How I learned to make exercise a part of my busy schedule ⌚🏋️‍♀️

Do you ever feel like your schedule is so packed that finding the time to work out seems impossible?

Exercise is an essential part of life and wellbeing. Fitting it into your schedule doesn't have to be as complicated as you think.

As someone who had always been active in my youth, I remember how disappointed I felt when I realized I wouldn't have nearly as much time to work out once I started school and an actual job. However, it was important for my mental and physical health, so I knew I would have to make small changes.

You too can make small changes to greatly improve your overall health and change how you view fitness by following these tips.

You might feel like you're too busy but when you actually write out your schedule, you'll find that you probably do have time to fit in a short workout!

Whenever you have a short break, or you're doom scrolling or watching TV, you can do quick exercises to replace being sedentary. Sometimes while cooking, instead of sitting and waiting for my food, I'll do short exercises. I'll also do this during commercial breaks if I want to watch TV.

A few exercises you can do are:

• Jumping jacks

• High knees

• Side to side steps

• Planks

• A quick power walk

Something I do to prioritize exercise is to do it first thing in the morning. When I first started to do this, I wasn't used to waking up early. So I started small by waking up 15 minutes earlier than my normal time. Each week, I added about 5 more minutes to get used to the change. I now wake up an hour earlier than I used to!

If you find it hard to wake up earlier, you can take walks during work or school breaks. When spending time with friends or loved ones, you can play a sport, do a physical activity, or take a fitness class instead of doing something sedentary like going to a movie.

HIIT stands for high-intensity interval training. It's "repeated short bursts of high-intensity aerobic exercises" within a short amount of time.

When my schedule started to become more full, I immediately knew hiit would be one of the best workouts for busy days. When I played sports as a kid, we would do them on conditioning days because they were short and effective. I also used YouTube to find HIIT workouts.. Youtube is great because they have a variety of workouts for all levels.

Here is a five-minute HIIT workout you can do on busy days.

If you look at your schedule and still have a hard time finding time to work out, don't worry! The little things we do throughout our day can also count as exercise. A few things I do are:

• Parking farther away from the door to your destination. This increases your daily steps.

• Taking walks during lunch breaks.

• Replacing some sedentary hobbies with active ones like sports or roller skating.

• Standing instead of sitting.

• Walking or biking to nearby places instead of driving.

Life can get pretty hectic but with making small changes you can find it will be easier to squeeze in exercise when keeping these tips in mind: