The Psychology of Fitness: Motivation and Mindset

April, 2024

Motivation and mindset play a crucial role in ensuring that you are best placed to achieve your goals.

How many times have you given up going to the gym or exercising because the motivation isn’t there? Maybe you have a small setback in your progress and you stop exercising for a while or don’t push yourself because “what’s the point”?

These are all common hurdles to get over and I’m going to explain why motivation and mindset are linked to your overall performance.

Understanding motivation

Motivation can be one of the toughest things to sustain. You’ll probably start your fitness journey with bundles of enthusiasm but this can wane over time.

We get motivation in two ways – intrinsic and extrinsic.

Intrinsic motivation comes from yourself, it is your own desire to get fitter, healthier, and achieve the goals you have set out. Extrinsic motivation is influenced by external factors, such as doing something because you’ll be rewarded for it or get recognition.

While a personal trainer can be great for continued motivation, to achieve what you want from exercise you need to have the desire from within too. Small tweaks to your routine to keep it varied or setting some micro goals for yourself rather than focusing on the big picture all the time can all help with motivation.

Having a positive mindset

Even though you can be highly motivated, you will experience some set-backs on the way and this is where having the right mindset comes in.

Barriers can arise as you go through your progress and being able to overcome these positively will help greatly. Embrace any failures you have and view them, not as a reason to give up, but rather as a learning opportunity. When you hit an inevitable fitness plateau, look at why that is and adjust your training to overcome it.

Things like implementing positive self-talk when you work out can have a huge impact on reducing negative thinking and instead creating a positive mindset.

Motivation and mindset are both crucial

Having a constant stream of motivation combined with a positive mindset is vital if you want to achieve your goals.

It isn’t always easy to retain the motivation. Don’t be too hard on yourself if you temporarily falter because everyone has felt the same way at some point. Sometimes we need an external push to keep us going – whether that is from a PT or somewhere else.

Also, going into your fitness routine with a positive mindset will do wonders for your performance. Failure or a setback shouldn’t be something to put you off or make you give up, rather it gives you an opportunity to step back and assess what you need to change. Use it as a learning experience.

If you are struggling to keep a consistent form of motivation or you think that you could do with some help to implement a positive mindset to your exercise, get in touch to find out how I can help.

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