How to keep motivated and physically active while staying at home

@DerbyUni – during the COVID-19 pandemic, many of us have found ourselves adrift from our usual routines and often without our familiar support and resources that help us to keep physically active. Furthermore, our reactions to uncertainty and disruption can have a negative effect on our psychological health. Here, Dr Ainslea Cross, Academic Lead for Health Psychology at the University of Derby, discusses how health psychology research and practice can help maintain the motivation needed for keeping active while staying at home and provides us with some tools and tips to follow.

Finding your motivation

Reflect on what it is about physical activity that isimportant to you in terms of value and purpose. Consider the personal rewardsyou get, or could gain from keeping active. If you are still struggling to findyour motivation, enlist the help of a friend or someone close to you to helpyou find reasons to stay active.

It can be rewarding to connect online with others who willmotivate and support you and whom you can help in return. Online groups, suchas the 5k Your Way, Move Against Cancer communityor your local parkrun Facebook page, can be a useful source of social supportwhich are important for maintaining motivation for physical activity. At theUniversity of Derby, we have developed the Derby Moves app for staff andstudents which has activity challenges and rewards to keep them motivated,alongside their own personal values and rewards for staying active.

Take committed action

If you’re struggling to get started, work out where the barriers are for you, or what you have been avoiding and consider the reasons why. Then, form committed plans to overcome the barriers to keeping active in the form of:

a) your reasons for wanting to keep active

b) the obstacle or barrier(s) to keeping active

c) the action you will take to overcome the obstacles orbarriers to keeping active

It is important that you keep in mind your own reasons forwanting to be active and avoid the thinking traps of social comparison and ‘shoulddos’.

Harness your energy

Throughout your day, notice where your attention is going andidentify the main draws on your energy levels. Reflect on which of these are helpful(and you should do more of) and what is less helpful (and drains your energywith little benefit to you).

Be psychologically flexible:

All movement counts, so avoid ‘all or nothing’ thoughts that you should be rigidly sticking to a routine and that anything else is failure and instead keep a flexible mindset. If you are just getting started with becoming more physically active, start with a small, feasible goal that you are confident you could achieve in the next 24 hours and then build on this.

Look for solutions that will work for you depending on whatyou enjoy, or try something that you think you will enjoy, rather thansomething you think you should do because everyone else seems to do.

With changeable situations, we need to consider what’s workablefor our own circumstances and situations, which means giving ourselves creditfor our ongoing commitment to keeping active and avoiding the trap of socialcomparison on social media. Keep in mind your reasons for wanting to keepactive and their importance to you.