Motivation is the name of the game

December 8, 2023 / No Comments

On my PT course this weekend someone asked me what my motivation is when I’m working out to keep going and not stop when it gets tough, and it got me thinking.

Why is it that this time, for the first time in probably 15 years, I have committed to a fit and healthy lifestyle? Motivation. It’s an incredibly powerful tool if you can figure out what yours is.

The interesting thing about motivation is that it can change all the time, whether it’s what gets you out on that very first run, or what gets you up out of a lovely warm bed on leg day, or even what makes you sign up for a fitness challenge. It can change day to day, week to week and it depends on your goals.

If you don’t know where to start on finding your motivation, these are mine, they might get you thinking.

I’ve always been a bit of a girl power advocate because I don’t want to ever have to rely on someone else for my own happiness and success. I’m capable of making my own life amazing and the people that I choose to be in it are very special to me.

Getting in shape and being the best version of me that I can be physically has helped me to become stronger mentally. Being strong physically and mentally puts me in the independent position that I want to be in and knowing that it will only get better from here keeps me going back to the gym, lifting the weights and exploring the optimum way of eating for me.

I know I’ve talked about ‘fitspiration’ or ‘fitspo’ before but it really helped me to move on from the ‘skinny = good’ mindset into ‘strong & healthy = good’. By following some beautiful and strong young women on Instagram, it kept me going before I could start seeing changes in my own body. By aiming for an athletic body type that I’ve never had before and working out a programme to get me there, the small steps of progress have kept me going. I’ve become my own personal fitspo!

What motivates you when it’s cold outside and you’re tired?

July 21, 2024 / No Comments

This is something that has really caught my attention over the past few days for a few reasons. It’s an advert from Always called #LikeAGirl exploring why ‘like a girl’ becomes a negative phrase as girls grow up.

As a girl who was a serious football-playing, anti-dresses, action man tomboy, being told that I couldn’t do anything as well as the boys because I was a girl was like a kick in the stomach. Just because I was the only girl at football training it didn’t give anyone the right to say that I was good ‘for a girl’. No. Get it right. I was good. The fact that I was a girl was irrelevant.

As I got older I was discouraged from playing mixed sports because no one ever included ‘the girl’ because what’s the point? She can’t kick the ball, she can’t hit the ball and she DEFINITELY can’t throw the ball. Bullshit.

I fully appreciate that men and women are physically very different, for example women hold onto body fat more than men (and for good reason, you need to be a certain weight and body fat percentage for everything to keep working properly and enable you to have babies). But stop comparing my achievements to those of my male counterparts.

When I run, I run for me. When I work out, I work out to improve myself. When I eat healthily that’s because I’m listening to my body and giving it what it needs.

As one of the women in the film says, I run, workout and eat like a girl. Because I am a girl. A girl who’s damn proud of who she is and what she’s achieved over the last year.

So I think I’ll carry on acting like a girl thank you very much.

(Source: https://www.youtube.com/)