Could it be that many people avoid physical activity and that the motivational tips of sports psychologists are not the right tool?
Almost everyone wants to move more, but most people don’t. The World Health Organization recommends two and a half hours of physical activity per week plus two units of strength training, which only just under four to ten percent of people in the West achieve. This article from the NZZ sheds light on the reasons for this from a new perspective: it is not our head but our feelings that decide whether we move or not. However, the call for more exercise is primarily addressed to the head: move more, then you will live longer and healthier! However, the mind cannot overcome the feeling and so appeals to exercise or good intentions are often useless.
Until now, the rule was that in order to integrate physical activity into everyday life, you had to set yourself goals, believe in success, plan concrete steps and then stick to them with self-discipline. However, many do not succeed. The article explains the “intention-behavior gap” – an abyss between intention and implementation. “In the past, the way people feel during physical activity has been disregarded, but the feeling is decisive as to whether we want to repeat the movement or not,” says a leading professor of exercise psychology.
The article also sheds light on the previously believed reason for the increase in physical mood after sport. The question arose as to why people don’t do the things that put them in a good mood more often. Only a new approach put psychologists on the right track. They asked people about their feelings not only before and after, but also during the sport. And here a correlation emerged: the better the athletes felt during training, the more likely they were to take part in further training sessions. One message of the article is accordingly: If you want to be more physically active, you should not only focus on good intentions, goals and self-control, but rather try to link exercise with positive feelings, to learn to love it, so to speak.
