basuragomi wrote: ↑Wed Jun 03, 2020 9:51 am
@ertyu:
I think people give that advice because the motivation that drives a habitual exerciser to exercise is so different from a couch potato. Habitual exercisers have trained themselves to the point that that the exercise itself is inherently rewarding, and can't remember what it's like to be on the other side of the cusp. That advice is common because those strategies work very well for someone already trained to enjoy exercise, but your brain isn't trained and life isn't arranged for it to work for you.
Theory:
It's 100% operant conditioning. First, I'm sure you maintain some kind of habit. At a minimum checking this forum counts as one. So you're obviously amenable to some kind of scheduled positive reinforcement.
Basic tools:
A big part of conditioning is figuring out what works as positive reinforcement and what triggers punishment. Positive reinforcement is easy: sleep, caffeine, novelty, runner's high, sugar, sex, money, positive social contact, performative displays. Lots to work with, our society has the pursuit of happiness down to a science.
Punishment is much trickier. The vast majority of punishment here is internally generated - i.e. stressing yourself out over perceived social judgement, or failing to compare to some imaginary standard. This is what you need to very carefully manage.
With respect to external punishment: Pain is another externally generated punishment. Not much you can do about that beyond avoiding risky behaviours. Public shaming does happen but it's pretty rare, and you've been trained in a hundred coping methods - the most obvious one is dismissing low-status people, and being fit is in itself a status symbol. That's a self-reinforcing coping system. I'm sure you can think of many others.
Method:
1) Start with a neutral or positively-associated context.
Since most punishment is internally generated and you've hated exercising before, you probably need to start by avoiding whatever negative associations you've built up with exercise. Certain clothing, equipment, places, people, whatever. Don't try to overcome them yet, just avoid them. You can shape your behaviour to be more efficient after it's become automatic. Exercise in casual clothes. Get a shitty beater bike. Work out on a beach rather than a gym. Tell your neighbour pushing you to become a gym buddy to fuck off. Whatever it is, you need to start with a context that at a minimum doesn't prime your brain for punishment. I started getting fit by running in my neighbourhood, but seeing my relatives was triggering social anxiety, then just running in the neighbourhood started triggering anxiety as well, and I stopped. Going to a gym and running there worked way better - my brain was still generalizing the anxiety to the gym, but the level of fear was not nearly as high since it was an entirely novel environment. I later shaped my behaviour back to being able to run in public without any issues.
2) Always pair exercise with a reward and ensure that reward is only available with exercise. Remove the means to obtain the reward otherwise.
When I started weightlifting I put my favourite songs on my mp3 player and removed them from my home library, so that it was the only way to get good music. When I later moved to this area I didn't even have a fixed internet connection at home, the gym was literally my only option to stream videos. I would watch action films and comedies, things designed to evoke a strong positive emotional response. I so strongly associate films with cardio now that I can't bear sitting through a whole movie anymore. Now I only watch films or TV shows at the gym. After my sugar fast, I started using candy as a home workout reward, and only consuming it in that context. The association eventually gets strong enough that the reward minus the exercise seems wrong - enhancing your natural
contrafreeloading instinct. At that point you can reintroduce the reward back into the rest of your life.
3) Set up your reward system so that your rewards reinforce each other.
Luckily exercise is a strong mood enhancer, so long-term you can start seeking it out for itself. In the meantime you can make everything surrounding exercise rewarding as well. Basically, develop rituals oriented around exercise. Performing the ritual should itself be rewarding, and ideally head off negative triggers as well.
Ideas cribbed from a post I put in @Hristo Botev's journal:
- Clear your schedule at the same time every week for exercise. Force people to defer to your exercise time.
- Sleep at a certain time or sleep in only before/on exercise days.
- Eat rewarding foods or extra amounts exclusively before/after exercise - e.g. Every year I do a 160 km bike ride and 95% of what I end up looking forward to on the ride proper is a burger and ice cream from this one specific restaurant. Doesn't matter that I can have ice cream any time, I've built that strong an association with the reward.
- Prepare music or podcast playlists exclusively for your exercise.
- Lay out or change into exercise clothes.
- Turn off phones, activate blocking software, or unplug monitors the night before.
- Visualize what specific routes/lifts/activities you will do.
- Solicit praise from people you respect, i.e. exactly what Facebook is made for.
4) Shape your behaviour.
Once you have enough positive reinforcement flowing in, you can start extinction of undesired associations. Try to introduce a negative trigger only in a strongly positive context. If you hate the gym, go during an empty time, bring candy or focus on only using a piece of equipment you already use elsewhere.
Stoicism:
At the core of it, exercise is not an inherently negative experience. Being tired doesn't feel bad if you have the freedom to rest. Compared to other pastimes, you can experience basically infinite novelty, set and achieve constantly increasing goals, and get a strong chemical reward on top of it all. Many social systems reward both being in shape and exercising. On a conceptual level, it should be much easier to create a system where your exercise is rewarded at practically every level than it is to do something much more heretical like ERE.