Two weeks ago, I almost puked and it inspired this article.
My friend Noah was in town, and he invited me to join him in a special workout with some other internet dorks (that’s what I call affectionately refer to those of us who make our living online). Noah lives in Austin and I haven’t seen in him in a while, so although the idea of going out in public (yikes), and working out in a group setting (nope) are things I try to avoid, I figured I’d be a good sport.
Upon arriving at the gym, I walked into a room with 25 other people, and an instructor who looked like he had been picked from a “good looking super jacked trainer” casting call.
What transpired was a 25-minute bootcamp style workout where we all did various things like burpees, box jumps, squats, dips, etc. There was no break, and you moved from one exercise to the next as thumping hip hop played, the training yelling louder and louder to encourage us to push ourselves.
I HATED EVERY SECOND OF IT.
I think I would rather get a root canal than go through that style of workout again. Or watch an episode of the Real Housewives of Rivendell.
Let’s be clear: I’m not saying this just wasn’t my cup of tea…This wasn’t mild-displeasure, but pure misery.
As I finished my gazillionth burpee, wheezing and out of breath, I looked at my friend Roman and we both kind of chuckled: “this is not my thing,” Roman said to me. Okay actually what he said was more profanity-laced, but I like to keep things relatively clean around here.
When the workout was over, I glanced at some of the other people around the room, also drenched in sweat, but with smiles on their faces:“That was great!” and “I loved it, thanks man!” phrases were shouted.
Although I knew I probably wouldn’t enjoy this type of workout, after realizing just how much I hated it – I knew I needed to write about it.
“Just how many people hate these workouts, and think they hate working out?” I wondered as I pushed myself to the point of puking during the workout.
Today, I’m going to give you permission that you didn’t realize you needed.
Don’t like “exercise” ? It’s probably the type
I have been training in gyms, parks, and playgrounds for 15 years.
I own and operate a health and fitness website, and thoroughly enjoy exercise. It’s one of my favorite things to do, and if I miss a workout, it feels like something in my life is missing. And yet, I found myself during that workout, cursing the exercise gods, wishing I was doing anything else.
You see, I like exercise to be an enjoyable and solitary experience. Pushing myself to the point of almost puking is not fun for me. Training in a group setting is not also not generally enjoyable for me, as I prefer my workouts to be contemplative and meditative. Headphones in, playlist on, eyes down, mouth closed, doing my routine designed with specific goals in mind.
Because of this, other than going for extended walks around New York City, hiking when I can, or doing ring routines that last for a few minutes, I don’t “do cardio.”
So a bootcamp/crossfit style workout is not one I particularly enjoy.
People look at me like I’m crazy when I tell them I don’t “go for a run” ever. It’s like there’s this law that says “in shape = formal cardio,” which I disagree with strongly.
I couldn’t help but think about somebody that might be in their mid 30s, who has been sitting hunched over a desk for the past decade, potentially also severely overweight, and ends up in a boot camp as their first fitness experience.
I think some people will love it. And maybe they build up to Crossfit or Soul Cycle or some other similar type of workout atmosphere. And that’s AMAZING. They love that feeling of pushing themselves harder than they thought possible, they get to work out alongside others, and it gives them a hell of a workout. They end these classes really beat up, and fired up.
That’s what some people will do.
I think many other people won’t particularly enjoy this workout style, especially if they’re rookies to fitness or very overweight.
Sure, they might find a way to push through enough times that they learn to “love to hate it,” and make this a thing they do regularly.
HOWEVER, I imagine the far majority of out of shape/new people fit into this category: Hate the workout, assume this “fitness” is the only kind of fitness, and get discouraged and embarrassed. “Screw this, I’m going back to my couch.”
Like Billy Madison getting teased when he HAD to write in Cursive, he got discouraged and never wanted to come back to school:
There’s nothing wrong with bootcamps and Crossfit. I would LOVE it if I liked that stuff. But It never worked for me. If that’s your thing, keep killin’ it! These are amazing ways to get in shape for the right type of person. (Here are my official thoughts on Crossfit, btw.)
But for those of you who don’t find these workout styles fun, motivating, and easy to get yourself to do, I want to make something abundantly clear: if you strongly despise a certain style of working out and don’t want to do it, it doesn’t make you a bad person, or lazy, or a quitter.
It might just mean that you don’t like this kind of training! So don’t do it. Ever again. Never ever.
You don’t have to prove anything to anybody but yourself
When I ran cross country my freshman year of high school, I hated every day of practice.
But I had friends on the team, and told myself I was a quitter if I stopped. I made it through the fall season, barely. As I trained for the upcoming season during the next summer, I refused to let myself get ‘beat’ by stopping running, even though I hated it.
