How to stay in shape when working from home
Posted: November 30, 2011
Staying in shape is a bit challenging for the stay at home worker. If you put in long hours at your desk and you need to take care of chores and kids as well, it's easy to overlook your health. Here are some tips to help you stay lean and healthy so you can continue being a productive home worker.
Having a job that requires you to commute every day is a pain, however, it forces you to leave the house and many times, that is half the battle when it comes to adding a fitness element to your daily routine. It's simple enough to go to the gym either on the way to or from the office.
Staying in shape is a bit more challenging for the stay at home worker. It's counter-intuitive but it is indeed true. If you put in long hours at your desk and you need to take care of chores and kids as well, you have to find ways to stay in shape at home.
Here are some tips to help you stay lean and healthy so you can continue being a productive home worker:
Do a morning workout
Doing a short workout session before eating breakfast has a number of advantages:
- You increase your energy which will help you stay focused on your work and be more productive.
- You give yourself a short metabolism hike, which is great for weight loss or weight maintenance.
- Getting some exercise done early in the day means that, regardless of the various surprises your day has in store for you, you won’t miss out on your workout.
Buy Some Simple Fitness Gear
Make it as easy as possible to do home workouts. Get some affordable fitness equipment that you can use during your work day.
Some of the possible options include:
- Dumbbells or kettlebells to do strength exercises like curls, swings, presses, and lifts.
- A jump rope to do a little cardio and to take the stiffness out of your body after sitting at your desk for too long.
- A stability ball to do abdominal exercises such as crunches.
- A buso ball for more stomach exercises and to work on your core.
- A yoga mat for stretching.
Keep your equipment at hand, tidy, and available. The easier it is to exercise at home, the more likely it is you will actually train.
Schedule Your Workouts
Working at home involves a lot of freedom. To make sure you workout, you need to take away some of that freedom and make time, in advance, for exercising. You need to have a workout schedule with time set aside for your training sessions.
Once you schedule your workouts, the chance of you missing it decreases dramatically.
Avoid Distractions
Your home is often full of distractions: the phone ringing, your kids yelling at each other, etc. You need to avoid these distractions and make sure that you can do your workouts without
interruptions.
Place your phone on silent mode, get your spouse to keep your kids occupied, don’t check your email between sets.
Take Mini-Workout Breaks
If you spend your day sitting at a desk, you need to take a break every hour or so to stretch your muscles and back. Why not use those breaks to do mini-workouts?
A mini-workout is a 5-10 minute long exercise session. All you need to do is to pick a few exercises, put them in a circuit and do this circuit 2-3 times.
For instance, here’s a good circuit:
- 15 squats.
- 20 push ups
- 15 single handed back rows with a dumbbell.
- 15 forward lunges with bicep curls.
Doing this mini-workout will give you a burst of energy that will help you stay focused on your work. It will also burn some extra calories and keep you lean.
All in all, it doesn’t require a lot of time to get in shape. You just need to turn exercise into a regular habit.
Biz Tip Source: Dumb Little Man
About the Author: Jonathan Dunsky writes a blog, World of Diets, about increasing fitness, losing weight, and improving your health. Get the RSS here. He lost over 30 pounds 12 years ago and has kept then off ever since.