I read a HN comment a while ago wrt running that said that motivation might come from saying "I want to see this beautiful place again" (where the running leads to.) instead of saying "I need to run because I want to lose weight" (or whatever). I'd like to say it works, but actually what was even more important for me was to change my thoughts about running. If you feel like running is a chore, you will never motivate <i>yourself</i> (that's where external motivators can help), however running itself can be fun. If it's fun, you will WANT to do it. You will go out and seek it.<p>I've found that I always pushed myself way too hard while running. The goal is not to be fast or have the best time. The goal is to enjoy the journey. That's why I always tell myself now the first few minutes: Don't go too fast, run slow! Slow. Enjoy it. If I start as slow as I can arrange, then everything else follows. Also, how your body feels after a run, is one of the best motivators to do it again.<p>Sure, these thoughts won't work for everyone, but what does? It's worth a try, anyway :)
I'm happy for the author, but I've always found these sort of tricks to be a chore. I bought a cargo ebike and use it for 99% of my traveling, including a 20 mile commute to work (~40 minutes each way). Now you can exercise for free, no tricking necessary.<p>Sadly you aren't going to become super muscular riding around a bike, but I assure you, you'll be in excellent shape even with an ebike.<p>Maybe it's because I'm lazy, but I find having an active life is superior to exercising frequently and having an otherwise inactive life (I also use a deskcycle and a treadmill desk setup for about 2-3 hours at work).<p>I recently bought a 20lb weighted vest to add some resistance when I'm walking around the house. we'll see how that goes.
I have a somewhat different financial game I use to motivate myself to work seriously on my hobbies. When I have a piece of gear I want to buy, like let's say new hiking boots. I make my self complete a challenge where say every time I run hills I put 5 dollars in savings towards the boots. That way I can't just buy the gear without putting in serious work at the activity first. Same thing for computing stuff, or photography, art or music. Want a new guitar? Need to play the one I have more to earn it first.
Nice! In case anyone is interested in the science of this effect and it's surprising power, this is an almost exact reproduction of an experiment, in the field of "connection science" or "social physics".<p>(NOTE: The true value here is in the CROSS-INCENTIVIZATION with an <i>existing</i> social relationship, not just the money)<p>The general truism that falls out of it is:<p>When possible, always apply incentives to the social fabric, not individuals. i.e. incentivize the edges of the graph (the relationships), rather than the nodes (the people) in isolation. Seek results by always opting to strengthen social bonds, instead of trying to bend people (who are social creatures) into actions while neglecting their social context, which often pull them back into prior habits or prevent the new ones from sticking strongly. Under some experimental conditions, incentives are 30x more effective when you use the money to strengthen a social relationship around an activity, rather than incentivizing the activity itself. (Further, unlike a direct monetary incentive where removing the incentive strongly attenuates the effect, you could now remove the money incentive between you and your brother, and you're much more likely to keep performing the activity even without monetary incentive, because the persistent social incentive is bootstrapped.)<p>This and other really interesting related research was pioneered by MIT's Sandy Pentland. It's very solid and applies in practice: His lab won the DARPA network grand challenge, where they found those 10 balloons hidden across the USA. He wrote a book. Here's his author talk: <a href="https://youtu.be/HMBl0ttu-Ow" rel="nofollow">https://youtu.be/HMBl0ttu-Ow</a><p>The book "Social Physics" is a really great read if the video speaks to you<p>Frankly, it's affected my worldview hugely. This sort of research has huge policy and regulatory implications imho.
One thing I'd really echo here is the emphasis on "realistic". And not "realistic for somebody else" or "realistic for your imagined optimal self" but realistic given not just your current fitness level but also your current level of skill in following through.<p>As an example, travel and illness threw me off my regular schedule this summer. One I haven't exercised for a while I get kinda miserable, so exercising seems impossible and I have a hard time getting back to it. I couldn't just set a goal of 3 solid workouts per week; I would have failed.<p>What I picked was a daily streak of at least 10 minutes of elevated heart rate (zone 2 or better) per day. A short, brisk walk would be enough to qualify. The first days sucked and I had a couple false starts, but yesterday was streak day 18, and now going out for a 3-mile run or doing 30 minutes on the indoor bike actually feels good. So now I'm ready to commit to something more serious, but it took a ramp-up to get my brain ready for 3 real workouts per week.
