this post was submitted on 22 May 2025
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[–] shplane@lemmy.world 2 points 22 hours ago

Boxing. Constant movement, hell of a work out, and you get to punch shit

[–] DirigibleProtein@aussie.zone 2 points 3 days ago

Walking the dog while listening to podcasts or audio books.

[–] snoons@lemmy.ca 11 points 5 days ago

Knowing I won't feel like shit for the rest of the day.

[–] sailormoon@lemmy.world 7 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

I like to watch shows/videos while I workout. Made a rule that I can only watch certain things while I'm exercising. I look forward to watching those things and 'tricked' myself into being excited about the exercise, too! Also I feel much better after I've exercised, so I really look forward to that post-exercise feeling.

[–] YiddishMcSquidish@lemmy.today 8 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (2 children)

I try not to think about it as a punishment for what I ate, and more a celebration of what my body can do.

[–] dan1101@lemm.ee 4 points 5 days ago

Yep. When you get old you won't be as able, so enjoy it while you can. And the exercise will likely prolong how long you can be mobile.

[–] baggachipz@sh.itjust.works 2 points 5 days ago (1 children)

This is a great perspective, I’m going to embrace it.

[–] dan1101@lemm.ee 6 points 5 days ago

I like to walk, I pick nice places with good/interesting scenery. It's good mentally too, helps me unwind and work out problems and come up with new ideas.

[–] volvoxvsmarla@lemm.ee 10 points 6 days ago

I got a kid but not a car. Just walking to the kindergarten and back twice a day is movement. We spend a lot of time outdoors at playgrounds or parks and I have to do all the grocery shopping by bike or walking. I don't do other physical exercise admittedly, but this kid is a fitness machine. We be running, playing, I need to lift her, carry her, carry her stuff, clean up, wrestle - for real having a kid made me the most physically fit and active I've ever been.

When I was younger I liked to dance. Trying to lose weight I'd just put headphones on in my room and dance for hours. A friend of mine actually lost a crapton of weight this way, think obese to normal weight.

Also, making a kid (and training for it and reenacting it) is great exercise.

[–] FrustratedArtist@sh.itjust.works 14 points 6 days ago (3 children)

Find sports that you actually enjoy - try out different things. In my case:

  • Cardio: running fucking sucks, swimming is boring as shit. Cycling, on the other hand, is pretty fun. Feels like flying when everything aligns.
  • Strength: lifting weights at the gym is doable, but boring. Climbing? Hell yeah, give me more routes where I have to tie myself into a knot while pulling up all my weight with my fingertips.

It can be an exact opposite of it for you. Or you'll find out that team sports are the bees knees because support from other people is what you've been missing.

[–] gt5@lemm.ee 5 points 6 days ago (1 children)

I used to hate running until one day something clicked in my brain. I just ran my second half marathon last week. One thing I learned was that of your dying from running, you’re probably going too fast and should just slow down.

My PT told me that the best exercise is the one that you can do consistently

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[–] EndlessNightmare@reddthat.com 7 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Sports or recreational activities, as opposed to going to gym for the sake of exercise. The physical exercise is a part of the activity rather than the sole focus.

[–] ulterno@programming.dev 2 points 5 days ago

When gym is no fun, go out and run

[–] Pika_nyan@lemmy.world 5 points 6 days ago

Dance

Dance

REVOLUTION!!

(That rhythm game with the arrows on the screen and ground that you stomp on)

[–] TwoBeeSan@lemmy.world 7 points 6 days ago

Combine with work. Birds and stones.

[–] blackstrat@lemmy.fwgx.uk 5 points 6 days ago

I'm trying to do stuff that's quick that I can do every day. I do pushups before my morning shower and some squats whilst I brush my teeth. Do it every day, I feel better for it and it only takes like 3 minutes. You can do extra sets around the house if you have a spare 30-60 seconds too.

[–] Statfish@lemmy.world 4 points 5 days ago

I've always loved sports; so that part's easy, personally. But I've also learned to kind of savor the feeling of using my muscles and getting tired. Whatever I'm doing, or even on days where I didn't have time to "exercise", I make a point to check in on different parts of my body, maybe tense them or stretch; just trying to notice what feels good and then really savor that feeling. I find that building that mental practice helps motivate me to seek out exercise, or power through when I'm not really enjoying a particular activity.

[–] Therobohour@lemmy.world 7 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Work out watch star trek. By the season 4 you'll be made of steel

[–] WindyRebel@lemmy.world 3 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Hold up. Which series? You starting with the original or with Next Generation?

[–] Therobohour@lemmy.world 3 points 6 days ago

That depends, how massive do you want to be?

[–] lightnsfw@reddthat.com 4 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Experiencing the benefits of strength training day to day (being able to move heavy shit easily and not struggle with things that I used to) also seeing how I look in the mirror after I do it helps.

[–] SoftestSapphic@lemmy.world 4 points 5 days ago

Fast speed hike incline on treadmill

Put in earbuds, drum&bass

Disassociate for 1-2 hrs while staring at the food channel

[–] moakley@lemmy.world 6 points 6 days ago

Personally, I like a treadmill.

For years I planned to get one, and all the runners in my family would talk about how awful they are, how no one ever uses it once they have it, and getting outside is so much better.

I finally got the treadmill a couple months ago, and I use it several times per week. Some weeks I use it every day. It's convenient, I can control the temperature in the room, I can watch something on my phone while I run, and I like being able to set a consistent pace.

