How to Overcome Your Gym Anxiety
Whether you are new to the gym or you haven’t been in a while, at some point some of us will/ have experienced gym anxiety. The social aspect of going to the gym and the judgement that comes alongside that is just one of the leading factors that feed this fear. In order to overcome that anxiety, we need to first understand why we find the gym intimidating and implement ways of overcoming those fears and anxieties.
Ways we can control our anxiety
1. Make a plan
By making a plan for the session you’re about to complete or a plan of action to get you through the front door, you’re already taking control over your anxiety and reducing the fear of the unknown. This plan doesn’t have to be overcomplicated. If your anxiety is getting started in the gym try creating a few tick boxes to get you first through that door such as; wake up, shower, drive to the gym, have an introduction to the equipment, drive home. After doing this for the first time you’ll instantly reap the rewards of feeling more comfortable in the gym environment and every visit after that will get easier and easier. If you’re already familiar with the gym, but get anxious once in there with not knowing what you should do try to make a list on your phone of 4-5 machines/exercises you want to complete whilst you are there and work your way through them!
Remember… “a goal without a plan is just a wish” You’ve got this!
2. Identify what your exact fears are
“The fears we don’t face become our limits” Write down what your exact worries are about going to the gym, you may find that once you write them down some seem a lot less fearful on paper than in reality. Once written down you’re then able to find solutions to them. For example, if one of your fears is not knowing how to use a particular piece of equipment you can address this fear by either researching online different tutorials or asking a member of staff at the gym for some help and guidance. This brings me to my 3rd point…
3. Knowledge is power
“The expert in anything was once a beginner” Remind yourself of this daily. Knowledge really is power and confidence. Fear is primarily driven by the unknown, the fear of doing something wrong or something new. Fear is what makes us uncomfortable. So how do we overcome this? By educating ourselves with the things we didn’t know how to do because it was new to us so it becomes familiar. It is so important to remind yourself that everyone was once a beginner, and you can learn something new from everyone from; why they're doing something or how they're doing it. We all have different individual goals and what works with someone someway won’t for another and it’s about investigating what works best for you.
4. Be open to doing things wrong
“We learn from failures, not successes”
Learning is the process of trying and failing over and over again. What we do may not always be right, but it’s a step ahead from not doing anything at all and a step towards knowing more. If a big element of your gym anxiety is the fear of doing things wrong, remind yourself that until you come across new challenges you won’t know how to do an exercise for the first time until you try it and more often than not the people around you have faced/ facing those same fears.