Efficiency Tricks to Intensify Short Workouts
I have to be honest. There can be days that I find myself less able to have enough time to hit it hard at the gym. Even a busy Mom like me, who prides herself on being a fit and healthy role model for busy women, can sometimes crumble to life’s pressures and demands of getting it all in.
Like most of you, we are lucky to receive a teeny window of “Me Time” during our busy day, which I am lucky grab when either the kids are asleep, at school or when the much needed “Daddy Daughter and Son” dates relieve me for a few hours on the weekend.
Tips of how one can conquer an efficient workout, in a short period of time, that will warrant positive results, are commonly sought ideas asked by my busy Moms, who yearn to get fit and strong. Is it even worth going?
When the small opportunities to take care of our needs vanish with the day’s trickling minutes, we must to get creative and figure out how to get our workouts to rule our bodies and minds like an efficient engine. If it’s just 30-minutes a day, and you are totally committed to making them “working” minutes, I say it’s a-go!
Get Uncomfortable
While exercise is positive and extremely self-rewarding, you need to experience how is feels to “get outside of your box” and prevent a plateau… the dreaded state of not being rewarded by positive physique changes from monotony. One of my biggest fitness philosophies is that your body and mind hate the exercises that they need most. In other words, work your weak points to make them right. When you do the same things over and over, because you are good at them or you simply enjoy them, you are preventing your body and will power to grow stronger. Trying new things can shock your muscles and make workouts more efficient in less periods of time.
Get Organized
It doesn’t take a fitness expert like me to notice that so many gym go-er’s roam around aimlessly, not sure what to do. Plan your workouts based on days of the week. Your schedule should be tailored to how much time you can devote on each given day. Picking certain body parts for each day, formats or favorite Group Fitness classes that you like to attend can easily accomplish this. When you know exactly what you need to conquer before you arrive, you can attack with purpose.
Get Focused
If you studied your time spent at the gym, I guarantee that a good chunk of the minutes analyzed would warrant the socializing scene. While it is a great time to catch up with friends and motivate each other on fitness goals, you need to keep focused on why you are there: To sweat! Even by talking to friends during your daily date on the treadmill, can cause you to work at a much lower capacity then if you were undistracted, focused in getting in the zone. Make your time work for you and focus on pushing yourself to the limit.
What is Efficiency?
There are no rules or guidelines for the required length of time to create an efficient workout. Efficiency is based on how hard you work in a specific amount of time… Period! You can work at a low intensity for an hour or amp up your energy expenditure in half the amount of time. You are the master of your fitness destiny and no one else but you and your powerful mind can make your body move and sweat…. So stop thinking about how and when, and just go for it.