Finally, after a month went by of increasing misery, I accepted my training preferences and decided that putting myself through another four months of torture to prove a point to nobody that I could do something I hated was the dumbest idea I’ve ever had.
Well, second dumbest. I once thought it was a good idea to cast a fishing rod a few weeks after breaking my collarbone. That was the dumbest thing I’ve ever done.
So, when I stopped running, I decided to try something else: I got a gym membership.
And that gym membership changed my life, and started me down a path that led me to Nerd Fitness.
Find your fitness
Today, I’m giving you permission to make some changes:
- If you don’t like “exercise,” it doesn’t make you a bad person.
- If you don’t like to run, it doesn’t mean you are a quitter or doomed to stay overweight.
- If you have gone to a bootcamp and it kicked your ass and you hated it, it doesn’t mean you’re weak.
- If you have gone to a gym and you hated lifting weights, you never have to pick up another weight again in your life.
Instead, I want you to find the type of fitness that brings you to life. If you haven’t done that yet, you haven’t looked enough places. So look more places.
How about rock climbing?
Swing dancing?
Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu?
Geocaching?
LARPing?
Kung-fu?
These are all awesome forms of exercise and will get you to a pretty solid baseline of health.
After all, how you eat will determine 80-90% of your physique.
If you are trying to look a certain way or build certain skills , then YES you will need to train and eat a certain way. And next week we’ll show you exactly how to customize your training to your goals.
For the rest of us muggles just trying to lose some weight, get in better shape, or look a little better, eating healthy and doing a fun form of fitness a few times a week along with some walks will actually get you most of the way there.
Don’t worry about getting your heart rate into the “fat burning zone” which is nonsense.
Don’t worry about “metabolic conditioning” or “WODs” or mile splits.
Don’t feel bad if doing squats and deadlifts aren’t your thing and you’d rather be outside in nature. Or that using an elliptical makes you want to cry out of boredom.
Instead, do the thing that actually brings you joy and gets you moving. THAT is what “exercise” is: For me, it’s gymnastic rings and power lifting.
The rest of Team Nerd Fitness is quite varied:
- For Staci, it’s powerlifting.
- For Jim, it’s olympic lifting and gymnastics.
- For Baker, it’s Brazilian Jiu Jitsu
- For Alek, it’s ultimate Frisbee and Crossfit.
- For Margaret and Darryl, it’s martial arts
- For Taylor, it’s lifting and bodyweight training.
- For Noel, it’s the NF Academy workouts.
Despite that list being quite “all over the place,” it’s all tied together by one principle: we exercise in a certain way because we enjoy it. This is why you can create a free character [link] on Nerd Fitness with a focus in whatever reaches out to you.
We also all know that some basic strength training, even if it’s not our mail focal point, makes us better and safer at the other activities we choose to do, so we all mix in a bit of that with our routines too.
It’s why principle #1 of NF is to train in a way that you enjoy! This will allow you to stay excited and motivated about moving – if you force yourself to do things you hate all the time, you’ll give up the second you reach an obstacle.
This is built into every element of Nerd Fitness, and we can help you find the path towards the life you want to live. It starts with a foundation of fun and the right attitude towards strength.
Stop today. Start today.
I want you to have an honest conversation with yourself right now:
- If you are brand new to fitness, remove any preconceived notions you have about how you’re supposed to train. There’s no perfect way to train, but I’ll tell you there IS a wrong way – forcing yourself to do something you despise because you think you have to.
- If you’re already on your fitness journey, is there something you force yourself to do because you’ve always done it, or because you think you have to keep doing it? If you’re doing it to reach a specific goal, good for you! But if not (and it just so happens to be what you think exercise is), can you STOP that thing?
I want to hear from you:
What’s one things with regards to fitness you have been forcing yourself to do, or the mental image you have for fitness that has kept you from starting?
And what’s one NEW thing you’re going to try, or an enjoyable form of exercise you’re going to do more of?
If you are lost and don’t have any money or time to try new things, do this instead. Load up an audiobook or your favorite podcast, put on a pair of shoes, and go for a walk.
We all have to start somewhere, so we might as well enjoy it from the first day too! This will help you actually build the habit of doing the activity rather than doing something because you think you HAVE to.
Once you’re ready to set some elite performance or physique goals, we can talk about sacrifice and doing things for reasons other than pure enjoyment…but until then, have fun.
We’ll be covering specific performance and physique goals next week. Get ready!
-Steve
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photo: PROReiterlied: lego, Steven Depolo: start
source https://www.nerdfitness.com/blog/2016/11/10/exercise-sucks-heres-what-to-do-about-it/
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