I can imagine people having fun getting lost in the flow of playing a competitive sport. I’ve also heard some people experience a post-workout high. But does anyone actually feel pleasure in the moment while lifting weights, jogging, cycling, etc?
If so… what does it feel like? Is there anything the rest of us can do to cultivate such a mindset?
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Yes. It’s my meditation moment. I don’t have to think about anything other than my posture and movement. I just put on the music I like and go. It also helps relieve tension and frustration when something bad happens during your day. And I feel great afterwards. That post-workout high is real.
This is what it amounts to for me as well. The first 5 min of a run SUCKS, but shortly after I start to zone out. My mind wanders and sometimes it touches on stressful topics. For whatever reason, there’s no anxiety associated with it. It’s like a zen state where I can think about things objectively without emotion.
That’s a big reason why I run.
That’s how I feel with running and cycling. Moving meditation has always worked better for me than trying to sit still.
The first 1km or so can be rough, but that’s just finding where your rhythm is for the session.
I need to get back into running.
I feel pleasure while my bicycle. The feeling is a mixture of childhood play and feelgood brain chemicals.
I like to go fast :)
I know exactly what you’re talking about. I can’t run seriously anymore (knees failing me), but I still dream about running fast and easily.
Similarly, when you get a smooth bike ride up to 20+ MPH and cruise there it’s really fun.
I like the feeling of progress as I’m still in the “noticeable improvement” phase of workouts, but while I’m actually on the bike I just kinda feel bored
I can push through it but it’s a means to an end, and I feel better after, not during.
you need a ferrari, not a bicycle
Are you trying to get them killed? Ferraris are expensive death machine.
You missed the point about exercise…
Yep. Especially after the training it’s like “yeah man I did it”.
Also, it’s all about consistency. Perfectionism is the enemy of consistency. Don’t be a perfectionist. Just be consistent and soon you’ll see results.
Like I see some people who just started working out and do as many push-ups or any other excercise with as many reps as they possibly can and after they’re exhausted.
That’s wrong. These people think that if you don’t do 100 pushups first day you’re a failure.
No, do even one push up. It’s more that 0. Then do 2, then 5, then 10, then 5 again coz you don’t feel like it today.
Like don’t starve for perfectionism. Just be consistent and you’ll actually get to enjoy working out. It’s a great way to clear your mind, have a healthy body, build muscles, better body chemistry and less diseases etc. Be consistent, not perfect. And avoid guys who make you feel you’re not doing enough. These guys will make you feel like every exercise should be perfect or with the highest reps possible or smth.
You are speaking to my soul. I’m the type of guy that prints out a blank spreadsheet to track my workouts. I’m also the type that doesn’t go to the gym. Lol. I need to just start showing up.
If you can convince yourself to just get there it’s half the battle. That’s what I keep telling myself
I love riding my bike on the weekends and if my commute wasn’t 1.5 hours each way, I’d go to the gym pretty often.
Riding my bike for long rides? Absolutely love it.
Slinging weights in the gym and sweating my ass off on an elliptical machine? Hate every second. But I listen to audio books in the gym, and that makes it much more enjoyable. Im envious of people who actually enjoy the gym lol.
I very much like how I feel after the gym, and overall when Im active which is why I keep going back.
No. I just like how I feel afterwards.
EDIT: Wait… I do enjoy cycling and jogging. I just don’t enjoy working out athe gym. For jogging I enjoy listening to music and having my heart pump harder for an hour. For cycling I enjoy the scenery.
I feel like if you feel like you need to cultivate a mindset for a particular activity, you are probably better off finding another activity. Unless you have extremely specific goals that really demand a particular exercise, it is better to simply be moderately active doing something you enjoy doing.
I’ve tried running/jogging, I am actually not bad at it. I freaking hate actually doing it though, I would rather be doing almost anything else. Which makes it a terrible exercise for me to do, because I will find any excuse to not do it. Same for lifting weights. I enjoy swimming but dislike public pools, in my current country nobody has private pools, even the rich.
For me I have always enjoyed martial arts, particularly sparring. I can’t necessarily find people to do that with regularly where I live now, but I can still practice forms and the like by myself. I get a not insignificant workout from regular Beat Saber sessions too, honestly.
