Motivational Hypnosis Help: What Motivates You to Exercise?
Take this Quiz: Are You an Intrinsically or Extrinsically Motivated Exerciser?
Understanding what personally motivates you to get up and head to the gym will drastically change how you view your exercise routine. If you’re constantly struggling to find motivation to visit the gym, it’s a clear indication that you have a disconnect between your conscious and subconscious mind. You know you “should” go to the gym, but your established behavior of skipping the gym keeps winning that battle.
Intrinsic Motivation and Extrinsic Motivation
Knowing the motivational terms of exercise psychology helps you understand what you want from the gym versus what you get from the gym. Hypnosis helps you hack your brain to create and maintain exercise behaviors that cause you to act instinctively. Like all #LifeHacks, once you learn the trick, it all seems so simple.
Based on your experiences, personality and lifestyle; you’re either an intrinsically motivated or extrinsically motivated exerciser.
What is Intrinsic Motivation?
Intrinsic Motivation is defined as a, “Stimulation that drives an individual to adopt or change a behavior for his or her own internal satisfaction or fulfillment. Intrinsic motivation is usually self-applied, and springs from a direct relationship between the individual and the situation.”
Main Takeaway: If you genuinely love exercising and staying active because the act makes you feel good, you’re intrinsically motivated.
What is Extrinsic Motivation?
Extrinsic Motivation is defined as an, “External stimulation that drives you to change or continue with your chosen behaviors. The motivating factors are external, or outside, rewards such as money or recognition. These rewards provide satisfaction and pleasure that the task itself may not provide.”
Main Takeaway: If you exercise because you want to see a specific end result that makes you look good, you’re extrinsically motivated.
Are You an Intrinsically or Extrinsically Motivated Exerciser?
The Incredible Hypnotist, Richard Barker, has come up with a very simple quiz to help you determine if your mind responds more to intrinsic or extrinsic motivators. Be as honest as possible when answering the next 5 questions. Fight the natural urge to respond with what your conscious mind thinks is the “right” answer. Allow your subconscious mind to come through and respond with how you really feel about the gym.
While you may feel a pull to both answers, select the response that best describes your personality.
1. When it comes to the gym, you find reward in:
a. Stepping on the scale and seeing a change in your weight.
b. The feeling of physical satisfaction when you finish working out.
2. When working out, what is most important to you:
a. Losing weight and gaining muscle in ideal areas.
b. Feeling healthy, energized and in control.
3. Would you rather go to a gym that:
a. Has mirrors installed in the workout rooms?
b. Doesn’t have any reflective surfaces in the gym?
4. Do you consider working out a hobby of yours:
a. No.
b. Yes.
5. What do you enjoy more:
a. After an intense training program, being able to see the results of all your hard work.
b. The process of developing a routine that makes you feel good every day that you show up.
If the majority of yours answers were “A,” you are extrinsically motivated.
Most people reading this article will fall into the extrinsically motivated category. Don’t worry, it’s not a “bad” group to be associated with. Many successful people are driven and motivated by tangible and visible rewards. The only issue with being extrinsically motivated is that once you reach the carrot, you tend to plateau and lose your drive.
For you, a motivational hypnotist would work on trying to develop solid intrinsic motivators that align with your extrinsic desire to exercise. Embedding feel-good suggestions into your subconscious that are linked with your extrinsic motivations will increase your success of adhering to your gym routine.
If you’re a cardio junkie that loves to sweat out calories, it’s like going to your Zumba class and suddenly, nothing feels right and you can’t get in the zone. In order to lose that muffin top you hate, you have to readjust your attitude and try hard to feel the vibe of the music. Creating an emotional, internal connection to your desire to lose weight and gain muscle will ensure that you keep going back to the gym.
If the majority of yours answers were “B,” you are intrinsically motivated.
If you’ve lost that loving feeling with the natural highs you used to get, chances are your workout routine has become stale and boring. Having an intrinsically motivated personality, you usually have no problem finding motivation to exercise. But something has happened and you just can’t find the internal push to get back in your feel-good routine.
For you, a motivational hypnotist would work on trying to realign your old thought processes with your newfound behaviors. Your subconscious mind has, for whatever reason, stopped cooperating. A hypnotist will find the block and either move it entirely; or train your mind to automatically move around the obstacle.
If you’re a runner, it’s like visiting your favorite running trail only to find that a tree has fallen into your pathway; blocking you from moving forward. In order to continue to feel that runner’s high, you’re gonna have to move that tree or move around the tree.
How Motivational Hypnotists Use This Information.
Professional hypnotists like Richard Barker help you understand the whys behind your whats. What you want to ultimately achieve by working out is easy to answer. You want to exercise because you want to:
- Lose weight;
- Build muscle;
- Fit into your skinny jeans;
- Have bulging biceps;
- Get a release of endorphins;
- Feel energized and alert;
- Be as healthy as possible.
You have to sit back, relax and ask your subconscious why you want these things. Understanding the “whys” behind your “whats” will allow your subconscious mind to act on autopilot when it’s time to go to the gym. Motivational hypnotists help create a neural pathway between the necessary action needed to reach a desired action.
A Clinical Hypnosis Session for Gym Motivation.
When trying to give you motivation to workout, a hypnotist’s job is to create a behavioral shift through relaxation and positive reinforcement.
1. Creating a State of Ultimate Relaxation
We begin by putting you into a deep state of relaxation and heighten your awareness of the present. This process allows you to forget your past behavior and future commitment concerns. It gives your conscious mind a break so that your subconscious mind can really hear the conversation.
2. Isolating Your Issue
The hypnotist will journey into your subconscious to locate your main issue that prevents you from being motivated to workout. Through a series of visualization techniques, your hypnotist will allow you to focus on the problem and magnify it within your subconscious mind. The clinical hypnotist will then begin chipping away at the big scary issue; making it smaller and smaller until it becomes microscopic.
3. Embedding Positive Message
After your hypnotist isolates your issue and cuts it down to a manageable size, you’re ready for some positive reinforcement. What a clinical hypnotist will focus on is tying together how relaxed, at ease and wonderful you feel, with the embedded messages that will get you back into that state when you’re psyched to go to the gym. We’ll place a direct path for your subconscious to follow whenever a specific trigger is set off.
For example, if you dread waking up early to exercise, your issue may be pressing the snooze button on your alarm clock. The Incredible Hypnotist would embed a message into your subconscious that is triggered when you hear your alarm clock go off. Instead of your normal thought processes of wanting to sleep in, your subconscious mind will associate the sound of your alarm with intrinsic motivators that are custom to you. This embedded pathway will override your unmotivated behaviors with a natural desire and excitement to get up and head to the gym.
Hypnosis is the Answer to Your Lack of Gym Motivation.
As you’ve learned, changing your behaviors on a subconscious level will give you the motivation you need to get to the gym. By opening yourself up to hypnosis, you’re opening yourself up to become highly susceptible to messages that will directly improve your ability to break your cycle of skipping the gym.
Give motivational hypnosis a try. What have you got to lose; other than all of your excuses that prevent you from going to the gym. Reach out to a local hypnotist to schedule a motivational hypnosis session or click here to watch a video on booking a private session with world-renowned hypnotist, Richard Barker.