I think a primary root cause to all motivation problems is that our brain is programmed to be lazy. By lazy, I mean, we are programmed to exert the least amount of effort possible to secure our safety and physiological needs.<p>And, in today's developed world, it's EXTREMELY easy to secure our safety and physiological needs. Once these basic needs are met, we find ourselves in a position where happiness is a function of self-esteem, fulfilling relationships, and physical health.<p>The problem is that these higher goals take hard work to obtain and maintain. And, our brain isn't wired to want to do that hard work - as long as we're safe & satiated, it wants to check out.<p>As a result, we have to learn to trick our brains into feeling motivated to achieve these higher goals.<p>One way to do this is to attach failure of goal completion to something scary like loss of income (see OP's article) or social status. This will trigger motivation because you're endangering your safety and physiological needs (which is what your brain is programmed to react to).<p>Another way is to learn to silence your subconscious programming (that voice in your head that convinces you to be lazy). You can do this with meditation or by following the 5 second rule: When you feel yourself hesitate before doing something that you know you should do, count 5-4-3-2-1-GO and just start moving towards action.<p>Finally, after you're done taking action and doing the hard work, you'll feel good. Taking time to notice these positive feelings, and building a causal connection between hard work and positive self-esteem makes goal completion easier as time goes on.<p>Being lazy is completely natural, and instead of feeling badly about it, we should just accept that our programming is misaligned with the modern world, and learn to take action towards being happy despite of it.
If this sounds appealing, but you want a nice UI to go along with it, check out <a href="https://www.beeminder.com/home" rel="nofollow">https://www.beeminder.com/home</a>. Not affiliated with them, just a happy customer for several years.
I started working out 6 months ago for the first time, with a personal trainer. I had tried a few times to do it on my own or with a friend, but with a friend it's too hard to coordinate schedules, and without a pro, it's too easy to get hurt (tore my shoulder up the first day and it took a year to sort of heal).<p>Hiring a good trainer has lots of advantages:<p>- you don't have to think about what you need to do<p>- they show you safe vs unsafe movements and keep you safe during training<p>- it's an appointment, so you're less likely to miss. My trainer doesn't normally charge for missed appointments (too nice IMO) but I pay by the month so I have to pay if I miss<p>- my trainer creates several circuits of 3-5 exercises and they are done 3-5 times each. The circuits are designed so that different muscles are used in each exercise, ie, "active resting", so an entire workout can fit in a half an hour for example.<p>If you have the funds, highly recommend hiring a trainer. Now I actually enjoy working out 4x a week for 45 minutes.
What worked for me was not car commuting. Walking and biking everywhere is great for keeping your baseline cardio level decent without it feeling like you’re making and effort, and it is often not a noticeable time difference. When you’re used to driving everywhere, most people are prone to wildly underestimating actual door to door travel times (city bicyclists will spend a lot of time waiting on friends who drive) so while the 40 minutes you spend bicycling home from work & picking up groceries is longer than the 30 minutes it’d take to drive / park it also replaces a separate gym trip. Saving thousands of dollars a year is nice, too.
The easiest way to workout plenty is to find a physical activity that you actually enjoy doing. It really doesn't matter much what it is as long as it's active. Some people think it has to be going to the gym and lifting weights for an hour or two every other day (this just happens to be what I personally enjoy doing), but really any kind of activity will work. Biking, walking, running, lifting weights, team sports, wrestling with your dog, yoga, etc.<p>This is great for the author, but this type of motivation tends to fail at a certain point. So I'd say you can start with this, but in the meantime find something you love/like doing.