Beat Saber is really good to do some sport. Play it 1 hour every day and you will see improvement in your cardio
I think the mindset aspect that’s true to a degree, where there’s something you just enjoy more easily. There can be something though to not being acclimated to a particular feeling since it isn’t necessarily comfortable initially, but it eventually morphs into something positive and that feeling changes. It doesn’t always happen though, I’d bet, so after some time of no change one would have to find something more naturally fitting for them.
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Cardio is awesome, the runners high is real, but you have to be well conditioned so it’s tough for beginners.
Hell nah. I spent 40 years telling people running is what you do to get away from the police. I started jogging during the pandemic 2 years ago. You sure as shit don’t need to be well conditioned just be aware of your body and its limits which I will admit many people are not.
I don’t enjoy motivating myself to go workout. Everything up until the point of the actual workout isn’t enjoyable. But the workout and post-workout I do enjoy. There is a high associated with it. And that feeling of accomplishment, and visible progress is extremely enjoyable.
The only advice I can give is to give it adequate time. It’s easy to get discouraged. Just keep this in mind: You spent a lot of time doing damage to your body, you’re going to need to put in some effort to reverse that damage. Give it some time before getting discouraged.
Ever bitten into a spicy pepper and enjoyed the burn? That’s what it feels like! Different strokes for different folks, but for me, every drop of sweat is a medal of honor. It’s tough to describe, but it’s about the journey of getting stronger, faster, better. Embrace the grind, my friend, and you might just find that elusive gym rat bliss.
That’s a good metaphor. Biting into a pepper and enoying the burn. It’s like using Linux just so you can say that you use Linux.
Well… I use arch btw.
This made me snort.
I use Linux.
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This kinda did the opposite for me because all spicy food is just pain for me. No enjoyment.
I mean I do work out, I just never enjoy it.
I don’t think I truly understood why some people don’t like spicy food until reading your comment.
As one of those people, they might as well have said “Have you ever stubbed your toe and really enjoyed the feeling?”
Yep, I prefer to taste all of the nuances of the food that I am eating, instead of trying to chemically burn off my taste buds
My gf says this. But when I eat spicy food, it doesn’t interfere with the taste whatsoever. I also love the taste of really hot coffee when I’m eating something spicy. Something about the double burn really enhances the flavor.
I love spicy food but a hot beverage with it sounds awful. I don’t like carbonation with spicy food either though
Growing up we barely seasoned food and now I was getting to point were I was getting bored with food, so I started buying black pepper, paprika and chili peppers to experiment and it changed me.
For me, it’s not about the burn/numbness (the first two barely give you any sort of kick anyways), but instead it’s about the flavour they add that I had never tasted. It’s that flavour that enhances the food, not the hotness. I have no interest is using artificially hot sauces for the gimmick.
A few years earlier I ate a chili hamburger out of curiosity and two bites into it my lips were absolutely numb, it was ridiculous. It wasn’t painfull, but it wasn’t pleasing either and it kept me out of “hot” food for a long while.
So it’s not solely about “stubbing your toe on purpose” or stepping on a Lego, but it can also be about experiencing new things like walking on freshly cut grass or wet sand.
I agree with this one. Spicy sauces actually need to have flavor. My friends recommend Tapatio and so I doused that stuff on my food and it was just salty. I much prefer Sriracha or any other spicy sauces with flavor.
I seriously can’t imagine a flavor so good that I would be willing to experience significant (let alone severe) pain in order to taste it. (Nor Have I been able to taste any extra flavors in even mildly spicy food.)
I don’t doubt your experience, but I absolutely can’t relate to it, or for that matter comprehend it.
Spicy food isn’t just “it’s so hot I can’t breathe”, it’s no different than eating something that’s bitter or sweet. Obviously, things that are super bitter or super sweet are equally displeasing for most people. Watered down lemon juice is very different from sugary lemon juice or raw lemon juice.
Spices and herbs affect the flavour of food, that’s why people use it. Same for condiments. For most, it’s not about a flaming/numbing effect because they don’t put big doses or use gimmicky sauces in the first place.
I think it’s incredible how the internet can connect people who come from different planets like this.
I mean yeah, if food is more bitter than it is sweet then it’s unpleasant to me (even the darkest chocolate has a lot of sugar) but that still doesn’t directly stimulate pain receptors like capsaicin does at any level. Very low levels of “heat” (pain) are indeed tolerable to me, but No level above zero is more enjoyable than zero, for any type of food.
