Blog

You hear the stories about the benefits of exercise.
You know you could be in better shape.
You know you should exercise.

You might even want to join the gym but it would be a waste of money. You’re so busy there just isn’t time to go to the gym or start exercising.

it’s so hard to start exercising and even harder to stick to it when there are so many demands on your time. But what if everyday activities counted as exercise? And what if you could do small things to increase those everyday activities?

Then it would be easier to become more active. And what if that caused you to be less tired? And what if you started to have more energy? And what if you started to feel stronger and healthier?

You would be getting in shape without even working too hard. Wouldn’t that be great!

Well, I’m happy to tell you that it is possible.

Recent research has shown that even incidental everyday activities can help boost your cardiorespiratory fitness benefiting your health. The people studied were like most people: getting very little activity and moving at a very slow pace of less than 3mph but still at the end of the study they moved the needle on cardiorespiratory measurements enough to make a difference. Interesting indeed. And it directly affects you. With very little effort you can move your needle and get healthier.

Try these five ways to add exercise to your everyday life activities.

1. Park at the far end of the parking lot: Whether your at the grocery store or the mall or at work head directly to the end of the parking lot. You won’t have to wait for parking since most people want to park closest to the doors and all those extra steps walking to the entrance will boost your everyday activities. And if it’s cold out, you’ll walk faster increasing the benefits even more.
2. Take the stairs: Save time and add some exercise by taking the stairs instead of waiting for the elevator/escalator whenever possible: at work, at the doctor’s office, at the mall, at the supermarket. And if you’re in a rush you’ll walk faster and get even more cardiorespiratory benefit.
3. Step away from technology: Rather than calling, texting or emailing your co-workers or boss take a walk to their desk for a face to face conversation. Not only will you develop stronger interpersonal relationships you’ll add incremental steps to your day increasing your activity level.
4. Play with your kids or pets: Take a few minutes after work or after dinner to get in some play time. Take a walk, toss a ball, make a snowman, play a game, dance or wrestle. You’ll bring joy to your family/pets and boost everyone’s daily activity while having fun.
5. Do some housework: There’s always something to be done around the house (or even the office). Tackle the work a little each day to keep up with things and add extra daily activity. Sweeping/vacuuming the floors, filing or sorting paperwork, watering the plants, folding the laundry, dusting the shelves – all tedious activities that we want to avoid but doing a little each day will reduce the mountain and add to your daily activity level.

As you can see it won’t take much to increase your incidental daily activities and start on your way to getting in shape and improving your health. So try these suggestions.

If you discover additional ways to increase activity without much effort at all please leave your suggestions in the comments section.