[–] untorquer@lemmy.world 3 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Play is a good one for aerobics. Going for a run or bike? Try to find new routes or go places you haven't before. Maybe run an errand. Maybe try to study wildlife or plants around while running one to another.

For strength training IDK. just pop in some absurd music and know that later it will feel good either just post exercise or weeks later when the exercise itself feels nice. It's also going to be nice when you go to lift a thing or hike and recognize you're actually stronger. Always a rewarding feeling!

In either case, it's important to reflect positively on your progress. "Hell yeah i can do this thing now thanks to my effort!“ and not negatively e.g. "my goals are so far away I'm so weak".

[–] WraithGear@lemmy.world 3 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

I like to bike, and my motivation is to see what is around the bend…. And so i needed to spend a week recovering after biking 50 miles, and hard bonking 35 miles from my car. But hey i absolutely had the motivation to do that to my self.

Now my next motivation is survival, because the Sun has totally gone down, and if i don’t make it back to my car, i might actually die. A very powerful motivator that one.

[–] arararagi@ani.social 4 points 6 days ago

I put some vtubers when running.

[–] kinther@lemmy.world 6 points 6 days ago

I got a recumbent exercise bike, a pawn shop tv, steam deck, and a steam controller. I play whatever is loaded on my deck while I bike, usually for about 30-45 minutes at a time.

Right now I am playing Fall Guys while I exercise, as it keeps me entertained on survival for ~10 minutes per game.

[–] Angry_Autist@lemmy.world 5 points 6 days ago (1 children)

I chart my improvements over time and equate them to role playing game experience points

Do 20 crunches? that's +20 xp towards constitution

Really makes it a lot easier to reframe boring tasks

[–] slaneesh_is_right@lemmy.org 6 points 6 days ago

I'm really not a charting guy or a numbers guy at all. I hardly write anything down if i don't have to. A few years ago i kept reading how much people enjoy running or jogging, so i gave it a shot. I absolutely hated it, but i kept doing it to see if it clicks at some point. Suddenly i saw big leaps in improvement. I still kinda hated running, but the "leveling up" part kept me going. I bought a smartwatch, and suddenly i had numbers and graphs to back the feeling up. I got obsessed.

[–] Witchfire@lemmy.world 3 points 6 days ago
[–] sunglocto@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 5 days ago

I just do it until I physically cant

[–] axEl7fB5@lemmy.cafe 3 points 6 days ago

None. I enjoy exercise itself. No music, no tech, no nothing. Just a program and a timer. When I'm running, I get runner's high. When I'm doing calisthenics, I look forward to doing advanced moves.

[–] BuboScandiacus@mander.xyz 3 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

Exercise bike + watching something on a cheap 2016 tablet

[–] Lorenz_These_Curves@lemmy.world 2 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (1 children)

Not sure if this answers the question; but, as soon as I learned about BDNF and how muscle building can increase the levels of it, I became a gym rat. I want my brain to keep working past 90 and be able to program well into my 90s (I wanna be yelling at everyone about my struggles with Rust).In all seriousness if you don't wanna have dementia a little too early in life. Lift. Weights. Don't ignore cardio though. But BUILD so you can reap the benefits of your lean mass into your elder years . Training also helps me improve my MTB performance, which I find really fun.

Sorry for the wall of text :D

[–] kcweller@feddit.nl 3 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Got any sources to read up on BDNF and working out? I just checked some stuff online but it's mostly either ai-slop articles or science papers about the protein itself 😅

[–] Lorenz_These_Curves@lemmy.world 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

This stuff is incredibly complex to study. And every time I read a study I forget to archive it somewhere. We don't have all of the answers, but studies like this one:https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37600508/

Really make me go, get your ass to the gym. No excuses.

And I suspect we are just looking at the tip of the iceberg here when it comes to things like BDNF. In short, exercise (specifically Strength Training and HIIT) seems well worth it since it is having some kind of effect on people who already have Alzheimer's.

I wish the fitness industry promoted the practical and real cognitive benefits of strength training instead of using using people with eating disorders and six-packs(six-packs usually aren't healthy by the way) to show/advertise the "perfect body". When in reality they should be promoting how much it can help your cognition and mood. I might get heat for this, but I'll say it anyway: I swear people would not have to take as many antidepressants in this country as they do if they just strength-trained twice a week. I see it in the software industry every day how people 15,20 years my senior (whom I respect since they are my mentors) and it hurts to see the beer gut and the lack of vitality (you can see this in someone's face regardless of age) just because as programmers we are sitting all the time, and if you don't fight the negative side effects of that with exercise your body will respond in nasty ways.

[–] kcweller@feddit.nl 1 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Thanks! I took a look at the studie and it's "citations" and "cited by" articles. Sounds promising! I've got dementia / AD in the family, pretty sure I'm next in line in about 50 years. I've never heard about the topic but it seems pretty rigorously researched!

I climb, but not very often. Time to get the running shoes out and start getting some regular exercise in again.

Weight lifting can get stolen for all I care, I hate it 😂 But we have a forest exactly 3 minutes walk away, so time to get out in nature again!

[–] Lorenz_These_Curves@lemmy.world 1 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

I understand weightlifting/resistance training is not for everybody. It is crucial to prevent sarcopenia a little too early in life. And it doesn't take a whole lot to get 90% of the benefits from strength training. Two sessions/week of 1hr each is all you need to reap most of the benefits.

[–] gerryflap@feddit.nl 3 points 6 days ago (2 children)

Honestly I find it quite enjoyable on it's own. The more I do it, the more I just enjoy the running itself. But I tend to have some music playing and dream away a bit

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