How To Stop Exercising To Punish Yourself and Burn Calories

> Do you exercise to ‘burn off’ calories?

> Do you dread cardio but know you have to do it to make up for that last binge?

> Do you workout so you can ‘earn’ more food?

> And do you wish you could get back to that beautiful relationship with exercise where it's just fun and it's moving your body and it feels good?

Yep! So many women go through the same evolution with exercise as binge-eating takes over their life. But there is definitely a way back to simply loving exercise. I’ve got 8 tips for you today - all of which helped me in my recovery.

1. TAKE A HIATUS FROM EXERCISE COMPLETELY

Give it a break - whether it’s a week, a month. Whatever feels good for you, whereby by the end of it, you're actually craving to exercise in a very genuine way. Your body is yearning for movement. The other reason I want you to take a break is that it’ll help you break that link between food and exercise being this exchange system where you can only get food once you've exercised or you can exercise so then you can earn food. While on a break, exercise won’t be available to complete that chain. So you’ll be forced to realise that it doesn’t belong there. You don’t need to exercise to earn food or burn off calories.

2. CHOOSE MOVEMENT THAT FEELS ENJOYABLE FOR YOU

Once you do ease back into exercise choose something that just feels enjoyable for you and it has zero link to burning calories. So that could be walking, gardening, hiking, could be dancing, yoga, whatever it is for you. Just make sure it's something that really deep down inside, no part of you is thinking how many calories is this going to burn. For me when I started my recovery journey that actually looked like weightlifting, weirdly, in the gym. It just had no link to calories because I was like, “Oh I hardly sweat when I do it, it's so chill”. So I'm not even thinking about calories. I just wanted to get strong and feel badass and powerful. Then I also took a break from running. For a long time, especially long distance running, it was a form of punishment. I would run 15km or a half marathon just to burn off like a jar of Nutella or something. Once I did start to ease it back in, I started really small. I'm talking five minutes on the treadmill just trying to do on-off sprint's. And just for fun to see how fast I could run and challenge myself in that way. Nothing to do with calories!

3. FIND TEACHERS & CLASSES THAT PLACE ZERO EMPHASIS ON FAT BURN

Once you do ease back into exercise after that hiatus, find teachers and classes that place zero emphasis on fat burn or belly blast or a spin class that burns 600 calories in an hour. None of that stuff! Just find teachers and classes that are about having fun, mind-body connection, getting strong and just meeting people. Or maybe join a team sport!

4. SHIFT YOUR LANGUAGE AROUND EXERCISE

Language is powerful, and whether we notice or not, words have connotations around them that are personal to us. Some words lift us and some fill us with dread. So maybe for you “work out” or “training” have connotations to burning fat and punishment. So find something that resonates better with you in a genuine and pure way. Maybe for you that's “moving your body” or “movement”.

Work to shift other phrases too. Ever say stuff like “I'm going to go burn 500 calories at the gym today”? Switch that up and be, ”I just want to work up a sweat” or “I want to feel my body work.” or ”I wanna loosen up my muscles” or “feel a bit more flexible” or “feel stronger”.

5. DETANGLE THAT CONNECTION BETWEEN FOOD & EXERCISE

Food and exercise shouldn’t be this exchange system where after eating you need exercise, and before eating you need exercise. The only time we really want to connect the two in anyway is, ”Oh have I given myself enough time to digest this food so I can go for a run?” or “Have I actually eaten enough to do this exercise I'm about to do?”

6. TAP INTO YOUR BODY: HOW DOES EXERCISE MAKE YOU FEEL?

Let's take it right back to basics -  move out of the mind where we're tracking and were calculating calories and we're thinking, “How can I punish myself for that binge? What do I need to do?”. We want to zone down into the body. Ask your body how it feels:

“How does it feel when I do this certain exercise versus that one? How does running make me feel? Does it fill me with a sense of dread or excitement?”

“How does dancing feel? Does it light me up with joy or do I feel uncomfortable doing it?”

“How do I feel NOT exercising? Am I feeling tired and sluggish?”

Maybe if you're feeling like you need to be energized what can you do? So just remembering that you never HAVE to exercise ever. It should only ever come from a place of want. And desire and enjoyment and fun

7. CONNECT WITH YOUR INNER CHILD

Take it all the way back to childhood. So that inner child version of you inside who used to love playing stuck in the mud or tag or hide-and-seek all those games or team sports. Go back to that where it was just fun and it was play. As a child, never once would you have thought: “Oh, I need to go play hide and seek for an hour so I can burn 500 calories so I can eat this later on!”

No way! It would never have been that it's just so pure and all about enjoying moving the body.

8. STRIP AWAY ANYTHING THAT FOCUSES YOU ON CALORIES

Let’s strip away anything that helps you link exercise to calories. So that could be inputting your exercise into MyFitnessPal. Delete the app! It could be wearing a Fitbit to track how many steps you've done in the day. Leave that to the side! It could be using a running app to track how fast you run and how many calories you burnt or looking on the treadmill at how many calories you burnt. Let that all go! We want to release focus on calories and get back to just moving. Now I understand if you're really into sports and performance, then there’s definitely a place for these stats and devices. That's fine. As long as first you've detached from the idea of I need to exercise to burn these calories so I can earn this food. 

So those are the eight tips! I hope they are helpful for you. I know for me, I used every single one of them in my recovery journey from binge eating and getting my relationship to exercise back to a really nice fun place.

Comment down below which of these you're going to try out this week and maybe any extra tips you can share! Don't forget to follow me at @freewithbrid for lots of advice on how you can heal from binge eating and get your life back again.