I also don’t understand that concept of “too sweet” (for things that should be sweet, I am not talking about pizza for example). The only thing that stops me from just buying sugar in bulk and eating bowls of it at a time is concern for my health/teeth. (Which of course is a strong concern, and so far has managed to keep me from being diabetic)
I’m not sure if all of their drinks are like that, but my only experience with Starbucks was one of their holiday drinks and I could only drink 1/3 of it because it was so sweet that it was nauseating.
No. Never. I think I’m very different because I am never motivated, nor feel good during/after exercise. No, my testosterone is fine.
Same. I even went pretty regularly for months and tried all the different workouts and while I was in better shape, none of it was enjoyable in any way.
There is definitely a huge difference after 6 months of focusing on one thing. I’ve done hot yoga off and on over about 12 years and I’d say it took 6 months of going consistently before I felt like my body adjusted and it was more enjoyable. After 2 years I didn’t feel like I was going to die and it actually became very enjoyable.
I’ve fallen off recently because it’s easier to sit around and initially it does suck because you need to readjust. But I when I had gone 2-3x in a week, man I felt like a god. I started going in my 20s, I was high af all the time and knew I needed some exercise or I was gonna die.
I think it takes a certain person to love lifting weights of all things. But luckily there are lots of things out there
Two years for it to become enjoyable? What is it, a JRPG?
I’m in my mid 30’s and I spent A LONG time working out, getting as fit as I could.
I still hated my body when I looked in the mirror, and I hated every second of the workout. “Post workout” I was so proud, but like, that’s equivalent to drinking so you could appreciate being sober.
I stopped a while ago and started just trying to eat healthy and focus on other sources of happiness. I’m much happier since!
My body is the kind that absolutely won’t lose weight unless I do some cardio. Unfortunately, the gym is a while away, and work isn’t very forgiving either. If I worked hard on a day, I’ll come back home with a headache, and if I run with that my head will split open.
Eating healthy doesn’t seem to have an effect on my body. Even if I cut back to 1500 calories, my body fat is so stubborn that I couldn’t lose even a single kilogram in 2 months (didn’t exercise) of a very strict diet (not to mention I would be hungry sometimes).
I wonder if I could have a treadmill at home, and could just have a brisk walk every night I don’t feel like it (and run without going to the gym), I would actually do more cardio and maybe loss weight faster. But I can’t afford it.
My body looks like the underside of a frog, so I understand what you’re saying.
I feel sorry for people who don’t drink. When they wake up in the morning, that’s as good as they’re going to feel all day.
Dean Martin
It takes some time to build a routine, getting to that point requires effort. Once you’re comfortable and know your limits I personally get a lot of satisfaction from pushing my body to get faster, stronger, more agile and so on. You might feel exhausted but you know you can keep going and your body will respond.
Together with all other health benefits you get from it makes you feel good about yourself after a workout which translates to better confidence, mood and more.
I’ve tried for years to go to the gym regularly. I despise going to the gym. Putting on workout clothes, mindlessly trudging on a treadmill or whatnot before slogging through a bunch of machines then shower and going home. I loathe the idea of sacrificing 1+ hour of my precious free time just to feel miserable and accomplishing fuck all… Everyone claiming “just stick with it and you’ll start to enjoy it” lies. There’s no other way to say this. Lies. If you love it, good for you, but it definitely isn’t a universal thing.
Walks around town I do kinda enjoy but not enough to make me want to do it. But point me someplace new or nice to hike and I’m off to the races. I love being out in nature, taking in the sights and I don’t care whatsoever if I need to work for it.
The last few weeks I’ve also started to go swimming with my girlfriend. I’ve not been a fan of swimming as a child and basically never did it anymore since then. So I’m pathetic at it but to my huge surprise I do quite like it.
So my recommendation to you is: try loads of different things. Chances are you’ll like doing certain things way more than others. Ideally you’ll find something you love. Or at least you should be able to find something you don’t hate.
I am not a fan of other workouts but I LOVE cycling. Wind in my face, sightseeing, ability to push harder or just cruise to catch my breath makes it really enjoyable IMO.
Same. At first it sucked, but nowadays, I really enjoy just being on my bike. I’m not competitive at all, if I’m slow, I’m slow.
I was going to say the same thing. With cycling, you get an immediate reward for your spent effort because riding fast just feels really fun. So I find myself wanting to put as much energy in as possible.
I genuinely enjoy it. Especially cardio. Running cycling, doesn’t matter. I almost always love the feelint
Preach buddy 🚴
