As usual, your Monday schedule might as well be titled “Crazy” – you have two board meetings, five projects to finish and you’ll be impressed if you manage to squeeze in lunch. Yet again, it seems like exercise will fall to the bottom of your to-do list. You don’t even have the time to act surprised.
Sound familiar? You aren’t the only one. In fact, according to the Normal Bar Interactive Survey, the number one excuse people give for not exercising is lack of time. What if I promised that you didn’t need to log hours at the gym to reap the benefits of exercise? In fact, what if I said you could feel amazing by only exercising 15 minutes a day?
Now, I’m not making any rash promises like you’ll lose three dress sizes or turn into a mini body builder by squeezing 15 minutes of exercise into your schedule. However, a short workout can make you feel like Wonder Woman in plenty of ways!
Ever promise yourself that you’ll ride the stationary bike for a full hour at the gym – only to get bored at 15 minutes and give up? The truth is, doing the same exercise for long time everyday gets tedious. A short workout eliminates that. Not only do you not have time to get bored, but you also have plenty of workouts to try. To shake up your routine, run for a couple days, dance on others and even do some yoga.
When you commit to a long workout several times a week, it becomes easy to let time become a valid excuse. After all, if your work meeting runs late, you really can’t make it to that one-hour spin class. When you schedule multiple short workouts during the week, though, you can squeeze in fitness whenever you can. Happen to wake up early one morning? Welcome the sun with some jumping jacks! Not hungry during your lunch break? Do a power walk and eat a snack back at the office. The choice of when – rather than if – to workout really is yours!
Want the best bang for your buck? Then you’ll love hearing short, intense workouts actually do make a different in your health. As reported by Time Magazine, studies have shown that short workouts that rocket your heart rate, followed by resting or less intense activity actually provide more benefits than long periods of exercise at a fixed heart rate. In this case, less really is more!
Your wallet will also appreciate replacing your morning Starbucks run with a short workout. As Robert E. Thayer, PhD, a psychology professor at California State University, Long Beach, explains: “It’s now been shown in many studies that once you actually start moving around — even just getting up off the couch and walking around the room — the more you will want to move, and, ultimately, the more energy you will feel.” Unless you have a cute barista at your local coffee shop, you won’t need to stop by there anymore!
If you love grooving to tunes by Justin Bieber while working out, it may be because exercise helps us follow his advice to “go and love yourself.” As you’ve probably learned for yourself, self love has a lot to do with how we see ourselves. Besides all the health benefits of working out, it’s been known to boost your self-esteem. Suddenly, you aren’t just caring about how your body looks; you can take pride in what you can do with it.
