1. Engage your mind to engage you muscles.
Like many women, Ginger lost most of her abdominal strength after her C-section. The surgery demands at least six weeks of rest—a long time for your abs to be inactive. “You’d think dance is mostly about your legs, but it’s actually your core that makes you feel grounded,” she says. When she started training just 10 days after her doc approved it, she had to actively think about contracting her abs in every movement to teach them to turn on.
APPLY IT: As you do moves like situps and planks, don’t let your mind wander. Mentally cuing your abs (think, feel the tension) can increase muscle activation by up to 33 percent, research shows. Practice the habit on the treadmill, in the car, and in the weight room too to improve core stability.
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2. Focus on a different kind of progress.
Daily four-hour practices are, at best, grueling. But Ginger had a goal in mind beyond aesthetics: to nail a spin on her own. “Dance requires isolating body parts, where you’re ‘smooth’ on top and ‘busy’ on the bottom,” she says. “I had to repeat sequences over and over to master that.” After two weeks, “my body transformed from all the hard work, but my objective was much bigger, which helped keep me going when I wanted to quit.”
APPLY IT: Instead of stressing about losing those last five pounds, focus on learning a new activity, and throw your energy into improving it. When you’re training for something more meaningful than what you see in the mirror, you’re less likely to bail—and the physical results become natural by-products.
Want to get in on the DWTS action? Try these exercises that’ll make you feel like you’re bustin’ a move:
3. “Counter stretch” after your workout.
Every day post-practice, Ginger spent 10 minutes stretching on the floor since her routine never involved sitting or lying down. “Switching positions helped loosen muscles I didn’t even know were tight,” she says. Experts agree: “When you spend a lot of time in repetitive shapes, you’re likely performing work in incomplete ranges of motion,” says physical therapist Kelly Starrett. “Exploring your muscles in a new shape [a.k.a. counter stretching] can help restore range of motion—crucial for injury prevention—and promote recovery.”
APPLY IT: After an hour on the Pilates mat, stand up and bend over to reach your toes. Kickboxing? Lie down to lengthen your limbs as far as they can comfortably go. Cyclists, try lunges to open up your hips. (Get a stretch while you tone your stomach with Women’s Health Flat Belly Yoga DVD.)
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4. Own your agenda.
While Ginger could have someone else map out all parts of her day (office tasks, meals, workout sessions, etc.), she prefers to take the reins. “I feel the most motivated when I’m in control of my schedule, because if I plan something, I know I did so because it’s important to me,” she says. Ironically, having a baby made prioritizing easier. “I used to make excuses all the time, but now there’s no room to say, ‘I’ll do it later.’ It’s ‘I do it now, or I don’t do it,'” she says.
APPLY IT: Baby or not, we’re all busy. Tapping into Ginger’s now-or-never approach may help you actually make it to the gym. First pencil in downtime, commutes, and errands, together with your meetings, appointments, and social events. When you visually see the opportunity for a sweat sesh, take it.
This article was originally published in the September 2016 issue of Women’s Health, on newsstands now.
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