If the thought of working out fills you with dread, fret no more. Follow these four steps to transform your relationship with exercise.

Whether you want to get stronger, lose weight or improve your mental health, here are four steps to help you fall in love with working out. 

1. Set weekly goals 

Defining what you want to get from your weekly exercise sessions will make you more focused and more likely to keep turning up. Research has also shown that setting goals that are SMART - specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-based - makes it far more likely to achieve them. 

2. Find an exercise or activity you enjoy

Your time is precious, don’t waste it doing something you don’t enjoy. Exercising doesn’t mean killing yourself by spending hours in the gym. Find an activity that you genuinely love and it won’t feel like a chore. That way, you’ll find it much easier to keep up in the long run. 

3. Be consistent, not perfect 

Not every session in the gym will be perfect. Sometimes you’ll be raring to go and beat your PB, sometimes you’ll struggle to even walk through the door. That’s ok. The best way to see results is to aim for consistency over perfection. 

4. Be patient 

If you know me at all, you’ll know this is rich coming from me. But as someone who has little to zero patience with literally anything, trust me when I say patience is key to exercise. You might not see results straight away, but it doesn’t mean what you’re doing isn’t still working wonders for you. Focus on the small wins, like how you feel mentally and emotionally after exercising and let your bigger goals take care of themselves. 

Need some inspiration to kickstart your new fitness regime? Check out Five golf specific exercises to improve your game.