For me, setting a goal was the key. I've been messing about with kettlebells for a couple of years, but 16 weeks ago I started a goal to get to be able to complete a set number of lifts with a particular weight. I'm most of the way to that goal now, driven by meeting it and have been working out 6x per week since then. Previously, a normal week was maybe 2x.<p>When I do reach it, I plan to set a new goal around maintaining that.<p>For the other kettlebell nerds: the goal is 100x 32kg swings in 5 minutes and 10x Turkish getups with 32kg in under 10 minutes (the "simple" part of Pavel's simple and sinister)
For people who don't have a friend in the exact same boat, Beeminder[0] is this exact system as a service - you put in your goals, you report whether you completed them, they charge you for slipping up.<p>[0]: <a href="https://www.beeminder.com/" rel="nofollow">https://www.beeminder.com/</a>
Accountability is fairly easy to game. I don’t think it works for everybody though. Money to me doesn’t motivate. I could probably spend $100 per missed workout and not feel attached to it because it doesn’t feel real nor painful.<p>For me, having kids did it. Being able to get in good routines while I’m still young is my hope that I will be able to squeeze out another visit or two from them by extending my life a few more years.<p>Hacking your habits is a great place to start, but getting clear on why you do certain things is how you master it.
I’ve had great luck with his technique and highly recommend it. Whenever I need to try something radically new and I find myself resistant to doing it, I’ll Venmo a friend a $100 and tell them to donate to my anti-charity if I don’t follow through. Hasn’t failed me once.
The author mentions sports, and that he stopped exercising regularly after he stopped playing soccer. One of the best ways to motivate yourself to exercise is to play sports, for several reasons, a crucial one being social: if you schedule a game with other people, then there's social pressure to do it and not skip it.<p>I think the ideal sport for recreational exercise is tennis. It only requires 2 people, 2 racquets, a ball, and a court. The court is perhaps the biggest obstacle, but there are public tennis courts all over the place. And if you've got money, you can join a tennis club. (The article author mentioned squash, which is fine too, but I think tennis courts are much more prevalent than squash courts.)<p>Team sports like soccer are harder to organize for amateur adults, though there are leagues and pickup games.<p>In a sense, the article author turned exercise into a social sport, with monetary prizes. The details are different, but the essence is the same: competition between two people rather than solitary effort.
I just got a VR headset so that it makes working out fun. Now I work out 7 days a week for an hour.<p>I use weights and resistance bands to make it a bit more demanding and I can do it at home and enjoy it. No need for hacks.
This is basically <a href="https://www.beeminder.com/" rel="nofollow">https://www.beeminder.com/</a><p>(Started by friends)
There is also <a href="https://www.healthywage.com" rel="nofollow">https://www.healthywage.com</a>, which is sort of a "battle royale" version of <a href="https://www.beeminder.com" rel="nofollow">https://www.beeminder.com</a>
For me the biggest thing is finding the sport or activity that you enjoy (or can at least tolerate) doing.<p>Over the years I tried biking, running (street, trail, track), swimming, various machines, other things I'm probably forgetting. Hated every minute of it, and could never stick with it.<p>I tried weightlifting a few years ago. No machines, just barbells. I honesly can't say that I love doing it, but I have been able to stick with it 3 days per week and I only miss if I am sick or have an unavoidable conflict.<p>If you can't get into the habit of working out, try something else. Also try variations of group/solitary activity. I'm a pretty introverted person but one thing that helps with getting to the gym is knowing a group of people there.
Contrast this with the Israeli daycare that charged $3 for being late to pick up your child, to teach parents they needed to be on time. Late pickups grew geometrically. Because it wasn't an ethical issue any more; it was a service with a fee.
Adopt a feral dog : they domesticate easily and their last countless generations of ancestors were among the fittest selected by nature for general wellness and energy, not specific characteristics by (an echo chamber of) breeders.<p>First hand experience : you'll not be bored, they're smart and loving, and energetic (and hilarious). You'll therefore be more physically active without being bored than you thought possible.<p>And when people joke about border collies being high energy, you'll get lots of exercise rolling your eyes. Ours has a husky rescue friend, with comparable and likely much higher energy level, but generally, a canine makes a great personal trainer.
Running is a chore. In the beginning I wanted to run for 30 minutes or longer. Couldn't do it consistently, thinking about it felt terrible. Then I read an article saying that it's enough to get heart rate up to get 80% of benefits, and a five minute run could be enough.<p>So I changed to running for just 5 minutes first thing when I woke up, which equaled to running around the block. Then get a shower immediately when I got home. After that I felt so much more clear mentally that I wanted to wake up next day just to run. Knowing that I would only run for five minutes it no longer was a chore.
