Month: December 2015

I know I run onto this and I suspect everyone does as well. You have great intentions to workout, to go to the gym and have a workout, but sometimes the motivation just isn’t there.

You know it is important, but there always seems to be something more important. So what do you do to make your workouts happen?

Here are 10 Tips to Get To the Gym

1. Decide what your priorities are today. Sometimes we just don’t feel like going to the gym when we are busy. There is sometimes other things that appear more important. More likely, though, your todo list is just so full of little things that you do not feel the time is right.

Go to the gym anyway.

That time away from home and work is rejuvenating and refreshing to the mind as well as the body.

2. Maybe you are just tired. I have run into the many times. The problem is that the couch is a lot more comfortable then being under a bench press bar.

Better to have a light workout than to skip it. Once you get off your butt and get your workout gear on you can trudge into the gym and make that workout time count for you.

3. Get in a Gym rut. Sometimes the workout today just feels like more of a continuation of yesterday. We all go through times in our workout schedules that everything becomes mundane and we are not motivated because the excitement is gone.

If this is the case then it is time to get a new workout schedule. Go to the gym with absolutely no plan (usually a very bad idea) and see why things are boring you.

Maybe too much cardio lately? Maybe too many weights? Maybe you just need a change and a new routine. Think about your schedule and change it up and make it exciting again.

4. Getting in a gym rut part 2. Sometimes that rut is just a product of overtraining. I have done this before when I am going for a personal best for a few weeks and my boy just gets burned out.

From a weight workout point of view, there are a lot of things that you can do to change up your workout to stop the overtraining. Make sure you are eating enough and resting enough. Look into what is going right and wrong with your eating and rest.

5. Sets, Reps, and Exercises. I find that it is important to change things up a lot. I change exercises often, probably every couple weeks a new exercise gets into my schedule.

Also, I will sometimes vary my sets from 2 up to 4 depending on weight and my plan. Reps are the biggest change I make.

My last set is usually 5 reps, but occasionally I will do a couple workouts in a row where I do one exercise for a couple sets of 100 reps. This feels a lot different than a usually 5-10 rep set and you really have to cut the weight down.

6. Cardio can get boring. If you are always dreading the gym on cardio days (like I do), it is probably because you either don’t know why you are doing it.

If you are not motivated by losing weight, or increasing endurance, then cardio seems like a waste of time. Remember though that the biggest reason for cardio is the health improvements with cardio.

Cardio can improve our concentration and stamina every day, cardio can improve our resting heart rate, and finally cardio will help us in hydration since we will sweat a lot and drink a lot.

7. Cardio is starting to hurt. Not many people can just hit a treadmill every day for months on end. I find that my body gets beat up by running a lot so I really have to cycle through lots of ways to do cardio.

I use a regular bike, an elliptical, treadmill, even rowing. All of these exercises can raise our heart rate and make us sweat but will not beat us down so it is important to change things up as much as possible for cardio.

These are my biggest reasons that I will stay on the couch or at my desk and make excuses why I am not working out. Of course, this changes for everyone.

I want to add one thing, and 8th reason and that is the rituals we build into our lives. I know that there are things that go on in my head and in my body before and during a great workout and that is the same for everyone.

If you can do a better job of recognizing these rituals before and during your workout, you will have better workouts more often and miss a lot fewer workouts.

I will try to write more on this subject tomorrow, just think about that today and see if you can identify some of those triggers in yourself.

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One of the problems that you may have right now in getting started or moving forward in your fitness and health goals is the fact that you may have no confidence that you can succeed.

Confidence is something that is built only from the inside. We have all met people that are very confident and many people that have no confidence.

Often I find that there is no reason for people in either group.

The best way to build confidence is to simply achieve simple goals and build upon them.

One Simple Step. One Little Goal

When I say that you need to achieve a goal I don’t mean that you need to win an Olympic medal or anything, all you need to do is set a tiny goal, achieve it and move on.

