Fitness is an important part of mental health. It’s not just about keeping your body healthy. When you exercise, you create neurotransmitters that regulate your mood, you burn off stress hormones, and you reduce physical tension – something that plays a huge role in remaining stress free due to the mind-body connection.
That is in addition to the obvious health benefits, the added confidence of knowing that you’re looking your best, and the clear improvement in both strength and sleep. Fitness is more than just something you should do – it’s something you need to do.
Of course, staying fit can be tough. You’ve got a busy schedule. Lots of men find that they can’t fit going to the gym into their day-to-day life without some serious sacrifices that they’re not willing to make. If you find that you’re too busy to be working out as often as you should, here are some tips for keeping yourself active during the work week.
Tip 1: Bike to Work
One of the best things you can do for yourself is bike to work. It gets you active early in the morning when you’re likely at your laziest, and it covers a time period that you would normally be spending in a car. It takes no extra time out of your busy day, and when you arrive at work you’ll be stress free, feeling good, and ready to take on the day. At the end of the day you bike home, and suddenly you’ve fit in all of this extra fitness into your schedule without impacting your free time. Need help getting out of bed? Consume a men’s pre-workout supplement to get yourself moving.
Tip 2: Get a Wellness Program at Work
Companies everywhere are focused now on employee wellness, because numerous studies have shown that when employees are fit and healthy, they show up more often to work, work harder, and are more likely to be productive. If your company doesn’t have a wellness program in place, talk them into it. Show them the research. If/when they have one, use it whenever you can. Often when you’re taking an hour lunch, you finish eating in about 10 minutes and spend the rest of the time relaxing. Spend it on the workplace treadmill and use your lunch wisely.
Tip 3: Move at Work
Fitness isn’t always about making some huge changes. You can burn calories and improve your health simply by moving in place. When you’re sitting in the office on the computer, move your legs up and down, lift some light weights, or walk around a bit. These little movements may not seem like much, but not only are you burning calories – you’re keeping your body more active.
Tip 4: Deal With Stress
Guys don’t always like to admit that they have stress in their lives, but the reality is that stress is one of the worst possible things you can do to your body. Stress and anxiety are literally poison to your body; they kill off organ cells, put pressure on your DNA, and more. They also create fatigue and reduce your energy level, both of which are important for being productive so that you have more time to keep fit. If you’ve got stress in your life, find a way to solve it.
Tip 5: Sleep
Sleep may not seem like it’s a part of workplace fitness, but it has a pretty profound effect on how you’ll deal with your job, and ultimately what you do before and after. Without enough sleep, you’ll find that:
– You won’t be able to have the energy to perform your daily fitness activities.
– You won’t be as productive at work, causing you to stay later and lose out on fitness time.
– You’ll be more fatigued after work, making it harder to run errands quickly and get started on fitness.
Sleep deprivation also vastly increases production of stress hormones, which hurt your mental health as well. Sleep’s not something you can skip out on once in a while and power through. Getting sleep regularly is guaranteed to make fitness easier.
Staying Fit on a Busy Schedule
When you’ve got a busy schedule it can be hard to fit in the work you need to do to stay physically healthy, but you need to try. The above strategies will make it easier to fit in fitness before, during, and after work, which will go a long way towards improving your mental and physical health.
