Motivation Is a Myth + Why Showing Up Anyway Is The Strategy That Works
Hey gym besties!
Let's be real about something rarely admitted to in the fitness industry: motivation is mostly a myth. Not in the sense that it never exists, but in the sense that it almost never shows up when we actually need it. It's available in abundance on Sunday night when you're planning your week, and nowhere to be found on Wednesday at 6pm when you're tired, stressed, and your couch is extra comfy. If you've been waiting for motivation to carry you to the gym, you've been waiting for something that was never going to show up on a consistent schedule.
This isn't a personal failure, it's neuroscience. Research on self-regulation and behavior change consistently shows that motivation is an emotional state — unreliable, context-dependent, and deeply influenced by stress, sleep, and circumstance. A 2018 paper published in Psychological Review found that intention-behavior gaps (the space between planning to do something and actually doing it) are largely driven by fluctuating mood and competing impulses rather than lack of desire or commitment. This means, good news, you don't skip the gym because you don't care. You do skip it because you feel something in the moment that overrides what you planned. And while your feelings are real and valid, that’s not necessarily a sign to believe them (I recently made a reel about the fallacy of believing everything you think when it comes to your fitness journey).
Here’s the Reframe
Your mood is not a reliable indicator of what your body needs, therefore it is not a trustworthy guide for whether you should work out today. We are wired to seek comfort and avoid discomfort. Which means the days we most need to move our bodies are often the days we least feel like it. Stress, anxiety, low energy, grief, distraction are not inherent reasons to rest. In fact, they are some of the most evidence-backed reasons to move. A 2023 meta-analysis of 97 published in the British Journal of Sports Medicine found that physical activity was significantly more effective than medication for reducing symptoms of depression and anxiety. The workout you do when you don't feel like it is often the most important one you'll do all week.
What separates people who maintain long-term fitness habits from those who don't is never superior motivation. It is the willingness to act in the absence of it. This is what discipline actually means: not rigidity or punishment, but the ability to do what you said you would do, even when you don't feel like it. And like any muscle, it gets stronger the more you use it. Every time you show up sad, tired, distracted, or unmotivated and do the thing anyway, you are building neural pathways that make that choice easier next time. You are literally rewiring your brain for consistency. Recent research on habit formation found that automaticity (the point at which a behavior no longer requires active decision-making) is built through repetition, not motivation. Stop waiting to feel ready, repeat until it becomes reflex.
Once you start this practice with your gym routine, I promise you’ll start to notice it in other areas of life. The person who learns to show up for a workout they don't feel like doing is building a skill that transfers directly to every hard thing in their life.
So the next time you don't feel like going, try simply: going anyway. Just show up, and watch how far it takes you.
WELLNESS ROUND UP
This podcast honestly has lots of great episodes exploring key nutrition and public health issues, often debunking common misperceptions about the food we eat. This episode was especially eye opening to me because it dug into the ways most Americans overconsume sodium without even realizing it (hint: only 2% of our sodium consumption comes from seasoning with table salt). If you’re not into the science but all of a sudden concerned about your sodium intake, here are a few things to do to be vigilant in your diet: read nutrition labels and check the daily value (DV) of sodium in what you’re consuming, rinse & drain canned beans & veggies, choose fresh meats over cured and smoked options, choose low sodium options when possible.
The cyclospora outbreak has been leaning into buying local produce more than ever, which of course means I’m buying more seasonal items. This August, my goal is to truly savor the summer by cooking more meals with seasonal ingredients such as: stone fruits (peaches, plums, etc), tomatoes, and corn. I’ll keep you all posted on what I try!
