What To Do When Working Out Is Boring
To a lot of people, working out is boring — whether it’s a workout routine or certain exercise within it, if not the concept itself.
Instead of the “F” in fitness standing for fun, they find it standing for FML or the string of F-words that flow out of their mouths during a workout because of how they put on hold their action-packed life to do whatever boring shit they’re bored doing.
How big of a deal is this?
Well, let’s consider that right alongside time constraints, price considerations, and feelings of looking silly and embarrassed, boredom is one of the main reasons people give for throwing in the towel.
Because you’re reading this, I’m going to go out on a limb and say you’re probably one of those people who feel like working out, or some aspect of it, is a burden.
I don’t know what your situation is, but people probably find this working out shit to be tedious because they’re on the elliptical every day for 3 hours. If not that, maybe they’re still using the same weight training program they were using when they were riding the bench on their high school football team 20 years ago.
Fuck, I’d want to blow my brains out all over the gym mirror walls, too!
But let’s imagine that you’re slightly smarter than that.
What are you to do?
Not working out clearly isn’t the solution because you kinda sorta need to work out in order to have a banging body. Switching routines or exercises every few days to spice things up isn’t the answer either because that too isn’t how you make your body bangable.
So if working out is boring and you shouldn’t ease the torture by radically changing things up or simply not working out, then what are you to do?!
Something you could do to make your workout less boring is to listen to music or an audiobook.
But wait, you probably already do that and still don’t find it enough to get you through your grueling set of dumbbell kickbacks. But whatever, at least you now have a soundtrack for the blowing out of your brains!
Hmmmmm…
You could also work out with a training partner.
But wait, that requires your people-hating ass to find someone whose presence you can stand. On top of that, once you find someone you don’t want to murder, their schedule has to sync with yours. And if it doesn’t, there’ll be days where you’ll be working out by yourself in absolute boredom again.
Hmmmmm…
Something else you could do is take a group exercise class.
But wait, they mostly suck because there’s no periodization and progressive overload, which are the principles responsible for taking your body from people saying “WTF is that” to “I wanna F that”. Even more, there’s no individual attention paid to you and your crappy lifting form because the instructor has, I don’t know, a class full of other motherfuckers to deal with.1Oh yeah, let’s not also forget that you’re a people-hater and would have to be in close proximity to a shitload of people. You’ve already made the sacrifice of taking your anti-social ass to the gym because, hell, there’ll be enough open space so it won’t feel like people are crowding you, but being trapped in a room with other people on all sides of you? That’s where the buck stops!
Fuck, what are you to do about exercise boredom?!
How do you make working out more entertaining?!?!
Hmmmmm…
EUREKA!!!
The answer is you don’t do shit.
Wait, what?!
Yeah, you don’t do shit.
Why?!?!
Because it doesn’t matter if an exercise or routine is boring.
Yup!
All that matters is if an exercise or routine is effective.
That’s how it is with almost everything in life.
It’s not any different with fitness, although people mistakenly think it is.
While working out is central to my being, I don’t do it for the sake of enjoying myself. I don’t think anyone on my level or beyond does. Stepping under a bar with hundreds of pounds of weight, for example, and experiencing the pain associated with muscle damage for rep after rep isn’t exactly “fun”. Neither is gasping for breath during a 30-second break before doing it all over again. I can think of a million more entertaining ways to spend my time.
If it’s not fun, then why do it?
Why do it?!
WHY DO IT?!?!
Ummmmmm…because those of us immersed in physical culture who lift seriously do it in pursuit of perfection. We’re mostly chasing the ever-elusive dream of sculpting the perfect physique. We have a goal in mind, and we aim to do whatever we have to do to reach that goal.
In that context, and assuming that you have a college degree, my doing straight bar curls to get big arms is the same as your doing coursework to get you towards your goal of getting that liberal arts degree in, let’s say, communications.2You? Have a college degree?! I know, it’s a stretch…but play along!
I’m sure you found your school workload tedious — unless you’re some kinda sadist — but you did it nonetheless because of where you were told it would bring you in life.
That’s the exact same thing with people like me, except what we’re sacrificing our own personal enjoyment for is a nice body rather than a good career as an intrepid journalist — a career that the economy can’t provide because of technology’s impact in making newspapers obsolete and the public’s willingness to become an idiocracy, all of which now has you bussing tables at Red Lobster and drowning in student debt out the wazoo!
Too many are under the impression that changing their body SHOULDN’T be a chore, as if it’s supposed to be shits and giggles.
This idea that working out should be fun is thanks in large part to Jazzercise fitness programs, Zumba classes, and the Sean Ts of the world hawking their Dance Party DVDs.3It’s also the fault of magazine covers saying stupid shit that pieces fitness and fun together in hopes of catching your eye while you wait with your one bleepin’ item in the only supermarket checkout lane that’s open while the cashier waits for the stock boy to return from his pleasure walk with a price check on a package of Sooper Dooper Choco-Chip Crunch that the person in front of you says is “Buy 1, Get 1 Free”. Sadly, the person ahead of you is wrong because the sale only applies to Sooper Dooper Chock O’Chip Crunch, not Sooper Dooper Choco-Chip Crunch. The fine print gets ya every time!
To the contrary, anything that will have your body seeing results should have you NOT looking forward to your workout like it’s the latest overhyped release in the Star Wars saga. While fitness doesn’t have to be torture, what you do to burn fat, build muscle, or increase strength shouldn’t be a hell of a good time either. It should be tough and stimulating because what doesn’t challenge you doesn’t change you.
That’s the difference between exercise and training.
If you want fun, exercise…but don’t expect anything else.
Do those one-legged overhead squats on a stability ball balanced on a needle that’s propped on a tightrope high above the open mouth of an erupting volcano.
Now that’s FUN!!!
Yeah, do that and have all the fun you want if all you’re concerned about is getting a good sweat. Or burning calories. Or feeling a pump. Or waking up sore the next day. Or just need something to get your heart rate up so you don’t die of cardiac arrest and whoever you’re survived by discovers your cake crush porn stash.
But if you want results, train…and quit talking about your being bored, as if you’re a five-year old who needs constant stimulation.4On that accord, for example, you would change out those dumbbell kickbacks.
But wait, didn’t I say not to do that?!
Well, yeah. Don’t switch exercises every session that calls for the training of X body part.
However, because this shit is all about doing what’s effective, you can swap out an exercise such as dumbbell kickbacks for another exercise not because kickbacks are excruciatingly boring to do but because the recruitment of the triceps is almost nonexistent with dumbbell kickbacks because there isn’t constant tension placed on them throughout the entire range of motion.
Glossary: arms, calories, dumbbell, exercise, fitness, goal, gym, gym mirror, lifting form, muscle, physique, program, results, routine, training partner, work out, workout, Zumba