How Does Exercise Help You Feel Better About Yourself?
It’s not just about what changes in your body. It’s about what changes in how you see yourself.
Maybe you notice you feel better after moving around, and you think it’s just your body.
Part of it has nothing to do with your body. It has to do with you.
If you’re quitting smoking, the Seventh Step already covered how physical activity helps lower anxiety and offers a natural source of well-being and reward without depending on cigarettes. But there’s something else that happens when you complete a physical activity, however small, that almost never gets named: you start to feel better about yourself, not just your body. In practice, that has a name: a sense of accomplishment.
1What is a sense of accomplishment in physical activity, how is it built, and what result does it bring?
A sense of accomplishment isn’t simply «I feel better.» It’s «I’m the one making this happen.» That recognition of your own achievement, however small, carries a different value than just feeling good. It’s built by completing an activity, even a minimal one: the act of setting something concrete for yourself and following through trains a discipline that doesn’t depend on how much you managed to do, but on the fact that you followed through. The result doesn’t stay confined to your body: that same discipline can carry over into following through on the other steps of quitting smoking.
You need to help it recover. STOPCIGARROS.COM DR. HUMBERTO PALLARES
2Why does exercise make me feel better about myself, not just my body?
Because part of that improvement is physical: better circulation, better sleep, more energy. But there’s another part, just as important or more so, that isn’t only about the body: recognizing that this achievement is yours too. That second part is a sense of accomplishment, and it can help you keep feeling better even on days when your body doesn’t show much progress. The body’s natural reward mechanisms we mentioned in the Seventh Step explain part of it; a sense of accomplishment helps explain why that improvement also feels personal, not just physical.
3How does this discipline carry over into quitting smoking?
The discipline you’ve already built doesn’t stay locked inside your exercise routine. Once you’ve shown yourself that you can set a small goal and follow through, that same ability to set a goal and follow through can support you in completing the other steps of quitting smoking. And the well-being that physical activity brings, along with the body’s natural reward mechanisms, also helps you get through the restlessness and tension that come with quitting.
Recognizing that this achievement is yours too matters as well. STOPCIGARROS.COM DR. HUMBERTO PALLARES
Conceptual creator of Timing for Smoking Cessation
