6 Ways To Stick To Your Fitness Routine

Two girls doing yoga together — Karla Tafra / LifeSavvy

Starting a new fitness routine can be intimidating and, more often than not, make it hard to stick to. How to keep the motivation going, adopt time-management skills, and make it all work? Find out.

Schedule Your Week

It might sound like a weird thing to do, but scheduling your workouts into your week brings more than one benefit to the table. First, it makes it easier for you to remember it as it’ll be right there before your first meeting or right after your last. Second, it makes it harder to come up with excuses for not going as you’ll feel guilty every time you look at your calendar. Third, it creates a psychological effect of playing the role of a “task” on your weekly to-do list and is therefore considered something you have to complete and cross off your list. Fourth, it makes the time around it easier to control, meaning you’ll know when to prepare a change of clothes or meal prep your food. And fifth, it makes it easier to keep track of, especially when you’re trying to reach a specific goal. Don’t leave your workout plans in the air and add them to your calendar and planner: Once they’re there, it’s done, and there’s nothing you can do about it.

Make It Fun

Bringing the fun into your fitness routine is one thing, but making everything around it match the feelings of joy and happiness ensures you’ll stick to your plan. It doesn’t matter whether you create a playlist that makes you move like Jagger, dress up in colorful outfits, bring a friend that’s always full of energy, take the scenic route there, or create a fun ritual like stopping by your favorite flower shop on the way home. As long as it brings you joy and makes you look forward to your workouts, it’ll make sticking to them easy peasy.

Find an Accountability Partner

Two girls doing yoga together near the lake — Karla Tafra / LifeSavvy

Sometimes we need more than our willpower and support to push through the toughest workouts and still make ourselves come the next day. Finding someone who will not only be there for you, motivate you and inspire you, but also stop you from making excuses and prevent you from giving up, is a great way to stick to your fitness routine, discover your own strengths, break those imaginary limits, and get the most out of your workouts.

Sometimes you’ll find that person in your personal trainer or a gym partner, and sometimes you’ll look closer to home and ask your family member or loved one to join you. Whatever the case may be, let them help you out, prevent you from skipping your workouts, and keep you on track of reaching your fitness goals.

Dress Up To Show Up

It’s amazing what a pair of cool-designed leggings or brand new sneakers can do for our motivation. We always try to dress to impress, so why would showing up for ourselves be any different? Making sure we feel good in our workout clothes and have all of our equipment all neatly packed in our beautiful new bag does wonders for our self-esteem and make us look forward to sweating it out in the gym.

Make it a habit to prepare everything you need and plan to take with you the night before so that everything is good to go. That way, you don’t waste time in the morning running around and trying to figure out if you’ve managed to pack everything you need (cause you’ll probably forget to pack your earbuds or god forbid, underwear).

If Something Doesn’t Feel Right, Change it

Woman doing a warrior II pose in blue leopard leggings — Karla Tafra / LifeSavvy

If you find yourself losing energy throughout your workouts and struggling with the set weight or nailing your technique, try changing things up a bit. Maybe you need to lower the weight, take down a few reps, or even try a different workout all together. Everybody is different, and there is no one-size-fits-all. Listen to your body and make the necessary changes to feel better, get more comfortable, and avoid the feeling of “having to do something” you don’t want. At the end of the day, you won’t be able to stick to it, no matter how much you try. And quite frankly, why would you?

You chose to get on this fitness journey because of specific goals you’ve set out for yourself, so whether it’s shedding off a few pounds, getting stronger with your deadlift, or being able to run a marathon, dreading your workouts will make those goals hard to attain. But before you go switching things up, give it a few weeks at least: sometimes we need to get a little uncomfortable before it gets better.

…and last but not least…

Remember Your Why

Why did you choose to get on the fitness train? Is it because of your health? Fitting into your wedding dress? Being able to run a mile under 7 minutes? Whatever the case may be, sticking to the good and the bad throughout your fitness journey will only be possible if you really want to achieve your goals. Set yourself little reminders around the house, in your gym bag, on your calendar, or even in your car, as they’ll get you through all the cold mornings and rainy nights when all you want to do is stay on your sofa.

Sticking to your fitness routine can be tough, but as with everything in life, it just needs a bit of practice. Finding ways to do that can be hard, so try out our six tips and feel yourself getting inspired, motivated, and ready to rock that workout in your gorgeous leopard print leggings.