This is a well known phenomenon and its great to see it verified anecdotally again.<p>Some Econ professors also discovered this a while back and created stickk.com which allows you to put up a monetary punishment when you don't meet your agreed upon goal. The loss of money and having someone else keep you accountable greatly increases your motivation to achieve your goals.<p>The money you pay if you don't meet your goal is donated to charity.
I do something similar though less <i>taxing</i>. I gave my brother an Apple Watch and we track each other's workouts but <i>not</i> competitively. Often, to close a ring, we'll WeChat during the walk; a chat or a podcast really takes the edge off of exercise. I also use the StrongLifts app to track workouts at the gym.<p>Yep, I dropped three tech names. I'm surprised but they work. The key is daily effort. I close my rings every day, for weeks and months on end. On days when I don't feel like it, I still force myself and then I feel great afterwards. I've done that enough times that I know for a fact that it will work when I'm not feeling it. The other key is to set a reasonable goal so that everyday isn't a stress. For me, that's 600/45/13.<p>From the depths of the COVID lockdown to now, my VO2Max has risen from 25.5 to 32 which for my age bracket is pretty good. Fun fact: donate blood and your VO2Max will go down.<p>The silicon guilt works for me. Yeah, I enjoy being in the gym and maybe not everyone does. But this gets me over the hump of wanting to work out to working out.
I never liked “working out” (though I like doing physical activity with friends).<p>A few months I had an injury followed by a long post surgical recovery (still under way). I am forbidden from almost all exercise until the surgery heals.<p>And I notice it! I don’t think as well, I sleep more, and I have trouble getting things done.<p>Now I am really eager to work out!
I did a version of this to achieve the holy 6pack grail. My wife held me accountable - I just had to stick to daily limit of calories (adjusted over time) and that's it. Around 7 months work.
Then when I "finished" I couldn't stabilize the habit and am still stumbling at around 19 % body fat... I guess it's time to dust off this method.
For myself, I play video games and lost weight and have gotten really fit. Unlike the author, everything is tracked in my case through my watch and VR headset<p>I play games like this<p><a href="https://www.vrfitnessinsider.com/review/the-thrill-of-the-fight/" rel="nofollow">https://www.vrfitnessinsider.com/review/the-thrill-of-the-fi...</a><p><a href="https://beatsaber.com/" rel="nofollow">https://beatsaber.com/</a><p><a href="https://fitxr.com/" rel="nofollow">https://fitxr.com/</a><p><a href="https://untilyoufall.schellgames.com/" rel="nofollow">https://untilyoufall.schellgames.com/</a><p><a href="https://www.lesmills.com/us/fit-planet/fitness/bodycombat-vr/" rel="nofollow">https://www.lesmills.com/us/fit-planet/fitness/bodycombat-vr...</a><p>I’ve lost 25 lbs so far
I actually wrote three articles on how and why I've been running for 50 years (<a href="https://albertcory50.substack.com/" rel="nofollow">https://albertcory50.substack.com/</a> the first three articles). The subject of motivation is considered deeply, since no trick, not even a wager, will keep you doing it more than a couple years (although maybe a bet with a relative <i>will</i> last a while).<p>The overall answer is "whatever works for you." One saying that I've found does impress people is:<p><i>If you can't find time to exercise, you'll have to find time to be sick.</i><p>Do you have time to wait on the Customer Support line for your health insurance provider, listening to "Your call is very important to us. Please stay on the line." for half an hour? Didn't think so.
Yale behavioral economist Dean Karlan made a site called Stickk (<a href="https://www.stickk.com/" rel="nofollow">https://www.stickk.com/</a>) that has a phone app that helps you do the same; you donate money to causes you hate if you don’t do what you say you’ll do
My friends and I do something similar.<p>We text the group- gym 1, gym 2 etc as we start our workout. Anyone can say “proof” which means we have to send a selfie. If you don’t do 3 gyms in a week, there is some penalty which no even remembers or enforces.
