Leaving the gym for good

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I gave up on going to the gym over a year ago. Best thing I’ve done. After an initial investment of about $1500, I had myself a decent home gym including a commercial treadmill, rower and pull-up/dip/boxing station. While I wouldn’t call the basement Goodlife Fitness, I found that my workouts were just as (probably more) intense than at the gym.

Why?

The gym is a cult. Every gym is a little different, but you can be guaranteed that you’ll have your  stereotypical people no matter the gym. The meat head, the hot chick, the tries too hard and the elliptical monster will all be there in full force.

It never really bothered me too much. Everyone I met at the gym was friendly and generally unjudgy. Still, I felt that it was important to conform to the gym norms if I had any chance of fitting in. You know, simple things like don’t lift too much, don’t stare, don’t hog the equipment and for goodness sake don’t do anything extreme - like handstand push-ups.

Having shed the burden of a gym membership, I have found that I need to be more self motivated. That’s made easier by the fact that I can walk down the stairs or throw on a pair of running shoes and go outside instead of packing up and commuting to the gym. 

Most importantly, I can workout at an extreme intensity without anyone judging me. If my form sucks, I can work to fix it at my own pace. If I want to try a heavy lift, well I can go for it and not be scared to fail - or look silly. Headstand push-ups? Well, I’m getting better...