God-Focused Solitary Exercise

Monastic Fitness could be worshiping God as you exercise on a mountain top – but it doesn’t have to be.

Monastic – It’s just one of those words. The more you say it and think about it the more you discover it works really well with fitness in so many way. Here’s 3 examples:

The Monastic Blaster is that tool that helps you target more than just your abs. It’s the device you use to stimulate spiritual discipline.

Or you might think of, the Monastic, as that cartilage that provides spiritual integrity not at you knee (the Meniscus) but in every part of life where you undergo tension and torsion. It can help to disperse the weight of worldly cares and reduce friction between what you do and want to do.

Before you find that the cancerous effects of sinful thoughts, self-gratification, or just being chill and doing the same old thing with your workout has metastasized (grown and spread) throughout your lifestyle, it’s time to Monastasize (let God’s words spread) and produce life-giving wisdom, health, strength and joy in your spirit.

I could go on but hopefully you get the idea. We all need to reimagine the place where we do physical exercise and the time we dedicate for it our “gym”, and see it as the monastery – the place where we can pursue and have robust communion with God. A space where we not only get dynamic instruction for life by God’s Spirit but are dedicated to being obedient to that instruction.

And we all need to reimagine who we are. More than finding ourselves somewhere between workout-wannabe to fitness-fanatic we can discover our calling to become a modern-day monk, the person who does spiritual exercise, religiously working out our pursuit of God with dedicated time, effort, passion and eager anticipation. Whew! Yeah, that’s Monastic Fitness.

DO WHAT YOU DO ALREADY – JUST DO IT BETTER

According to, 23 Gym Membership Statistics that Will Astound You, a 2020 article by Rebecca Lake, less than half of those who have a gym membership (44%) workout together. That means about 6 of every 10 members exercise alone. Further, a survey by Invisibly reports that 73% of people prefer to exercise alone. The bottom line is when it comes to exercising, if you go solo, you’re not alone (pun intended!). The idea with monastic fitness is to do what you do already – just do it better.

How can you be “alone” better? Shift from distraction to attention.

THE LEAST OF THESE

So what do people do when they exercise alone? Well, we know they “exercise” and hopefully they do that well and achieve good physical benefits and results. BUT, what do people do with their brain when they exercise alone? How are they distracted?

Cassie Wakin in her article, How to Create Distraction Free Workouts, says that some people choose to be distracted to take their mind off of the workout. It’s more likely that many people rather than just ‘some’ people choose to be distracted. For those distracted people who “take their mind off of the workout” there’s a good likelihood that they are exercising mindlessly. At the very least that can result in a failure to make physical gains and at the worst it can result in poor form and movement that can lead to injury.

When you exercise alone shift from your go-to distraction to giving intentional attention to God.

Many choose some form of ENTERTAINMENT: music or podcast, television or videos, a book, audio book or magazine and online content.

COMMUNICATION is another form of mental distraction. It will actually interrupt or take time away from the fitness activity. Go to any gym and you’ll see people ‘textercising’. Sending texts while exercising, according to research reported by Science Direct, results in lower intensity exercise. But that’s just the half of it. Often people do a lot of texting – that results in having less time to exercise. When you text a lot at they gym you aren’t exercising. Chatting with others in-person or by phone also results in lower intensity and less exercise.

VANITY and LUST (looking good and checking out others) are 2 more significant ways we use our brain when we do fitness alone – albeit in the presence of others. While you may feel vanity and lust are too harsh of a description the truth is these activities really affect our brain and our spirit.

Another way people use their brain is to PRAY and FOCUS ON GOD. Of all the ways people are mentally and spiritually engaged during a workout, prayer and God-focus are the least of these. Therein is the problem, need and opportunity. Monastic Fitness is solitary exercise without the distractions. It is God-focused solitary exercise. The difference achieves better physical outcomes and transformational spiritual outcomes.

SO WHAT DOES MONASTIC MEAN?

First let me say that this relatively short article on monastic fitness offers some unique physical and spiritual health, wellness and exercise understanding from a monastic perspective that I believe can really help you expand your vision of being alone. However, this article is just a starting point. A monastic lifestyle or at least a monastically influenced lifestyle ultimately is an ongoing journey of you going deeper into what it looks like for you and more significantly all that God can be in your life.

Let’s start with the a definition for monastic, then understand the basic mechanics of monastic fitness identifying a beginner’s workout and how to advance beyond that then finish for now with links to video, audio and text resources that can help you dig deeper and go further. The more you delve into these resources, the more meaningful monastic fitness will become to you.