I quit smoking in a similar way. My buddy and I agreed that the first one to smoke a cigarette paid the other one $100. We’re both competitive people and we both actually wanted to quit so it worked for us.
If you hate exercising but want to build and/or maintain your muscles for long term health then I highly recommend the book “Body by Science”. I have been working out for 15 (yes fifteen) minutes one day a week (yes once a week) for a few months now and have more than doubled my strength. I am now leg pressing 260kg. It might not be much by body builder standards but it is <i>way</i> more than I could do starting out! And the complete trip to the gym takes 30 minutes from I leave the house until I am back. Worth it.
Hm, if they switched the schedule up a little and had a workout every other day (with a rest day in between) they <i>could</i> have been working out 4-5 times per week.<p>If anyone's unsure about the maths on that then don't worry, "you don't count the day you're on when you're counting days " ;-) <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eECjjLNAOd4" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eECjjLNAOd4</a>
I didn't work out the last 5 years to my regret. I had a ski accident and my back hurt severely the previous 2 times.<p>I changed my behavior again, i was working too much to actually "want to do/start it".<p>I'm at 3 hours per day ATM. ( Back seems to be ok! ). Next step is to change to weight training and reduce the amount of hours, since the current slow-paced cardio phase is not sustainable. But i hope it helped me for my back as a transitioning phase...
This is a great system. Simple, and as long as you and the other person are trustworthy and both agree on what counts as a "session" (e.g., 30 minutes of continuous moderate to strenuous physical activity), and if the economic pain point is set properly for both people, then it should work.<p>I'm going to bring this up to my girlfriend and see what she thinks. I think this could introduce some healthy competition to our fitness routines.
My coworker did a one sided bet. He pays $2K if he didn’t lose weight. The friends he’d pay would deliver food to his place, which made him more determined haha.
Something that's worked for me is to pay for a group fitness/yoga class. The first couple of months are easy. You'll see enough results and you're also motivated. By then you'll make enough connections that you don't want to "let down" by not going. However, it is much more expensive than going to a gym - about three times as much. Still worth it for some people like me.
I have always found myself more engrossed and wanting to run if I have a great podcast series or a great audiobook to listen to. Lately haven’t been getting any good recommendations and feeling like it is a chore to run.<p>Maybe having a bet like this with my sister who is also trying to become more active might help.
What really helped me doing thinks I don't like is the meme of callousing your mind (from David Goggings' Can't hurt me): You get accustomed to the discomfort to a point where things that currently are daunting become effortless. Maybe that is obvious to most ...
What worked for me was making the accomplishment going through the door of the gym. Twice a week, sometimes just for five minutes, did a lot to get me into the habit and to the point where i did actually enjoy it and feel better (and spent gradually more time there)
For me running has always been like therapy. Whatever is stressing me out on a particular day, I struggle to think of a time when I haven't felt better about things after going out for a run. Especially if I can find somewhere close to nature to run.
Apple Watch rings sort of did the same for me. Helped to also have done at the same time as my wife - so I guess that is similar to your motivation.<p>Maybe I missed it. What classifies as a workout in your model with your brother?
Pickleball is a good option. It’s easy to start playing and have fun. Pick up games are everywhere. And you’ll have to stop yourself from playing hours a day. I’d estimate you burn at least 400 calories per hour.
When you're the only person to answer to for your physical health, it can be very easy to let yourself go. Having external accountability is a fantastic driver for improving physical health.
I just put it on the calendar like any other meeting and just do it. Some days i like it, some days i hate it, but if i were to wait for 'motivation' i would never do anything.
Really happy for the author!
I also find gamification and vanity help. Strava/Peloton are good places to keep scores and brag about what you've done.
A variation of this idea that worked for me: I made pact to donate money to an organization that I deplore for every day I skipped the gym.<p>Sloth is strong but hate is stronger.
This method can stop working immediately if both parties decide to stop working out.<p>Also there is nothing that FORCES you to pay to the other person, no legaly binding contract so if you really don't feel like you're just gonna say "fuck it and fuck you" and it's gone.