Your score: 3-4 points.
Plan on fewer structured workouts, and don't bother to try to carve out formal exercise time. Instead focus instead on accumulating your activity throughout the day.
Here are Mark Fenton's recommendations for you, the Flexible Fitness Personality: Count Steps, Reduce Inactive Time, Break it Up, & Set Goals.
A pedometer is great for the gadget lovers out there. It's also ideal for the person who simply can't find a hunk of 30 minutes-or even three chunks of 10 minutes-in a day for walking. A pedometer is a pager-sized device worn on your belt that simply records the number of steps you take based on your body's movement. Using one to record steps all day long began with public health experts in Japan, and is now all the rage in innovative exercise and weight loss programs in the U.S. Many experts now recommend that if you can't make time for exercise, at least be sure to get 10,000 steps over the course of each and every day. Of course, 10,000 steps may not be your best initial goal.
Here are 10 easy ways to log more steps on your pedometer in a day:
- Use a bathroom on another floor at work or school.
- Get a post office box and walk to pick up the mail.
- Go to a more distant cafeteria or restaurant for lunch, or walk to a park or mall to eat.
- Walk to a corner store for the newspaper, milk, or bread.
- Carpool with a friend, and walk all or part way to her house for the ride.
- Forego some e-mail-actually hand-deliver a message now and then.
- Walk the kids to school, a friend's house, or soccer practice, rather than drive them (they'll end up healthier, too)!
- Intentionally park at the end of the mall farthest from the store you're going to.
- Take a quick stroll rather than sit down for a mid-morning snack.
- Take mass transit to work, and get off a stop early.
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Here's a twist. Instead of adding activity to your day, do something even easier-take inactive time out of your day. Behavioral research suggests that reducing time in front of the television, a computer terminal, on the phone, or in front of a steering wheel may have a positive effect on your total daily activity levels. That's because those activities are so sedentary-you move so little-that almost anything you do instead will be more active, and thus burn at least a few more calories and be better for you.
The key to this is being realistic. Don't necessarily decide to eliminate television entirely. But maybe you can make sure that it doesn't go on until 9 p.m., and then only for your favorite show for an hour. Then maybe in that time between dinner and TV, you clean the house, do some errands, take a stroll-a host of more active choices. Here are some other ideas:
- Walk to a neighbor's house for a chat rather than calling on the phone.
- Set the five e-mail rule at work. One out of every five e-mails, get up, walk over, and respond personally, not by e-mail or telephone.
- If you do have to watch TV, always get up and move during every commercial. Every one!
- Eliminate or reduce your children's chauffeur service. Offer to walk or bike with them to a friend's house, and everybody gets more activity.
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The Surgeon General of the United States recommends that everyone accumulate at least 30 minutes of physical activity most days of the week in order to live a longer, healthier life. But breaking your 30 minutes of exercise into smaller chunks of time over the day still provides the same health benefits. This is good news for lots of new walkers. Whether you walk 30 minutes all at once, or 10 minutes on the way to work in the morning, 10 minutes at lunch, and 10 minutes in the evening, over the long run you should see similar improvements in cholesterol levels and blood pressure, cardiovascular risk and weight loss. Thus, if you're having trouble getting organized for a full 20- or 30-minute walk, break it up.
Can you count little bits of activity-just a few minutes worth, say-toward your daily walking total? Exercise researchers will tell you that 8 to 10 minutes is the shortest "exercise bout" that has been studied, and for anything shorter they're just not sure of the value. However, there's a growing consensus that even little doses of movement like pacing while you're talking on the phone rather than sitting down, or fidgeting while standing in an airport line rather than sitting on your luggage can add up over the course of the day. Their idea is that if it's enough movement to increase the total calories you expend in a day, it's probably good for you.
As far as I'm concerned, they're right. Any movement is better than just sitting still. But as far as tallying your total walking time in a day, don't count jaunts shorter than eight minutes.
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Behavioral researchers say that goal-setting helps people create concrete targets for their exercise, and makes it much easier to focus and feel successful. I also think it can be just plain fun.
A goal can be anything from trying to train for a specific occasion or event, to simply trying to walk a certain number of days in row. But here are some important tips to help make your goal-setting more successful:
Goal Setting Tips:- Choose internal rather than external goals. An external goal depends on how others view you or their expectations. An internal goal will be more successful because it's based on what's important to you. So don't just try to drop a dress size by your class reunion for appearances on one night. Instead try to walk 20 minutes a day so you wake up feeling better each and every morning.
- Focus on the process, not just the outcomes. Rather than just try to be able lose 15 pounds, why not instead try to add 5,000 steps to every day using a pedometer? It will get you to the weight loss, but allows for success every day, not just when you're "done."
- Have both short- and long-term goals. For example, a short-term goal might be planning to walk 12 out of the next 14 days, or 50 out of the next 60. A long-term goal is trying to log 600 miles this year.
- Tell others about your goals. They're likely to ask how you're doing and help keep you on track.
- Plan real rewards for meeting your goals. And we're not just talking about food. Choose substantive things you'll really look forward to, such as a new workout jacket or a concert. For a long-term goal-walking 320 days next year-give yourself a big pay-off like a walking vacation!
- Use your exercise log to chart your progress. It will keep even a long-term goal on your mind.
- For bigger challenges, join an organized club or team. For a goal like walking a marathon, an organized group may teach you more quickly than if you were training alone. You may also see faster improvement and be helped through setbacks by the group.
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