5 "Don'ts" That Make Your Workout Ineffective
I’ve been working, exercising and surrounded by gyms for almost half of my life and I can easily tell if someone is not being effective at the gym by certain bad habits that turn a potentially, life-altering workout into a waste of time, energy, and effort.
Most people that I work with don’t have a lot of time to exercise so making workouts for them that are effective and efficient are very important. I teach them the good habits they need to have in order to have a successful and effective workout so even when they exercise on their own, they know the requirements to create the same result.
Till this day, I can go to a gym, park, fitness center and still see bad habits from exercisers that are not effective and efficient with their time and energy. It’s a sad scene to always watch but this blog is to share with you the 5 “Don’ts” that make your workout completely ineffective.
1. Don’t use at your cellphone unless it’s gym related.
This is a HUGE pet peeve of mine. The whole point of the gym is to create “You” time. You’re supposed to use the gym as a way to unplug and have personal time to disconnect from the world and focus on building your mind, body and spirit. My biggest pet peeve is when people use their phone between sets to scroll on social media, have conversations that are not important or snapping a photo or video and then obsessing over watching it for 3+ minutes.
I’m totally okay with people taking picture and videos to record progress and hold themselves accountable but it’s when you take the time to obsessively looking at those pictures and videos when the workout is not over, THAT’S when it become ineffective. You’ll usually see this with people trying to create content for social media but it portrays the wrong message of the purpose of working out. You begin to workout in vain when this is your reason to be in a gym and that’s not effective.
The phone screen is already a huge distraction in modern society. The only purpose a cell phone should have at the gym is for playing your music, timing your set with a timer or snapping a picture or video of your progress or lifting form. If you look at your cellphone for more than 20 seconds, you are no longer HERE and NOW.
2. Don’t Have Time-Wasting Conversations with People
It’s ok to catch up with a friend you haven’t seen at the gym but if you’re friend knows the reason why you’re both at the gym, your conversations will not last that long. You’re here to be focused and to work on yourself. If you have a conversation with someone, keep it short, positive and light. Conclude the conversation as fast as you can and politely tell them that you still have work left to do for your workout. They shouldn’t feel bad because you “are” at the gym.
The only people that feel bad are the people that go to the gym to say “hi” and have as many conversations with as many people as they they can. Every gym has “that” person but that person is making their workouts extremely ineffective. They are wasting time conversing and avoiding the hard, important work they should be doing.
I’m all for feeling part of a community because its a healthy way to balance social stress but in excess, it creates negative kickback. Now you become the person everyone avoids because they know you are going to talk them about his/her current life story for 20 minutes. The best people to talk to the gym are the ones that keep the conversation energizing, uplifting and talking about growth and change.
3. Don’t workout without warming up.
Nobody really warms up before working out. It’s either because they’re running late to their workout, they don’t know how to warmup or they get too excited to start doing the fun stuff. This makes every workout ineffective because you dramatically increase your chances of injury, prolonged muscle soreness and muscle fatigue during the actual workout.
As you get older, this habit becomes even more important but since most people never built the habit up in their younger years, they try to push past the pain and tightness leading to workouts that are painful, hurtful and big wastes of time and energy. If you prioritize warming up, you are participating in preventative measures and actions that give way to consistent and effective workouts.
Take the time to sharpen the saw rather than trying to push forward with a blade that doesn’t cut anymore. Warming up is taking the precious time to sharpen your saw before cutting swiftly through your workout with ease and less effort.
4. Don’t leave your machine not re-racked.
Put your weights back people. Its the one behavior you can do to show respect to your gym. Your gym is your church. Its the holy ground when you transform yourself and the space should be respected. If you’re there to put 5 plates on each side of a barbell to life, take a video and leave - you’re a phony and a big liability to everyone at the gym.
People that don’t re-rack weights are aren’t showing respect to the weights, the gym and the people around you. These actions in itself describe the person that you are. Self-centered and ego-driven. Everything is for you and you only. Working out in a shared space is one big, synegistic party. Everyone is tossing their energy in the air for someone else to use and pass on to the next.
People that don’t rerack weights, halt that energy transfer and dampens the energy and motivation to keep going. There are some machine and racks where its maybe okay to leave a big plate on like a squat rack but only if you see its common practice. If not, its expected for you to rerack your weights especially if you know someone may not be strong enough to do it themselves. Pretend that your mom is using the machine after you. Would you leave all those weights on for her to take off?…
5. Don’t compare yourself to other exercisers.
Everyone is at a different mark in their fitness journey so comparing yourself to other people is only going to rob you of your joy of being there. We are our biggest critic and judge but the gym should a judge-free zone. We are all our biggest critic and h=judge and sometimes we particularly don’t like where we are and how we look and feel. In a sense, we are all “ugly” at the gym. That’s the best part about the gym. You are surrounded by people that are just like you with the same general goal in mind - we want to “look” better and “feel” better.
Even though we all may look different and seem to be at different points in this journey, we are actually more alike then unalike. So when you are working out keep your eyes on the exercise at hand. Don’t look at other people to judge them because the more you judge, the same amount of judgement is coming right back at you. If you feel feelings of jealously of someone else, don’t judge yourself. Remind yourself that you are walking in their footsteps and if you trust the process, you can get there too.
Create the habit of extreme tunnel vision at the gym. I maximize this habit by wearing a hat and blasting my headphones with my favorite, motivating music. Then I pretend, I’m the only person there, making everyone at the gym disappear. The only place my eyes go are right back into my eyes in the mirror because that person is the only person in the gym that is challenging you. Its You vs YOU. The only comparison you need to make at the gym is the person you see in the mirror against the person you saw in the mirror the last time you were there.
Conclusion: These are really the “Dont’s” at the gym that I’ve seen from the beginning and still resonates to this day. If you keep these in mind, your workouts will become significantly more effective, you will love working out more and you will begin to tame your mind, body and spirit. In return you reach Empyrea, the highest level of Heaven.
Thank you for reading!
- Carl Anthony Grande
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