BMF Blog

How difficult is it to motivate safely, but harder?

Written by Bonnie Hatcher | 19-Oct-2012 00:00:00

Motivation is vital for anyone who intends to take part in a regular fitness programme. People motivate themselves in a number of ways and setting goals is particularly popular. Setting short term goals like attending a British Military Fitness (BMF) fitness bootcamp twice a week are useful as they can be easily measured and built on.

Another form of motivation is to start exercising with a friend. This works well because each individual can encourage the other to participate. At a BMF military bootcamp, members work out in groups to encourage social interaction, which is one of the main reasons that members enjoy the sessions so much.

Making fitness training a habit is essential to success because this ensures a time is allocated to working out each week and the individual can keep trying to improve previous performances.

As a BMF instructor, I have to be aware of the different motivational needs of our members at each fitness boot camp. People react differently when working out in groups with some needing positive enforcement such as the correction of bad form, whereas others need a firmer direction.

I find that our members fall into three categories when it comes to motivation:

a) those who are competitive and need little encouragement
b) those who like to help and encourage other members
c) those who need to be motivated and would not succeed without the encouragement of an instructor.

This is true for both sexes. I have met men who need just as much motivation as women, and women who are as competitive as men.

We ensure that our instructors learn to gauge the mood of members during a military bootcamp, identify who needs more motivation than others and then use the most appropriate motivational skills for them to achieve the most from their fitness programme. Most of all we make it great fun!