I need to get out of my desk chair more, but lately I've been trying to walk my neighborhood since the weather's nice. What kinds of things do you do to stay active? I'd love some suggestions for good stretches and simple/effective exercises. Thanks!
Assuming you work from home the real answer is that you just get up every few minutes and move. It doesn't matter what. Some squats, pullups, pushups. Even a few hundred steps works wonders.
The key is to make the barrier to entry as low as possible. Then you actually do it more often.
Besides that, find a sport you think would be fun. Just try a bunch of trial lessons or join some people you know.
I alternate between spin bike and weights 6 days/week throughout the year, but with the weather getting nicer, I’m getting back out on my road bike on weekends and playing tennis with some friends after work. It helps to live in a city with a nice park!
Gave up on gym membership already. Switched to home workouts (check darebee website and youtube) I feel way better with this compared to the gym. You cant have noodle arms also, so get reasonable dumbbells to grow your arm muscles (they are effective and easy to store also)
It s 40min at most daily from home workouts so you need less mental energy to get to it (compared to: prepare backpack, go to gym, interact with people, go back). I am on the Avatar Upgrade program.
I add early morning walks and occasional hikes to spice things up.
My pleasure! These people have been doing volunteering work for more than 10 years and deserve a lot of love. They had some meal plans also. They are great people and they need a lot of support.
I refuse to drive or take any form of public transport, unless I am going to be traveling far.
I walk or bike everywhere I go. I get to where I am going and I get exercise along the way. I barely think about it anymore, it has just become normal to me.
Currently unemployed, so I can't exactly remember, but I used to launch a call with just myself. By default, that will change your status to "in a call", but I believe you can override it and set it to available. Alternatively, a mouse jiggler is around $20.
I was fortunate enough to get invited to a ballroom dancing class in high school and fell in love with it. It's exercise and a social experience all in one fairly affordable package. Where I live an hour long group class is $10 a head. I wouldn't do private lessons for these purposes. And if you like it, there are so many subcultures! There are entire groups dedicated to certain dances like West Coast swing and Argentine tango. Regular social dances on the weekends in addition to classes. YMMV based on where you live, but dancing with the stars has brought ballroom into the mainstream and there are quality studios in most decent sized US cities as far as I know.
Love ballroom dancing, and especially east coast swing is my jam. Unfortunately no regular social dances in my area but I go when there's one available. It's really fun and playful, great way to meet new people and good exercise. Equipment cost is basically a pair of shoes. I joke about dressing up in a dress and heels for my workouts.
Going to the gym is so boring for me. I ended up finding an activity that I enjoy doing that also happens to be good exercise and started kickboxing about 9 months ago. The people there are very friendly and they text me if I don't show up for a while, so there's more accountability that I would typically have.
I break up working day with small 5 min breaks where I rest in a squat. I do this a minimum of 6 times. It helps to stretch the whole posterior chain.
First 30 days I had a 4cm block bellow my heels since I severly lack the mobility. After a month of daily practice I've been able to reduce the height of the block to 2 cm. Will continue for another month and hopefully the full squat will be available to me.
The goal is to be able to have the squat as a natural resting position that I can use on a daily basis to break the chair sitting banner.
Instead of doing in 5 min blocks, do it in smaller intervals, say start with 30 seconds. And also you can aim for a smaller total daily time like 5 min, and work your way up to 30 dailly minutes over the course of weeks if not months. It may seem small but the goal is to accumulate the work and slowly induce adaptations.
I love this idea! Tie it into your existing routine! I decided a year ago to stand on one leg while brushing my teeth. Started as a teeter-totter, now I just sway a bit. I change legs when I change quadrants & do each for 30 seconds.
Also, squares are great. I avoided them (and lunges) for 20+ years because of my knee. Then I worked with a trainer for about 8 months last year. She slowly got me working the knee and after a few months I realized I could do squats! My pampering the knee for decades did nothing for it while her slow but steady working on it has me pain free and able to hike for 5+ hours now.
I also found the book: Built from Broken: A Science-Based Guide to Healing Painful Joints, Preventing Injuries, and Rebuilding Your Body by Scott Hogan
I need Motivation and often trick myself into doing some activities. Mostly per videogames. I try to do at least one Minigame per day and it actually helps with my Back-Pain. Continuity is key.
I ride an electric bike instead of driving, gentle exercise but I'm sure it makes a difference. Pokemon go walks, yoga 4x a week at a group class, weightlifting less than once a week. Yardwork too, hauling things around. I got running shoes but have not deployed them yet, I'd like to run once a week only. I do move around a lot. I read somewhere that if you wanted to be fit after you are 50 you really need to exercise 3 hours a day, and it seems true. Not like lifting for 3 hours every day but if I was retired I'd do cardio every morning, lifting every noon, yoga every evening except one day totally off everything each week.
Also, keep a glass of water at your desk. Get up to fill it, drink, get up to pee, repeat. So that you aren't sitting for too long.
I do yoga multiple times a week, use a rowing machine twice a week, and walk/hike my dogs.
Yoga is the best especially if you are sitting all day. And it's a nice "third space" where you see the same people every class and make weak links with them that aren't at home or at work.
Doing step challenges and tracking steps keeps me walking. I try for 10k steps a day and use Samsung Health's monthly challenge on my phone as gamification to keep walking daily.
Climbing! I've never been fond of weightlifting, but lifting myself up on the wall is way more fun! It's incredibly physical, and there's an equally important mental problem solving aspect to it. Most cities have a climbing gym these days and it's a lot more approachable than most people think. Bouldering especially only needs shoes and maybe a chalk bag. Just short but hard climbs that are usually only a few challenging moves. No ropes or harnesses, just big squishy mats to land on. It can also be pretty social with most gyms having a good community, and if you really take to it there's always room to grow into actual outdoor rock climbing.
