What If You Hate Working Out?
Once, long ago in UPCF history, we ran a program that offered 6-week boot camps. Michelle did one of those. She liked us, but the working out was not so fun for her. She didn’t stay. Quite a bit later, she came back to chat because she knew that exercise was good for her and she needed to do it. In that conversation, she said to me, “Just so you know, I hate working out.”
So we dug in a little more to figure out what worked for her and what didn’t. Working out on her own was a no-go. Working out in a group didn’t really do it either, but she definitely needed some accountability. So we decided on Personal Training. We really dived in to what she wanted around fitness – why exercise at all? And ultimately it came down to wanting to live her life: to be able to be around for a long time and be capable for as much of that time as possible. That was 18 months ago.
We started with some general strength and conditioning. After a while we checked in on how things were going and she was running into trouble with some joint issues. We changed her programming and spent months working on joint mobility and strength. She got way stronger and was feeling great. Then, as she continued to think about longevity, she became concerned about her muscle mass. So we changed her programming again to focus on hypertrophy – or muscle growth – and in the last 5 weeks, she’s gained two pounds of lean muscle mass. (Note: this is incredible. For some context, check out this post on how long muscle gain typically takes).
Now, with exactly one exception, the odds are 100% that if you’re reading this, you are not Michelle. So what does this have to do with you?
Michelle had some friction points around training: doing it on her own had no accountability, doing it in a group had an energy that didn’t feel like it fit for her, the physical aspects of training were uncomfortable, it was hard to find a place where she liked and trusted the people enough to want to spend time there. She travels and it takes time to get to the gym, change, work out, drive home, and clean up. And the combination of all of those things ultimately were too much and were keeping her from exercising.
All of us have some point where the number of friction points will outpace your tolerance for them, and when they do, you stop doing whatever the thing is. If you still want to do that thing, you need to figure out why those friction points are so hard… OR you can just figure out how to eliminate enough friction points that you keep going. (That’s the strategy we tend to use).
Michelle still doesn’t particularly enjoy doing a set of push-ups to failure, or the feeling of struggling under a barbell. But we’ve been able to eliminate enough other friction points that she’s been consistent for over a year and a half. And through that consistency, she has made remarkable progress.
Part of our job with her (and with you) is doing whatever we can do to eliminate as many friction points as possible so that you just keep going. Because that breeds consistency, and consistency is where the magic lies.
