How to fit in exercise on those super busy days
We all know exercising and moving is important....you don't need to see all the research studies in the world to know it because you know you feel better when you move regularly than when you don't. Right?
Sometimes when I'm tired I take a short walk instead of a nap and 99% of the time feel better than if I had taken a nap.
It's not always just the knowing what to do however, that will get people to take action on things around their health and well being. (I know that eating chips isn't the greatest choice yet I still do it sometimes - I'm sure you can think of a few of your own examples here)
Knowing doesn't equal DOING.
It's the doing that is the hard part. If everyone knew how to fit exercise in and be motivated to do it every day, they would!
We need more HOW's that make sense to keep in our toolbox when we're trying on new behaviors.
The list below are strategies to help you move past the traditional ways of exercise and to think more creatively about how you can build it on given the constraints on your time and energy.
In order for these strategies to work you need to let go of black and white thinking (I'm either running for an hour and sweating or I'm gonna do nothing).
And you need to let go of perfectionism in terms of a particular amount of time, steps or reps you NEED to do in order to feel good, that it was worth it and feel successful.
I'm working with a client now who is trying hard to build in movement again after taking an extended break from it over the pandemic. Her usual way of getting exercise in was swimming, which for her was both fun and social because she would meet up with 2 friends and they would all get lunch afterwards. It became a ritual that she looked forward to doing rather than feeling like she HAD to do it.
The gym that she attended closed the pool when the Pandemic hit and rather than transitioning to a new way of exercising, she felt stuck and unmotivated to do anything at all.
I asked her to try an experiment. Without having any particular outcome in mind how would it feel good to just move your body right now? She thought for a while and said "Yoga Cat cows." They always make me feel grounded and it feels good to stretch in that way. Her assignment for the whole week was just to log all the cat-cows she did that week.
When we met the next week, she had told me that the cat/cows turned into a couple of downward dogs and then eventually by the end of the week she had done an entire yoga class.
Success begets success. And, a body in motion stays in motion, a body at rest stays at rest.
Taking one small action towards your goal can help you build natural momentum that comes from an intrinsic place and that builds and grows naturally and effortlessly.
Enjoy this list and I hope you get some ideas to fit in, even just a little movement into your days, even on those really busy ones.
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HIIT
Stands for High Intensity Interval training. If you're short on time, these are going to give you a lot of bang for your buck. The idea is to do a short bout (30-90 seconds) of something high intensity where you go all out. (jumprope, sprinting, burpees, kettlebell swings etc). Even if you do 5 minutes of HIIT, your body will not only burn a lot of calories for those 5 minutes but you will also be burning calories at rest for up to 24 hours.
BOUTS
On really busy days I focus on bouts of movement of about 10 minutes each throughout the day when I have time. I have way more intervals of 10 minutes throughout the day that I can devote to moving to get in 60-minutes of exercise than I have of actual hours. And bouts count! I like to do a 15-minute loop around my neighborhood, or I jump on the treadmill for 10-minutes between clients
WALKING IN KITCHEN/PACING
This is the same idea of bouts but what I would call micro-bouts. If I'm waiting 5 minutes for my food to heat up when I'm making lunch, I put on music and pace around my kitchen rather than scroll on my phone. It's only 5 minutes so why not be purposeful with it? I also sometimes do this when waiting for water to boil or a tea kettle to scream at me. Why not anchor movement to a task you're already doing?
STRETCHING/GENTLE MOVEMENT
On the busy days, your brain, body and nervous system is amped up trying to get through the day. Instead of forcing more stress on your body, maybe that's a good day to look at more "rest and digest" type of movement, like yoga, Thai chi, Qi Gong, or just stretching. This will help bring you back to a parasympathetic state in your nervous system and will help access your rational brain which can help you plan and be strategic about how you'll get it in the next day.
PLAYFUL MOVEMENT
Honestly, this is an opportunity to just get in your body and have fun moving where it's dancing or gardening or playing catch with your kid - that all counts and sometimes is needed most of all.