I haven’t got the time….
Make time for your family. Make time for your friends. Make time to progress in your career, to do the laundry, to wash the car, walk the dog and answer all those emails.
There are 24 hours in your day. If you are lucky, 7 or 8 you are asleep. Maybe 8-10 at work. On a good day, 3 or 4 you spend socializing, running errands, organizing our lives and sometimes even relaxing.
If you have kids or work a 60-hour week and still manage to get to work on time every day then you are indeed a superhero.
Sometimes, making time for exercise can seem rather insignificant in the grand scheme of life. Maybe you miss one session a week to spend time with your family, or maybe you take a month off during a busy time at work. I understand.
Sometimes it’s hard to even breath during the day.
Well, you can still find time to work out. There is a way, listen…
What about 10-minute workout first thing in the morning? A workout at this time can potentially help your productivity throughout the day, as it releases endorphins (happy hormones) into the bloodstream. It can also help to boost your metabolism and burn calories after the workout, provided you are working at a high intensity. And if you do this every day for 6 day’s you have done the equivalent of one 60 minute maximal effort workout session!
The determination that goes into those 10 minutes, along with the subsequent endorphin release could also help to improve your general outlook on the day. After All, you may find you are less inclined to spend half an hour putting together a greasy fry up for breakfast if you have spent the previous 10 minutes working up a sweat.
For the 10 minutes, I challenge you to pick 2 exercises that make you sweat hard, and do the first one for 50 seconds with 10 seconds rest, and the second for 40 seconds with 20 seconds rest. Do this 5 times and make sure you are working hard enough to need that 10 second break.
The good news is that’s actually only 7.5 minutes of exercise! Yipee! And hopefully your body won’t have figured out what you are doing to it at 5am. It’s basically working out without being there.
Now the actual struggle is not hitting snooze. As a personal trainer, my wake up time is sometimes around 4.30am, and setting my alarm for 4.20 still pains me. However, those 10 minutes always improves my mood for the remaining 23 hours and 50 minutes of the day.
Here are my top tips for not hitting snooze:
•Put your alarm clock across the other side of the room.
•Put your exercise matt/equipment next to your bed so all you have to do is roll onto your yoga mat!
•Lay out any clothes you need to put on to do your workout (I usually do it in my pyjamas!)
I challenge you to feel worse off for waking up 10 minutes early each day. Give it a go!
By Ellie Richardson