Health and Fitness Work Best with Routine

Sometimes, two workouts are better than one!

Like it or lump it, human beings are creatures of habit. This means that organisation and routine are a vital part of promoting wellness and fitness in your life. Your health can be greatly improved by having a routine, and that goes for your exercise as well as your daily life.

It’s common to suffer from any number of different issues if you aren’t able to adopt some form of routine in your life. These might include…

❖    Distraction and worry – Do you find yourself constantly worrying about when you’ll find time to get all of your chores done, exercise and squeeze in that hobby you’ve been thinking about picking up? A routine will help with this!

❖    Unhealthy diet – If you don’t have time scheduled for a weekly shop, you may well find yourself falling back on fast food or ready meals. You need to eat, and if you haven’t given thought to it before you get hungry, a quick and unhealthy substitute can quickly sneak in.

❖    Poor sleep – It’s easy to find yourself playing catch-up on yesterday’s to-do list if you don’t have a strong daily routine in place. If you’re always behind on what should have been done the day before, you’re likely also staying awake worrying about what didn’t get done today.

Most importantly of all, a lack of strong routine can allow the procrastinator in you to take over. If it’s not part of your routine, what’s preventing you from putting off that exercise class that you aren’t particularly in the mood for until you’re feeling more energised (spoiler alert: if you aren’t exercising regularly, you aren’t going to feel any more energised any time soon!)?

Once you have a routine in place it’s much easier to motivate yourself to do things that are easily put off. It’s also easier to build on your barebones routine to create something that works perfectly for you.

For example, you might want to think about changing your scheduled exercise time so you’re fitting in two exercise classes instead of one. This means you’re getting twice as much experience, twice as many benefits, and can build on your skills much more quickly. It also means that if you’re sick one day and are unable to go to one of your scheduled classes, you’ll still be able to attend the second one and won’t be too far out of the loop when you return. In many cases, people will drop out of their exercise classes without really planning to, simply by dropping from two classes per week to one, and then from one to zero. Try to keep yourself attending at least two classes each week if you want to feel the benefits of all of your hard work.

When building your routine, try to schedule time for movement each and every day – don’t leave all of your weekly exercise to those two classes. Many people find that daily physical activity can improve their self-esteem, balance, coordination and sleep habits, and boost their weight loss. It’s also been suggested that it can reduce your risk of developing a chronic illness. Just 20 minutes each day can make a world of difference.