Here is a definition of monastic that offers insight and clarity as you prepare yourself for monastic fitness:

Finding seclusion away from the influence of others and yourself, desiring for God to sanctify or set you apart from all the elements of common existence so your spirit can awaken to all that God intends for you, the beauty and transformation in being alone – as one with God.

THE BASIC MECHANICS OF MONASTICISM AND MONASTIC FITNESS

There are several basic mechanisms that work together in a monastic lifestyle. These same elements can be incorporated into monastic fitness. They are:

• Devotion
• Modeling the life of Christ
• Contemplation
• Communion
• Prayer
• Simple and austere self-discipline
• Spiritual renewal
• Community minded
• Service to others

It’s important to understand that these qualities are ways to pursue God. They are a means to exercise your faith and do the works of God. But, none of them are to be elevated above God. They are foundational in the Christian journey but they are not to replace Christ. To illustrate this somewhat from a fitness perspective, cardio exercise, strength training, good nutrition, rest all contribute to a fit lifestyle. But, to have wholistic health you can’t just focus on one or even all of them.

God is the exclusive focus not the tools that help you focus.

Anticipate that it can and will be demanding while also guarding that it not become legalistic. How you do it may look very different from how someone else does it. In fact how God leads you now and how God leads you tomorrow and next week and next month and beyond will evolve. The constant is that “God – leads – you.”

MONASTIC FITNESS 101: THE BEGINNER’S WORKOUT

So, with that said, do monastic fitness in ways that God leads you rather than YOU working to create some model. Give yourself time to learn how you sense the presence of God when you’re alone. Don’t let what you think is the right way to be monastic prevent you from exploring simplicity and the subtle yet powerful ways God connects with you in your time of aloneness.

Instead of trying to go from 0 to 100, take a few smaller steps toward doing monastic fitness. That’s as easy as praying, “God help me to focus on you” as you get a drink at the water fountain. Don’t just pray for you, find your calling to pray for others who are working out alongside you at the gym. Sure, you can walk up to them and ask, “Hey, how can I pray for you today?” But, God hears your prayers even when they don’t. They don’t even need to know you’re praying for them. These are some beginning ways you can do God-focused solitary exercise.

A beginner’s workout for example can be as simple as repeatedly listening to a short book of the Bible (like 1 Thessalonians in the New Testament). It only has 5 chapters. That makes it easy to listen to it maybe a dozen times during a single workout. Listening in different translations can expand the meaning of words and enhance your understanding.

What may seem like an improbable even impossible way to workout — “distraction-free”, can blossom into your passion for solitary God-focused exercise.

Try it and you’ll find it starts to minister to you more deeply with repetition. You’ll likely be both challenged and inspired, convicted and yet uplifted with fresh vision. You’ll most certainly experience a greater focus on God, which is one of the big consistent outcomes of monastic fitness.

Since 1 Thessalonians demonstrates giving encouragement to others, you may find that part of your monastic fitness then leads you to praying for someone and then even sending that person a text message with a few sentences of encouragement.

You may then wrap up your workout out with a cool down or soak in the hot tub where you allow yourself to open up and have a conversation with your spouse or someone else. This others-minded aspect of monastic fitness begins with a simple observation, comment or question demonstrating genuine interest in the other person. Then your primary role is to listen to them and give ear to their spirit – not with your mind but with your spirit.

Before you know it, what may have seemed like an improbable even impossible way to workout — “distraction-free”, has taken hold and blossomed into your passion for solitary God-focused exercise. Keep it up and continue returning to your highly coveted alone-time with God to see monastic fitness shift from “that wasn’t too bad after all” to “I can’t wait to do it again”.

You may start to incorporate communion, worship (even with your own playlist of Christ-focused chants), a book or Bible study later in the day after your workout, and some intentional ways to minister God’s love, grace and goodness to others.

GIVE THESE PLAYLISTS A ‘CHANTS’ TO GET YOU IN THE MONASTIC SPIRIT

SHARE YOUR MONASTIC FITNESS JOURNEY

Take time to journal what you do along with your experiences, observations and how God is speaking to you. Perhaps you do that on paper, your laptop ,ongoing self-recorded audio memos on your phone or an online blog. As you do this, we’d love for you to come back to this article and post your comments below so that others in the Faith & Fitness Magazine community can benefit from your monastic fitness journey.

THE MONASTIC MAGIC OF A WINTER GETAWAY

It’s cold and quiet out there. The perfect temperature and setting to get alone outside. We’re planning a winter getaway and we hope you’ll join us.

It’ll include some great outdoor adventure fun, exercise, good food, conversations, fellowship and plenty of time to nurture the monastic side of you. Interested?