While I’m sure there are some diehard gym fanatics who love every second of training, most of the rest of us do it begrudgingly. I’ve been lifting weights since I was twelve years old and personal training for over sixteen years, and I struggle to drag my ass to the gym some days. Training isn’t the most pleasant physical or mental experience, but there are some important changes you can make to the “workout experience” that make training suck less.
This isn’t an exhaustive list, but it doesn’t need to be. The point of this post is to get you thinking about (and eliminating) all the things not directly related to the effort of training that can make your workouts more unpleasant.
Forget the exercises with long setups
I like barbell hip thrusts, but I hate setting them up. You need a barbell, a bench, plates, clips, a hip pad to prevent the bar from grinding your pelvis to dust, potentially something to put on the bench to keep it from shifting beneath you. And you need to gather all of this when the gym is likely busy. Awful. This is why I will generally recommend a machine hip thrust if it’s available. This movement is begging to be made into a machine. It’s a simple up and down movement resisting hip extension. Nothing fancy.
Another good example of a pain in the ass setup is seal rows. Fantastic exercise. Setup often makes it not worth it. To do a seal row, you lie face down (prone) on a bench and pull a barbell toward you (underneath the bench) until it makes contact with the bottom of the bench. The setup is so annoying because unless you have T-rex arms, you have to elevate the bench on boxes so you have enough room to do a full row. This is another exercise that can be replicated with machines. I like T-bar rows or machine chest-supported rows, both of which are far easier to set up.
There are a million other exercises, typically found on TikTok or Instagram, that only exist because some fitness influencer needed content or was hellbent on making their mark on the fitness industry. Many of these have absurd setups. Which may have been worth it for someone who is getting paid to get attention, but not for someone who is trying to quickly get in and out of the gym.
Basically, any exercise that forces you to sequester equipment away from its normal home, requires multiple pieces of equipment, or just has too many things to set up or adjust needs to have a damn good reason to be in your program.
Life is too short to be spending the majority of your workout setting shit up when there are suitable alternatives.
Build your workout around the gym you actually use
I have written a ton of programs over the years for clients and one of the first things I have them do is to give me a rundown—via pictures or a list—of what equipment they have regular access to. Your program needs to be form-fitted to your gym. The reason is simple; every little point of friction you inject into your workouts makes it more annoying to do.
Superset two exercises that are far away from each other? Program an exercise in an area with insanely high traffic? Pair exercises that require multiple pieces of equipment that you have to hunt down? Prescribe an exercise on a piece of equipment that you only sometimes have access to? Any one of these things alone may not seem like that big of a deal, but in aggregate, they are a huge quality of life drag. Which can markedly influence your desire to do your workouts.
All this to say, program for the gym you have, not the gym you want. Consistently good is better than inconsistently perfect.
Pick exercises you like (within reason)
There are two facts about training that are beneficial for someone who doesn’t love being in the gym: there are no must do exercises and there are many options for training each movement and/or muscle group.
Of the exercises you have available to you that target what you want to target, pick the ones you hate the least. This does not give you permission to skip every exercise you dislike. If you want to build your lower body, you will need some form of squatty movement. But if you prefer leg press, asymmetrical movements like lunges or split squats, or front squats to barbell back squats, do those instead.
Does the movement train the general movement or muscles you want to train? Great. You don’t have to love it, but pick the one(s) you’re least likely to skip.
Have backup exercises
Ambiguity is the death of any plan. If you need to do a set of barbell bench press and no barbell bench stations are available, what are you going to do? Just not do it? For starters, if the benches being unavailable is a regular occurrence, you might want to pick another exercise moving forward. But if you’re mid-workout and suddenly need to pivot, it’s handy to have a list of backup exercises. You can do dumbbell bench or machine chest press or if you have nothing available, you could try a push-up variation. All of these exercises are horizontal presses that target essentially the same muscles.
The point isn’t to find the perfect replacement but to remove ambiguity and prevent you from doing nothing. One of the best things about training is that it requires a much smaller input than most people think to maintain gains. It is far better to do a backup exercise than to skip the movement altogether.
And if you’re not sure what good backup exercises are, we have AI now! Upload a screenshot of your program to ChatGPT and ask for a list of backup exercises that covers each one in your program1. Keep the list in a pinned note in your notes app and refer to it any time you get stuck.
Wrapping it up and why these things matter
I couldn’t even begin to tell you how much time I’ve spent in the gym in my life. If there is any one thing you can take to the bank it’s that every point of friction you inject into your workouts will make them suck a little more. Training is already hard and uncomfortable, but that should be because of your effort, not all the other tangential shit that doesn’t actually move the needle.
So no long setups, no logistical headaches, pick exercises that you jive better with, and have a plan when things aren’t available.
It might not suddenly make you fall in love with training, but it will at least make it suck for the right reasons. Godspeed and feel free to leave questions, comments, or concerns below!
If you want to send me what Chat said, I can let you know if it’s full of shit.