How to Avoid Injury While Exercising: Starting New Routines While Staying Safe

Reputable sources tell us that we should always consult a doctor before beginning a physical program, and while it would be ideal for each of us to have access to a personalized, baseline assessment, exerting our bodies is also a very natural thing to do! We start moving, shaking, jumping, rolling, and otherwise exercising our physical form from a very young age, and for the very vast majority of us, it’s perfectly safe to continue intentionally incorporating this movement into our lives as we age — even if differently-abled, pregnant, over or underweight, older, younger, stressed, or just downright busy. Getting moving can truly be a simple as throwing on your best Nike shoes and hitting the gym — or the pavement.

Don’t get me wrong, there are risks, but 9.9 times out of 10, the risks boil down to improper equipment use, ill-fitting gear, and other preventable circumstances surrounding the activities being performed. When done safely, exercising provides far more net gain than loss, but it can be hard to get started on that path for a number of reasons, some of which can be incredibly deep-seated and difficult to break beyond. The “Just Do It” ideology is excellent and powerful motivation, but it doesn’t alert us to the fact that we still need to ‘do it’ safely, equipped with all the information and resources we need to build our beast-mode body from the ground up.

A Healthy Relationship

Diet and exercise are two extraordinary elements of our existence, both of which possess an incredible power to change us, for better or worse. In modern society, the “worse” seems to be easier to come by, with the “better” seeming to require a lot of perceived sacrifice (think: time, energy, and delicious junk food concoctions). As a result, in moments of desperation and strong-determination alike, we may dramatically thrust ourselves into changing our habits, and potentially sow the seeds of our own injury and disappointment.

This can also often result in over-doing it at the gym, sometimes making things worse. Step one for staying safe while exercising is actually to take it slow. Yes, you do still want to get up and “Just Do It,” but emulating a professional athlete our first time (or first time in a long time) on the treadmill can result in injury, strong feelings of being discouraged, and even a long-term, unhealthy relationship with exercise.

Even if we don’t actually enjoy the steps of our exercise program, we can become addicted to the sensation of having worked really hard, from the moment we lace up our best workout shoes to the endorphins afterward. Sounds great, right? Well, not really. Specific, often intense exercise can then become a form of self-punishment, a reward for eating, or perceived as a necessity in order to gain, lose, or maintain weight, to name a few new bad habits. In reality, a healthy relationship with exercise is a self-comparing one that sees our progress and achievements as an exploration and challenge of what our bodies can do. Yes, it’s good for us, and yes it helps burn calories, but it needs its own space in our minds, unlinked to other elements of our personage.

How To: Just Do It

So, how do we be sure to cultivate this healthy relationship with exercise? And how do we safely begin exercising at all?

Remember: start slow. Any fitness professional or educator has uttered the word “form” more times than their own name — and for serious reason. Improper form when working out can lead to massive joint, muscle, tendon, and ligament injuries; these injuries can then prevent us from having full use of our bodies from thereon out, which is no joke. The only way to build great form that will last through the most intense of future workouts is to take the time to train our bodies for the moves we want to execute, from the most basic modification upward.

I certainly don’t mean that we should cut ourselves off after a five-minute walk. What I do mean is that when it comes to squats, planking, crunches, sit-ups, various jumping maneuvers, push-ups, pull-ups, and using any gym equipment, for instance, there is an idealized way to perform these movements, which will not only tone the body but also keep us as safe as possible as we push further.

It seems a little silly to have rules and time-gating when it comes to moving our bodies, but keep in mind that the exercises we perform now are typically ones that have been created over many years to take the place of or enhance the natural activities that used to keep our society fit. As a result, they are not necessarily going to come easy to us or feel perfectly intuitive. Over time, however, we’re only doing a disservice to ourselves if we haven’t trained these movements from the ground up. Exercise injuries are incredibly uncomfortable, and some of the side effects can last for the rest of our lives!

Never Fear: How to Set Healthy Goals for Exercise

As long as we’re going slow at first and making sure that we “feel it” in the right places, we’ve conquered the first of the two most important exercise building blocks. Step two is entirely about the gear and accessories we use, rather than how or what we’re doing our exercises.

Choosing to do the same exercise over and over again can feel rewarding at first, but not only will our bodies get used to it and stop progressing, it can also cause us profound discomfort via our exercise gear. Ill-fitting shoes and clothing, along with repeated movement of an accessory, can actually injure us gravely over time. Listen to your body and never force yourself through a painful workout of any kind!

If you’re still unsure of how much exercise is appropriate for you and want some extra helpful information to set realistic and healthy goals, seek a guidelines chart like this one, which provides information about baseline activity goals from ages 3+, including for those of us who have chronic pain, are pregnant, or are differently-abled.

Finally, be sure that your personal exercise plan includes time for stretching, both before and after. Exerting our bodies from a fully resting state is something that should be reserved for choice moments of adrenaline, while long-term fitness relies on each of us to prime and cooldown our bodies. Stretching prevents injury and helps muscles recover without cramping, and the types of stretches that help with each differ, so learning about these differences will be a great education to add along with learning about proper form. This is a long-haul journey, so take your time at the beginning.

Now that you know what to do — just put on your best Nike shoes and, well, do it!

Resources— Harvard Health, Everyday Health