The first time years ago that I rode my bicycle to work was a huge leap of faith at the time, I had not ridden a bike in years. After I rode to work and home that first time I knew that I could do it again, I learned that dressing and packing differently would make it easier and I was confident that I now had a new skill.

This is all that you need to build confidence. There is no secret to building confidence although everyone thinks that there is. People spend years and lots of dollars trying to find the secret to great self-confidence when all it really takes to be confident is to build little goals, achieve them and move on to slightly bigger goals.

Confidence in life is just an attitude. If you have ever heard the term “fake it till you make it” then you know that others will see you as you project back to them. If you are timid in your own life to others then you are probably speaking to your inner self the same way. If you project and talk to others in confidence, then you are probably using better self-talk.

Self Talk

The next step to having great confidence to achieve your dreams is to have good self-talk. Never say negative things if possible. You do not have to be one of those irritating people that sees everything as being great, all you need to do is avoid thinking of things negatively as much.

I talk a lot, in my head, as well as to other people, and often I will catch myself in a bit of a funk in the morning where nothing seems to be going smoothly.

One crappy thing builds on another and finally I will catch myself noticing the bad stuff going on and I snap myself back to just seeing things in a better light. I start by focusing on the good things that have happened so far in the day and just try to build on those.

This may sound corny and like some kind of new age voodoo but I have always found this to work.

So today, try to find the good in things, make sure you are building little goals and achieving them and make sure everything going on between your ears is helping you, not hurting you in the long run.

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Many different illnesses are able to be treated using the procedure of acupuncture and one of those illnesses that are able to be easily treated is Depression.

Even though Depression is a mental illness and not a physical ailment, the whole process of acupuncture is able to cure almost any mental disorder that the Chinese used back in ancient civilizations to cure.

There is no doubt, also, that ancient Chinese individuals and society did suffer from the horrible effects that some people call Depression.

Of course, Depression has lots of other names and there are actually many other mental illnesses that should be able to be treated with acupuncture.

Acupuncture to Treat Many Mental Illnesses

Treating Depression with Acupuncture

Aside from Depression, though, many types of anxiety disorders, schizophrenia, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, along with a whole plethora of other mental illnesses, need to be treated with this revolutionary medicine that has been available in China for the past thousand of years but has just been introduced to the United States in recent decades.

One important issue, though, that’s important to note when trying to treat Depression or any other mental illness with acupuncture, is the fact that those who undergo the process should have some remote belief that they will be cured.

For example, if a person has claimed that they have literally tried everything to overcome their Depression in their life and they don’t believe anything else will help them then chances are that they won’t benefit very much from acupuncture.

On the other hand, there are also plenty of people who would more than likely be ready and willing to put their trust in a medicine form that was their last hope to heal their body and mind.

Acupuncture Treats the Body to Help the Mind

If one is going to use acupuncture in order to treat Depression, though, another good issue to realize is just how acupuncture works on the body in order to heal the mind from its ailments. After all, Depression is not just simply a physical ailment at times but many times it can take over one’s whole mind.

In the acupuncture therapy, it is believed that the same positive effects that are felt throughout the body are also felt within the mind. Indeed, though, this mindset has worked for many people when treating their Depression and other mental illnesses.

Just because negative feelings are left in the mind doesn’t mean that the needles associated with acupuncture are not able to help them.

Furthermore, there have been plenty of individuals all over the world besides China and the Far East countries that have had success with acupuncture therapy.

For starters, many people here in the United States have had success with this age-old technique, however, they may be fearful to speak up just because of what others may think.

Try Acupuncture to Treat Depression

If you have had acupuncture performed on you, though, then you probably already know the positive effects it can have.

If you have been suffering from Depression, though, the best thing to do would be to not only seek out an acupuncture therapist, but to witness to other people about the benefits of acupuncture once it has been established that you have truly been healed!

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