread it less and be more inclined to do it and be more active!
Hopefully the suggestions above have given you some ideas about being active! Let’s accomplish our goals and be healthy!