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While social relationships are important to individual happiness, that doesn’t mean you should give up on exercising to maintain them. In this study on the role of friendships and happiness, researchers concluded that “Having friends and close peer experiences are both important predictors of life satisfaction, and satisfied individuals tend to have stronger and more intimate social relationships.” Instead of being stressed out about it, it’s important to realize that those other things like meeting up with your friends or spending time with your family are equally important to your happiness.
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Things are going to come up that derail your exercise plans each week. Have a Good Backup PlanĮven if your daily workouts are important to you and you’re able to fit them into your schedule most days, you’ll still need to be flexible and have a good backup plan. So, instead of falling into the depths of despair, keep in mind that in time results will come and decide before your event that you’ll be happy with your progress instead of focusing solely on the end result. In all likelihood, all that training you’ve done has made you fitter and healthier than you were prior to your race.Ĭhances are that even if you didn’t finish first, you probably still beat a lot of really fit, tough competitors, and you should be proud of that. Instead of focusing on what didn’t happen, it’s important to be happy with what you’ve achieved. Imagining what might have been can lead those who do better to feel worse than those they outperform.”Įven though most of us are not competing professionally, there is something to be learned: “While bronze medalists can find contentment in thinking ‘at least I won a medal,’ silver medalists are often confronted with an imagined outcome that almost occurred - a preferred outcome in which they are the winner and have the gold medal hanging around their neck. Here’s what one researcher had to say about the cause of the results: In fact, a study done by researchers in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology found that in Olympic competitions, bronze medal winners were often happier and more satisfied than silver medalists. After all, training hard for an event often means sacrificing other aspects of your life such as family, friends, and sometimes even work, and not reaching these goals can make it seem like it was all for nothing. That means placing tons of energy and effort during training on reaching this goal and failure to do so on race day can often lead to negative reactions and even disappointment. Unless you’re aiming to tackle an extreme distance, in which completing is a win in itself, you may have specific time goals that you train to reach. If you’re into endurance sports, like running or cycling, you may set goals according to a specific race you want to compete in. Don’t Place Too Much Emphasis on Race Results Instead of setting yourself strict fitness goals that may ultimately be impossible to reach and lead to more stress, maybe try this:įocus on the progress your making and the joy of exercise. Here’s how you can start figuring out ways to optimize your life and decrease your overall stress rather than adding to it. Yes, you have a fitness routine and a workout plan, but life happens – and we all just have to go with it and try our best to find a way to balance life and fitness. While exercise is ultimately a good thing and, naturally, important for our health and well-being, striving for our fitness goals shouldn’t override everything else and unduly cause more stress. In the best case scenario, exercise reduces stress, not adds to it. Or maybe it’s that family obligation that you forgot to put on your calendar that forces you to skip your workout all together. And you start to feel your stress levels rising and the anxiety for missing a workout take over… An important workout you have scheduled in the evening suddenly becomes derailed by a request from a friend to meet up for dinner. Do you really need fitness goals or would a more laidback, balanced approach to life and fitness make you happier?