How Taking Control of Your Exercise Choices Can Help You Become a Consistent Exerciser

As I’ve written many times before, building long-term motivation and consistent exercise habits are the most valuable things you can do for yourself.

There are many mindset shifts that can help you achieve those goals. Here's a really important one: taking ownership of your exercise.

Taking Control Of Your Exercise Choices

The feeling that you are in control of your choices and actions is known as Autonomy. That's one of the three basic factors for creating long-lasting motivation to do anything, including exercise. It's also a hard-wired human need.

I have two kids, and I can’t tell you the number of times they’ve decided “on their own” to do something that I had already told them to do. When I said it, of course, it was a terrible idea. But when they felt like they were in control, suddenly they were motivated to take action.

Adults are the same. When you feel like you have to do something, you resist.

If you feel ownership over your choices, it's a different story. When you feel like you're the one deciding to do something, you're more likely to enjoy the activity and stick to it.

The Power of Autonomy

A study in 2009 had participants exercise on a treadmill for 30 minutes. In the first session, they could adjust the treadmill speed to whatever they liked. They couldn’t see the control panel display, so they didn’t know exactly what the speed was.

About a week later, they came back and did another 30 minutes on the treadmill. This time they were told that the researchers were going to set the speed for them.

They didn’t know that the researchers actually set the treadmill to the exact same speed that the participant had chosen in the first session.

Before, during, and after the exercise, the participants rated their enjoyment and motivation.

Even though they were doing the exact same workout, they enjoyed it more and felt more motivated when they had chosen their own speed.

Other research backs this up. Many studies have examined the relationship between cardio intensity and how pleasurable or enjoyable the exercise is.

There are some people who love to work out so hard that they want to throw up (crossfit, anyone?), but for many people, the threshold when exercise changes from pleasant to unpleasant is around the point when you start breathing very hard.

These studies have found that for most people, exercising above that point is considered unpleasant. That means interval training, sprinting, or other high intensity workouts are usually not enjoyable.

Interestingly, though, there is an exception.

The researchers are usually the ones that control the treadmill or bike speed during the experiments. Once the speed is increased past that heavy breathing threshold, participants start to dislike the exercise they’re doing.

In a couple of studies, though, participants were allowed to choose their own exercise speeds.

When people increased their own speed past the heavy breathing point, they didn’t experience that same decrease in pleasure. It still felt good to them.

Why? Because they felt autonomy over their exercise choices.

What Does This Mean For You?

You can improve your motivation just by changing your mindset and reframing your exercise experience:

Exercise is a gift; you don’t have to exercise, you get to exercise.Furthermore, you get to choose the exercise you do.

Take ownership of your exercise by deciding for yourself which exercises you will do and how you will structure them.

How To Take Ownership Of Your Exercise

There are basic guidelines for effective exercise, but there is a lot of flexibility in the details within those guidelines.

Anyone can learn enough about exercise (there is a lot of information on my site and others) to be able to make their own exercise choices in a safe and effective way.

To learn more about the basics of strength training, including how to put together your own program, download my FREE Strength Training Guide.

Even if you decide that you need more guidance in the form of a made-for-you program or a group class or personal trainer, at least take ownership of your movement within that program.

Choose the program based on your goals, and learn about the exercises so you can understand why you’re doing them.

If nothing else, take ownership of each movement as you do it.

When it’s time to sprint, don’t think “ugh, the trainer says it’s time to go all-out so I have to do it now”. Instead, think “I’m choosing to go all-out right now, because I know it will benefit me”.

Choose to exercise because it’s going to make you feel good, because it’s going to give you a sense of pride and achievement, because it’s going to help you get a little fitter so you can have more energy to do the things you love.

Overall, remember that you are in charge of your choices, so choose to do something great for yourself and get moving!

If You Need Help

One of the things I pride myself on is teaching, not telling. In all of my one-on-one personal training programs, I make sure my clients understand what we're doing and why. I give them input and ownership over their program so they can get better results.

If you're interested in in-person or online personal training, contact me.

To get started on your fitness journey right now, check out my Strength Training For Anxiety Program. It's a 12-week program, guided by an app so you can do the workouts anytime, anywhere.

The app allows you to track your progress so you can improve over time, and if you want to swap exercises so you can be in control of your program, there are approved alternate exercises built in. This program also has unique features to help you manage anxiety and build mental resilience along with physical strength.