Keeping healthy is a chore to some people, while to others it’s a relief or just part of everyday life. Health and fitness shouldn’t be unfortunate activities that we are forced to take part in just to keep our waistlines lean and our looks intact. Rather, health and fitness should just be interwoven aspects of our day-to-day lives, as normal and as unquestioned as eating dinner and going to the bathroom. If you’re the type of person who struggles to stay up on your fitness routine but are adamant about succeeding, consider these three suggestions on how to stay fit every day.
Keep It Convenient
If you try to convince yourself the only way to get fit is to spend two hours every night at the gym, but then you get so overwhelmed at the thought of accomplishing such a task that you almost never go (hello, excuses and random reasoning), you won’t actually be accomplishing much. Besides, fitness isn’t something that can only be achieved at the gym. With an exercise ball at the ready or doing bicycle ab crunches or having a jump rope hanging in the closet, you can even work out at your own home if you so desire. Whether you’re doing core strengthening exercises on an exercise ball while watching ‘The Simpsons’ or ‘Desperate Housewives,’ or you're doing 15 minutes of rope jumping while the oven heats up, you’re working toward a goal of greater personal health.
Change Things Up
Even though many people have workout routines, workouts don’t have to always be so routine. After all, routines can get boring after a while, and variety is supposed to be the ‘spice of life.’ If you always do a morning run, maybe instead one day you can play a pickup game of flag football with some friends in the afternoon. Or if you’re used to only lifting weights, you can try throwing some heavier cardio regimens into your day every once in a while. Even with a routine, not every fitness activity needs to fall under some predetermined fitness plan.
Don't Give Up
This may be the most important advice of all. If you’ve worked out for two months really well and often, and then came across a few weeks of scattered exercise or none at all, don’t just throw all of your progress away because of a hiccup. Too many people do well, mess up once or twice, and then quit all-together thinking they had ruined everything. The thing is, no one’s perfect. No routine is completed 100% of the time. If you have a bad week, get back on that bike or treadmill next week and keep pushing at it. That way, you’re always making progress (you know how it goes: two steps forward to make up for that one step back).