Biking for commuting and errands is great as others have mentioned.
Running too. Just needs shoes and some comfy clothes. Even starting at a one km run doesn't seem like much, but you'll be surprised how much further you can go if you stick with it.
Bicycle commuting, but it sounds like you might be WFH. I am a 100% remote worker, but I keep an office and workshop to keep the day job out of my tiny living space. When I still worked from my boat (where I live), I would go for a bike ride through varying loops before and after work just to have that separation of mental states.
When we're on a passage or anchored out, yoga, calisthenics, dumbbells, TRX (body weight training system), and swimming keep us fit. Among my peers, there is a 1:1 inverse relationship between who does yoga and who has pains of inflexibility.
Another great book for keeping your range and flexibility is "Ten Golden Exercises" by Daniel Philpot.
That'll wreck anyone's day. Sounds like multimodal commuting is also a no-go for you? i.e., drive to something like a park-and-ride, then bike the remainder?
My boat is a 1979 Formosa 46, center cockpit cutter-rigged (two headsails) sloop. The design intent was to cross oceans and weather storms, carrying enough provisions for six people for up to six months. This is the sailboat I dreamed of owning since I was a kid. My family were into powerboats, but I hated the noise, stink, and wastefulness. I wanted the freedom from all that. I wanted to just go buy my own small sailboat so I could learn, but my parents wouldn't let me.
Cut to 30 years later, I finally bought my first sailboat in 2013 and moved aboard shortly thereafter. I had been searching for an F46 for years, but they were all either meticulous and priced ridiculously, or were clapped out and still priced ridiculously. I knew that I would want to make a lot of changes, so I didn't want to pay the premium on a mint boat. But I wanted a boat that I could still sail and determine what all I want to change.
Cut to 2015. In the same week, my marriage imploded, I spent Thanksgiving (my favorite holiday) and my birthday alone, and I was fired from the software company I co-founded in a hostile takeover. I also found my ideal specimen of F46 and it was in the same region, to boot. I'll take that silver lining.
I'm re-modeling and rearranging the interior, re-powering with electric drive, taking it down to bare glass and refinishing with modern coatings, re-rigging with Dyneema, fixing all of the engineering errors in the boat design, reducing the through-hull count, installing modern wiring and reducing the electronics (while modernizing the electronics I'm keeping). Modernizing the plumbing. Adding systems for longevity and autonomy (in the context of "extending time between having to visit ports"), e.g. solar, dual water makers, recovering dead spaces, shoring up deck durability, moving chainplates...
These following pics are the same place inside the boat:
Regarding using your boat as an office, there are a few caveats I share whenever anyone starts thinking about getting a boat. All boats leak. Everything you do in a boat creates humidity, and that humidity must be managed. The magical numbers are >55F and <55% relative humidity. Anything outside of that is inviting mold. While having your boat in freshwater reduces maintenance costs and lengthens maintenance intervals, owning and maintaining a boat is still at least a half-time job. And you know what they say about guys with big boats? They have big bills. The little-known origin of the word "boat" is actually an acronym: Bust Out Another Thousand. :D You really have to want this life. And the less that this is your life, the greater the overall expense in terms of opportunity and financial costs. It's crazy hard, but super rewarding.
Oh, and if you have an engine/fuel on your boat, your boat stinks of that. If you have a holding/blackwater tank on your boat, add in those wonderful smells, too. All of these are mitigable, but they are factors. Just a few things to think about...
Being active is so important to your health. Take where you're at and just build on it. One thing I always tell myself is that things won't get better if I don't act on it. Yeah, I want to loose 10 lbs so I'll start exercising and eating less. Tomorrow. Nope, it's got to start now. And give yourself some grace. Changing habits is hard and you will backslide. Don't beat yourself up, just awknowledge the slip and say you'll try to do better.
Lifelong lazy person here. I got a Fitbit. At first I just used it for counting my steps and heart rate, but after a while I decided to I crease my cardio load. Being able to see the data of my progress really helped. The steps goal is a big one too (I also work a desk job). It helped me keep mindful of how much I need to move. After a few months it was so much easier.
I'm lucky to have a relatively nice bicycle lane network in my city so I use it whenever I have to get groceries or whatever. Not that I have a car, but I wouldn't want to drive anyway. Cycling is also a hell of a lot better than the bus.
Sometimes I don't need groceries and just feel like a slug or whatever, so I do a bunch of jumping jacks until I start breathing hard.
You can find instructions online for stretches and exercises, but that doesn't hold my interest. I bit the bullet and joined a gym, going a couple of times a week to keep loose. Maybe I could do the stuff I do there at home (after purchasing some equipment), but I think the environment is worth the expense. I don't talk to anyone else except to greet the staff, but I like the fact that other people are around and it's a space dedicated to working out.
I run about 30 kms a week and I happen to live near my office, so I go there by bike. Walking is good. I do that almost daily after dinner. If I am tired after work, I make a point of taking long walks. I will still be tired, but the exhaustion will be physical rather than mental.
I got a personal trainer at a small local gym to do strength training. I meet with them twice a week and then go by myself a third day during the week; all three days I go before work. Pros are that I'm much stronger than I was 2 years ago, cons are that it does cost money and I do have to get up earlier to be there, but it's pretty easy to get up early when you paid someone for their time to meet you there.
I found a gym-quality elliptical on Craigslist a couple of years back, and if I walk/run at a pace between 50-60 rpm’s, I can walk about 2.5 miles in 30 minutes.