Getting Your Workout On
Finding time to exercise can be a real challenge.
Here in NYC the options are endless, from gym subscriptions to classes to parks and paths to walk, bike or run, you could literally pick something different every single day of your life and never run out. Which sounds amazing! But in reality, no one has time to investigate all these amazing options, and actually, when it comes to it, finding the time either to work out on your own requires loads of self-discipline, which is only doubled when you have to get to the gym or studio at a particular moment to catch a class or trainer.
Also, I don’t know about you, but I find that I am simultaneously a creature of habit and also fairly easily bored? Go figure. So I need to be able to get motivated, show up, not disrupt the overall schedule of my life, while not becoming fatigued by repetition.
What to do? Here are my top tips for finding at least 30 minutes a day to work up a sweat and get your endorphins going!
TIPS TIPS TIPS
YouTube is YourFriend! People pay good money for all kinds of fitness subscriptions, live and remote. Depending on your budget, this can be quite an investment and for those of us who crave variety, you might find you need to mix things up every couple of months to stay engaged. To solve for this issue, tons of fitness companies offer free sample classes on their websites and then syndicate them to YouTube. Additionally, enterprising fitness professionals post their own workouts to the streaming video platform. So if you’re willing to undergo a bit of trial and error, just browsing and searching on YouTube can turn up tons of new subscription options, or you can just enjoy all the free content while never growing bored of the same old thing Some of my favorites include: DanceBody, Yoga with Adriene, and Barre 3.
FabFitFun subscribers have access to FabFitFunTV, where the box subscription company’s content team features partner content including fifty+ workout videos, from yoga and Pilates to cardio, barre, light weights, toning and dance classes.
Perigee’s 7 workout app is, I swear to you, a Godsend. All you need is a yoga mat. You and your phone and your yoga mat, anywhere in the world, 7-8 minutes, and you’re good to go. The way the app works is that it offers dozens of workouts that are between 7-8 minutes long. The workouts vary in type and difficulty, but are based on a library of at least a hundred individual exercises, meaning that you can also customize your own workouts as well as using the pre-curated ones offered by 7. If you want a longer workout time, you can loop any individual routine multiple times, or you can stitch together your own workout from several existing routines. When the workout starts, an announcer calls out the next exercise, and counts it off. The screens shows time remaining for the exercise and demonstrates the correct form. You can even change the announcer voices! The app has a free and a paid mode, the latter of which I am a happy subscriber, and if I had to credit my fitness to one specific tool, it would be this one, which has kept me accountable on long business trips, vacations and even on snowy/rainy/flaming-hot/polar vortex days when leaving the house again just seems like an insurmountable obstacle. BONUS - Good news, if you use Noom for your intake / output tracking, 7 and Noom synch with each other so your exercise is logged automatically!
Audible is one of the most-utilized apps on my phone. I love reading and if I can’t be holding a book, I probably want to be listening to one. When I need to cram in some cardio, I like to persuade myself by saving a particular book or podcast for the treadmill/elliptical/whateveroo. That way I simultaneously have something I look forward to that I can only get on that gadget, while also building a positive association of reward to what I find to be one of the more boring types of exercise. BONUS - if you subscribe to Audible, you get access to many free programs, which includes workouts!
Give yourself some credit for every move you make with a pedometer app. I used to carry a little counter gadget around clipped to my bra strap, but with the advent of smartphones, all you need is the right app. In fact, Noom, the app I mentioned above, includes a pedometer with its free version, and lets you know in real time how many calories you’ve burned, just walking. It challenges you to walk just a little more each day, and to try to reach new daily step goals. Regardless of what you use, remember that every step, stair, shimmy, dip and dance move count towards making you just that little bit more fit and healthy, so give yourself a pat on the back for incorporating exercise in all its forms throughout the day. I like to dance while I walk the dog. #noshame
What are your workout secrets? How do you keep your fitness commitments to yourself?