Tips on How to Succeed With Exercise Programs

Based on his studies, San Diego State University psychologist John E. Martin has some tips for reinforcing the exercise habit by meeting your psychological needs:

* Start very slowly, to minimize negative reinforcement. Slow down as soon as you reach 60% to 70% of your maximum age-predicted heart rate, or as soon as it becomes slightly difficult to breathe.

* Tell all your friends to ask about your exercise program often, and to praise you when you’ve exercised.

* Set time goals rather than distance goals.

* For the first several weeks, just doing something is more important than how much you do. Let endurance develop later.

* Fool yourself into the exercise habit by sleeping in your exercise clothes before a morning workout, or laying the clothes out carefully the night before. Make it a rule that you get up, put on your workout clothes, and step outside before you consider whether to cancel a workout session.

* If possible, exercise with friends and praise each other’s performance.

* Distract yourself with a headset or by talking.

* Do something pleasant afterward.

* If you slack off, see this as a lapse, not a relapse into being sedentary. Take responsibility but no guilt. Start up again at a level half of what you did the last exercise session--so you won’t feel like a failure.