Daylight savings time ends this weekend. The days are getting shorter and colder. It’s less appealing to bike to work, walk after dinner, or get up early to go to the gym. However, everyone knows that day by day physical activity is crucial to our health and well-being.
Physical activity releases feel-good neurotransmitters within the brain that help relieve stress stress, anxiety and depression. This helps too prevent diseases corresponding to diabetes, heart disease and some cancers. Regular physical activity can delay life and improve overall quality of life.
However, a lot of us have difficulty achieving this goal 150 minutes of moderate intensity physical activity are really useful every week. In fact, it’s three in ten Australians and half of Australians aged 65 and over inactive.
So what are you able to do to stay motivated and consistently get through these darker months? Here are some tips.
1. Reach these goals
Goals can provide us with a way of purpose, meaning, and direction. However, simply striving to “adapt” is less likely to achieve success than SMART goals: specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-bound.
Specific Goals are based on observable behavior or activity, corresponding to step count, yoga, or attending an event.
Measurable Goals are trackable, so you may easily tell whether you’ve got achieved them.
Available Goals are realistic and based on your current fitness and skills. However, they will and should still be difficult. If you’ve got only ever run a 5K, hitting a half marathon next month won’t be realistic. But you may aim for 10 kilometers.
Right goals are personally meaningful to you. Explaining why it is vital will help motivate you to do it.
Limited in time goals include a goal date for achieving them. You can all the time reschedule if you happen to’re ahead of schedule or it’s too unrealistic.
An example of a SMART goal is likely to be: “I will walk 10,000 steps every day of the week for the next month.” You can then break it down into short-term goals to make them easier to achieve. If you currently take 6,000 steps a day, you may increase your steps by 1,000 each week to reach 10,000 by the top of the month.
2. Follow
More than 90% of Australians own a smartphone and greater than two in ten own a fitness tracker or smartwatch. These devices can assist you track your goals and activity, keep you accountable and increase motivation.
A 2021 systematic review proposed fitness trackers and smartphone apps may help people increase your steps by up to 2,000 per day. Our research demonstrated fitness trackers may additionally be helpful in increasing physical activity amongst older people. If you haven’t got a fitness tracker, you may buy inexpensive pedometers or track your activity time with paper and a pen.
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3. Plan for success, but prepare for barriers
Take a while to take into consideration potential barriers which will prevent you from being energetic and plan solutions to overcome them.
For example, if the associated fee of physical activity is simply too high for you, try finding free options corresponding to walking or running. You may consider free online shows or streaming movies.
If you discover it difficult to fit exercise into your busy schedule, try exercising early within the morning before you begin your day and putting on your workout clothes the night before. You might consider joining a gym with a versatile schedule. A superb strategy is to try to incorporate physical activity into your day by day routine, corresponding to walking or cycling to work.
If you will have a long-term illness or disability, consider searching for advice from a healthcare skilled, e.g exercise physiologist Or physiotherapist. Start slowly and regularly increase your activity until you discover something that you simply enjoy and that makes you more willing to proceed doing it.
4. Team up with a training buddy
Physical activity might be more enjoyable if you happen to do it with another person. Research shows working with friends might be more motivating and enjoyable. This may help keep you accountable, as some people are more willing to show up once they have an exercise partner. So, Find a friend who supports your goal to grow to be more energetic or maintain your current level of activity.
5. Plan a small treat
Make an appointment with yourself in your journal to exercise. Approach it as necessary as meeting a friend or colleague. One idea is to postpone something you’d slightly do and make it a reward for sticking to your schedule. If you actually need to exit for a coffee, take up a hobby, or watch something, go for a walk first.
Research shows incentives can dramatically increase levels of physical activity.
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6. Find a coach
If you wish more support, health coaching could also be an option.
Trained specialists work with people one-on-one, sometimes via telehealth, to discover what reduces their motivation to make healthier selections, corresponding to exercise. They then use behavior change techniques to help them achieve their health goals.
Our recent research suggests that health coaching can improve physical activity older people and also chronic pain. IN (*6*)New South Wales, Victoria AND Queenslandthese sessions are government subsidized or free.