Why you should swap punishing workouts for happy feet

Sticking with a fitness routine is not always easy and now, a team of researchers has shed some light on why we wimp out on workouts and how we can make more lasting changes.

In a new study funded by the National Cancer Institute, IHPI member Michelle Segar and co-investigators analyzed what women say makes them feel happy and successful, and how their expectations and beliefs about exercise foster or undermine those things.

"A new understanding of what really motivates women might make an enormous difference in their ability to successfully incorporate physical activity into their daily routine and have fun doing it," said Segar.

The findings showed that both active and inactive women report the same ingredients for feeling happy and successful:

• Connecting with and helping others be happy and successful.
• Being relaxed and free of pressures during their leisure time. Accomplishing goals of many sorts (from grocery shopping to career goals).

"There are important implications from this study on how we can help women better prioritize exercise in their day-to-day life," Segar said. "We need to re-educate women they can move in ways that will renew instead of exhaust them, and more effectively get the message across that any movement is better than nothing. To increase motivation to be physically active, we need to help women to want to exercise instead of feeling like they should do it."