How to Make Time for Exercise within Your Busy Schedule

If you reserve exercise and fitness for whenever you “get a chance,” you’ll find that there will always be something else to fill your time and the opportunities will pass you by. To successfully fit exercise into your day, schedule it like you would an important appointment that you wouldn’t dare miss. Block out time on your smartphone’s calendar or write it down in your planner.

Since you want to stick to your schedule as you’re getting into the groove, be sure to make your workouts doable; if you’re overly ambitious, you could get injured which would leave you sidelined until you heal. As far as how much time you should spend on each sweat session, a half hour of exercise is ideal, but it doesn’t need to be done all at once.

For example, instead of one 30-minute spin session on your exercise bike, you could do 10 minutes of aerobic exercise in the morning, a 10-minute walk at lunch, and 10 minutes of poses on your yoga mat in the evening. By breaking it up into different times and types of activities, it can make it feel more manageable and you’ll be more likely to stick to your plans.

One of the best ways to create accountability and make exercising fun is to find a workout buddy. This person could be a friend, co-worker, or family member. Just having someone to exercise with can be a great motivator.

You could also sign up for a fitness class at a community center or join a recreational team sport. Because you’ve made a financial commitment, you’ll be more likely to show up for your scheduled workout or game time. Even if the classes or outdoor sports are free, knowing that others are expecting you to be there is sometimes just what it takes to get you out the door.

Although, if you can’t find a buddy or a class in your area at the moment, you can motivate yourself by using apps that go with your fitness tracker. These provide you with leader boards, specific challenges, connections to others who are pursuing similar goals and fitness tracking statistics that will incentivize you to keep going.

You could also make an investment that everyone in your house can use by trying out connected exercise and fitness equipment. These workout machines come outfitted with programs and membership options to keep you on track with specific goals. Depending on the type of equipment you buy, there are also ways to communicate with the fitness instructors within the built-in programs and receive virtual feedback and encouragement.

No matter what connections and commitments you use to help motivate yourself, having specific goals can contribute to the experience by giving you a sense of purpose. Plus, there are plenty of smart health and fitness devices that can help you track those goals. The question to ask yourself is what do you want to achieve by exercising?

Do you want to reduce joint pain and stiffness or build muscle to support your mobility for the long term? Perhaps you want to see the number on the scale go down as you lose weight? Or maybe you want to focus on monitoring your blood pressure as you improve your cardiovascular health. What about preparing for a specific challenge, such as hiking to a mountain peak or running a 5K race?

Once you have a goal in mind, it helps to create an exercise plan that will progress in stages as you become more physically fit. Remember, pushing yourself too hard in the beginning not only can be disheartening, but can also increase your risk of injury. Remember to ease into a fitness routine and consider consulting a trainer for advice or reach out to others who have approached the same goals and found success.

Whether you’re just now delving into exercise for the first time or you’re making a comeback, working out in a home gym is a great option to make fitness goals more achievable. Having a treadmill or elliptical machine can make fitting a workout into the day so much easier. This is especially true during snowy winter months or any time there’s inclement weather that could be a roadblock for traveling to a fitness studio or exercising outdoors.

One surefire way to make sure you don’t get bored with exercising is to switch things up. That means if you usually go for a run, try a HIIT workout or a dance class instead. If strength training is your normal routine, swap it out for yoga one day.

Another benefit of choosing different exercises is that you’ll reduce your chances of straining certain muscle groups because they’ll get much-needed time to rest and recover from workouts while you tone other areas. You might even stumble across an activity you truly enjoy that you would never have expected. And when you enjoy something, you’re more likely to stick with it.