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Comment by mse11028 | Hacker News Reader

Wow it's like we're from different planets. I'd never describe exercise as "repetitive, boring and requires discipline". For me it's an urge and it's fun to do.

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I'm definitely from the same planet as the parent poster (PP). There is a subset of people, like me and PP (I'd say we're probably < 10% of the general population), for which physical exercise really is "repetitive, boring and requires discipline" and sometimes even feels like pure pain when we force ourselves to do it, because we know it's healthy, even if we'd rather be lazying around, although there is no physical pain involved and we are otherwise in good health.

It would probably make sense to further split the participants of a study like this into two groups: the ones that enjoy physical exercise and the ones that most of the time don't enjoy physical exercise.

If I were to speculate on the physiology of this, I'd say that for people like me and the PP, the brain either fails to secrete enough endorphins - the feel-good chemicals that are usually released during physical exercise that make it "fun" and an "urge" (I've read once about a study liking physical exercise addiction to addiction to hard drugs, so it makes sense to have a similar mechanism) - or we don't have enough receptors for endorphins. Thankfully I also happen to have an auto-burner metabolism (I can eat anything anytime and just never get fat) and and no genetical predisposition for obesity or diabetes, so I can stay reasonably healthy even when I stop doing any kind of exercise for some periods of time, but other people are not as lucky as me...

I think it's much much simpler than that. Physical exercise is a super broad term and some of those activities really are boring and repetitive. Most of the low hanging fruit that we all think of as exercise is super boring. I've found that simply taking a walk with a friend who you like to converse with made me realize that exercise can be fun if you find something that works for you.

For me exercise is never boring because I don't do boring exercises. Jogging for example -- just kill me instead, holy christ is that boring.

Soccer, Basketball, Climbing, Sprinting, and Biking (to the liquer store for example) -- now that's exercise I can get into!

Yeah, I just struggle to find solot workout experiences I can gamify in order to sustain my interest. Like you, jogging is just so boring for me. But my problem with team sports is they're just so dependent on the schedules of others. This is my biggest excuse for my paunch.

Lucky for you. For others of us I'd rather do almost anything else. I'd rather clean the house, do dishes, anything other than exercise. Yea, I force myself to do it but I'm massively bored and can't wait to get on to whatever I really want to be doing.

I'd love to know some secret sauce other than luck to head into actually enjoying to exercise.

The secret sauce is intensity. The idea that I could be bored while exercising intensely is absurd to me because all my resources, mental and otherwise, are required just to maintain the pace that I set for myself. When I'm close to the edge of what I can tolerate, I take a rest interval, then ramp up the intensity again before I have a chance to get bored.

I don't like the pain of working out at all. So intensity doesn't make me not bored it just makes me want it stop as soon as possible. So no, that's not the secret sauce for me. Glad it works for you.

Fair enough. In my experience the sensation of intense exercise is similar to, but distinct from, the sensation of pain. I appreciate that people might experience this differently.

The secret sauce for me was to buy a treadmill and place a drawing board on top of the handles. I place my laptop on top of the drawing board and do stuff I normally do. Right now I am typing this comment and using the treadmill at the same time. Hours pass by quickly while you are immersed in coding, reading hn, watching youtube etc and when you get off the treadmill you notice that you walked 5+ miles in 3+ hrs.

The other thing is to read a lot of papers on google scholar so you can convince yourself of all the beneficial aspects of doing a cardio.

I've tried that. I'd go blind trying to focus on anything while my head is bouncing from walking

Try a lot of things - there could be an activity that clicks for you just untried. Really spam the parameter-space with options.

Do you mind describing your routine? I've tried getting into jogging but, like the above commenter, I find it extremely boring.

I've been trying to learn swimming. You can research the hell out of swimming techniques and apply it. No matter how good you are you can still get better.

Plus there is something about water that makes the stress go away( for me atleast).

I can't swim though.

I couldn't either until 3 months ago( being from the 3rd world and all that), then I discovered total immersion swimming. It was my life long goal to learn to swim I am glad I finally got around to it.

Now I can swim laps( with pauses after each length).

It's worth learning. It's one thing to not like it; it's quite another to be simply unable.

Learn to float. Then learn to use your limbs to move around without a ground to push against.

Perfect! Learning to swim is never boring.

Bonus, a swimmer's physique is often rated the most attractive type. Eh? ;)

- Weightlifting following a 5x5 program (ideally with a buddy) isn't boring because the weight commands 110% of your attention or it will fall on you

- Cycling on my trainer at a low level of exertion (Zone 2) while watching a good show isn't boring

- Intramural-type team vs. team sports are usually not boring. Caveat, if you aren't in shape you will be too exhausted to be having fun, but if you stick it out for a little while and get into shape it becomes more fun

You may be on to something. It's almost as if different people enjoy different things.

You know what "reps" are, right? ;)

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