Friday, January 16, 2009

Tip for Today #1

GET MOVING

Exercise is probably the single most important change you can make. As my sister says "If you exercise you can eat what you want." She's about a size 2 and exercises more than most, but she's right.

The hard part is doing it when you don't feel like it. I slept very poorly last night and stayed in bed way past when I should have so when I got downstairs to excercise I only had about 10 mintues of my designated time left. Being a CPA I'm very structured and have routines so I really couldn't mess with that whole timeframe thing. And I was so tired from tossing and turning. But I did the 10 minutes anyway on my Wii. Free stepped 1,300 steps in 10 minutes.

Now I'm one-third of the way to today's 30 minutes. That should always be your goal - 30 minutes a day. And no, you can't stockpile them. Playing tennis once a week for an hour and half doesn't earn you two free days. You might not want to do something as strenuous the next day and you do earn a "break" if you want but aim for doing something every day.

What is "something". Anything that gets you moving. Parking at the end of the parking lot (I know it sounds trite, but it counts). Ride bikes with your kids. Take a walk after dinner with the family (teaching good habits to the kids is a bonus in this). Set aside your 30 minutes and schedule it if that works better and find your activity. If your house has 2 stories don't accumulate a lot of stuff and carry it all up at once but instead take everything up separately. Stairs are wonderful exercise! Walk your errands or walk to work if you can.

The point is there are lots of ways to get moving in this world. Find the ones that fit best into your day and then work to incorporate them. Once you get them incorporated don't give yourself a pass to skip them. You may have to break your 30 minutes down into pieces like I have today, but push yourself to meet that 30 minute daily goal. Exercise makes you feel better, think more clearly, and gets the rest of your body working.

Now have a great day!

1 comment:

Unknown said...

Yes, and I once went to see that sister of yours about 2 or 3 weeks after she had a c-section....she had just been to aerboics. I think I was speechless.