10 Ways to Stick to Your Workout

From: Live Longer, Live BetterUpdated: Mar. 20, 2019

Sticking to a workout routine can be challenging but to stay in shape and in good health, you have to keep up regular exercise. Here are 10 ways to help you do just that.

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Find a Comfortable Fitness Level

You don’t need to keep intensifying your program once you have met your fitness goals. Research shows that you can maintain fitness with less activity than it took to become fit. In fact, continuously increasing your workout time raises your risk of hurting yourself.

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Maintain Your Results

You can’t store the benefits of exercise for very long. Missing a day or two won’t hurt, but skipping too many successive workouts will put you back where you started. Even professional athletes lose a portion of their fitness if they don’t exercise for a few weeks.

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Keep a Support Network

You can benefit from staying in touch with other exercisers. You may be inspired by what you see others accomplish. Or you may enjoy mentoring a spouse, child or friend.

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Make Exercise Convenient

If you can walk briskly half an hour to get to work, you don’t have to make time during the day for an aerobic workout. Think twice before joining a health club that is miles out of your way. If your program is centred on outdoor activities, have indoor alternatives for days when the weather is bad.

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Give Exercise Priority in Your Schedule

“Not having time” to exercise is an evasion. A survey shows that exercisers and non-exercisers have the same amount of leisure time – about 24 hours a week. During busy periods, save time by increasing the intensity of workouts instead of skipping them.

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Accept Temporary Setbacks

Then pick up your regimen again as soon as you can. An illness, an injury or a personal crisis will inevitably interrupt your exercise program. If you miss a few days of exercise, you can probably start again at the level where you left off. With a break of a week or more, you should re-evaluate your fitness and work back to your former level very slowly.

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Make Other Healthy Changes

Smokers and people who are overweight are the most likely candidates to quit exercising. Let exercise help you give up smoking and unhealthy eating.

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Consider Competing

Participating in a race, swim meet, golf tournament, or tennis match may give a focus to your fitness regimen.

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Reward Yourself

Getting fit and staying fit are achievements. Treat yourself periodically to a special evening out, new clothes or a trip.

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Build Up Your Activity Slowly

Running a mile or taking a two-hour aerobic class on your first day won’t improve your fitness. If such excesses don’t injure you, they will make you tired, sore and likely to drop out. Start out slowly and add more activities and higher intensity a little bit at a time.

Originally Published: August 09, 2011