What’s Your Mindset? How To Feel Confident In The Gym

A friend of mine who recently shed 50 lbs shared his new diet. This lifestyle change not only helped him lose weight, but it also eliminated his need to take his high blood pressure medication. As far as his physical exercise, he made small adjustments to his activity level that included daily walks with his little Jack Russell Terrier.

Новости СМИ2

I told him that if he wanted to go to the gym with me, I would be happy to show him my routine. I could even introduce him to some of the guys there. He declined.

“Oh no, I could never feel comfortable in the gym. I don’t even know what most of those machines do.”

Gym-phobia

This is not an uncommon mindset. People worry about going to the gym for a number of reasons, including the embarrassment of doing something wrong or for the way that they look.

How can someone get past their gym-phobia and start enjoying time spent there?

It is all about improving our gym confidence.

Maybe you have recently started attending the gym but limiting your activity to the treadmill or elliptical. While these are great tools for producing sweat, they are easy to plateau on.

To improve your cardiovascular strength (endurance) or your speed and see a continued growth in calorie burn, even if you wish to do a majority of your exercise on a treadmill or elliptical, you still have to build muscle. Excessive cardio will always burn calories, but a high-calorie burn will burn muscle tissue as well as fat tissue.

If a smaller, trim body is the goal, this might be fine. But if you’re hoping for a changed physique with a muscular appearance, you’ll need to become comfortable with weights.

Hands down, one of the most intimidating sections of the gym is the free weights section. This is primarily where you’ll find super ripped guys and girls putting in their gym time.

But that’s WHY they look the way they do.

They learned a thing or two about using free weights and started their journey, just like you, in strength training.