Peloton, Tonal, Mirror or?

Thanks in part to the Covid-19 pandemic, home exercise equipment has been flying off the shelves. Some of the most popular items (if you can afford them) are the Peloton bike or treadmill, the Mirror home training system, and the Tonal smart home gym.

Two things that separate the above three from their competition is the virtual personal training/encouragement that comes with them plus an additional monthly fee. They are often marketed as a way to save money on a gym membership, but do they?

A high percentage of people who join gyms stop going after a few months and I would expect the use of these products to have a similar arc. So if you’re like most people, these machines will end up costing you more, since most gym memberships don’t require the same upfront costs as all of these.

People are always looking for ways to buy things that solve their problems, in this case the need to exercise. I have a friend who saw the dismay on my face when he told me that he had two separate gym memberships. Before he could ask her why she had two gym memberships, he quickly said “and I’ll join a third if I don’t start seeing results soon!”

Buyout solutions rarely work as planned, because (in this case) the problem is not a lack of proper equipment or gyms. The problem is the common approaches that most people use in their attempts to solve this type of problem.

This is why I would recommend investing in Better Habits over all of the above options. You see, investing in others may initially/superficially help you, but it will also subtly eat away at your self-esteem. You start to become dependent on outside forces to move you in the right direction.

Why not invest in yourself and develop Better Habits? Most people have failed to create Better Habits in the past and this is why they often look outside of themselves for help to solve their problems.

The problem was not you, but the way you tried to build Better Habits. Most people try to do too much too soon and end up failing. It’s the feeling of failure that stays with you instead of the clothes you were trying to build.

Instead, start small and you’ll probably feel good about yourself and want to do more. In fact, the smaller the better when it comes to building Better Habits.

The two most important factors in successfully forming Better Habits are linking the activity to something you already do regularly and keeping the action small enough to overcome the inertia that keeps you from getting started.

If you want to get in better physical shape, start by doing a push-up right after you get out of bed in the morning. Once you’ve had success with that for a few days, add something like walking across the street after dinner. If you’re like most people, that feeling of success will propel you to do even more, and before you know it, you’ll have developed some better habits that will help you achieve your goals almost effortlessly.

The success you have in creating these Better Habits makes any future attempts to create Better Habits even easier than previous ones. Plus, you can save thousands of dollars by not buying any of those fancy training systems and using that money to go on a trip or adventure.

Best of all, when you take that journey, your best habits will automatically come with you, unlike any of those training systems. Because your best habits are with you, chances are you won’t be left behind and have to catch up when you return, just as you would if you lacked your gear and the artificial inspiration you relied on.

There’s no better time than the present to start creating a better version of yourself, so why not give it a try today?

You can follow Sam on Twitter @SuperTaoInc

POSTED ON THE SIDE OF THE MIND BLOG