How to Workout Every Day: 4 Steps to Daily Exercise
“I wish I exercised more” Is the #1 wish I hear most from the women I work with.
Exercise. We all know it’s one of the main pathways to feeling happier yet it’s often the first thing to hit the chopping block when we get busy.
POP QUIZ TIME: What’s harder?
Finding time to work out every day OR
changing a road trip diaper blowout during a Michigan winter?
Trick Question! They’re both tough but both are totally possible with the right tools and mindset.
It was about 6:30p on a frigid January evening. All the things for the family, house, and job were done for the day. I thought, maybe I should go downstairs for an hour of yoga - no one needs anything right now. Uugh. I just ate a big dinner, I already put on 8000 steps at school today, tennis is on right now… my mind instantly went into “no” mode.
What do you do when the world feels like it’s gently calling you to hit the recliner and turn on 1923 (such a good show!)? How do we still choose what we know is best for us?
According to James Clear in Atomic Habits, Charles Duhigg in The Power of Habit, and Joyce Meyer in Making Good Habits; Breaking Bad Habits, we absolutely can ignore/delay the calling of the couch in favor of the thing we truly desire - a healthier life - if we follow just a few simple steps over and over.
With a joyful, supportive, and simplistic approach, incorporating exercise into your daily routine is not only possible but can bring about benefits you may not know existed! Once I opened my mind and my heart to the idea that exercise was going to happen every day, I discovered some fantastic ways to make it happen and some fantastic outcomes I didn’t know were coming.
Step One: “Do What You Love, Love What You Do” - Confucius
One thing that typical advice about working out every day didn’t tell me was that the primary indicator of me actually doing my workout was liking it. 👏 Really 👏 liking 👏 it 👏
This seems obvious when I write it. But you know the things that will stop me from even getting ready to work? The grody people that don’t wear enough deodorant - or the opposite of that: the teenagers that wear too much Axe. That’s enough to prevent me from going to the gym!
How about the CrossFit place with a coach so intense you blow out your elbow joints? Yep - been there done that. Or even if the gym isn’t clean enough. Sound silly, snotty? Maybe 🤷 But the harsh truth is that we must like something to continue to build a beneficial habit.
In Atomic Habits, by James Clear, I was intrigued by his list of four things research says we need to make a new habit. If we make it
1) obvious,
2) attractive,
3) easy, and
4) satisfying,
we are well on our way to instilling great new things. Notice that attractive, easy, and satisfying are things that we want all the time! What does this mean for exercise when you’re chasing the dog, taxiing the kids, or going to work every day?
How do we find the things we like? Try it all! I loved step aerobics in college, watching Ellen Degeneres on the treadmill used to be fun, anything outdoors makes me super happy, and weight training makes me feel proud.
What makes you happy, excited, proud? Lean on that. Did biking make you smile or is it something you’ve wished you would try?
Are you already thinking, “My bike is old, my helmet is ugly, my clothes don’t look right, and I don’t want to go by myself?” Here’s the tough love part of my speeches that have the biggest impact:
Tune up your bike and ride it until you can buy a new one, buy a new helmet or borrow your husband's, and wear different clothes, buy new clothes, or call a friend to ride!
If biking isn’t your cup of tea, here are some other ways I’ve made sweating more attractive:
I set up my back deck with some weights or a yoga mat, prop up my cell phone, and work out under my bright patio umbrella.
Buy a paddleboard! I LOVE the outdoors but the beach is by far my favorite place on the planet. When we bought two inflatable boards, my exercise significantly more attractive as I float across a glass clear lake.
Everything is better when we work together! What type of class would be fun? Zumba, spin, BodyCombat, Jane Fonda step aerobics? Two perks of class workouts for me are definitely the awesome audio systems at health clubs plus socializing with like-minded friends before or after a great burner.
If it’s too hard to coordinate and make plans with friends, use your headphones, and listen to a podcast or some Janet Jackson. Janet will always be there for you.
We can always find a reason not to do something. Like the night I was thinking about doing yoga - there are tons of reasons not to do it. However, there is ONE reason to do it. JOY.
Insert your ONE reason here _________. Since that is a true deep intrinsic goal for your life, fall in love with meeting it so deeply that it wins the battle in your mind as you make the little decisions each day to achieve it. Knowing that I’d be way happier and sleep better if I moved instead of flumping onto the couch was enough to get me started. I didn’t do the full hour but the 40 minutes I did were very beneficial.
With your one reason in mind, let’s look at the other vital steps that are proven to help you meet your goal: Habits and Action.
Step 2: Stacking Up the Good Habits
Ok, stacking pancakes is more fun but we are going to stack up little habits to make exercise more obvious and remove barriers. Since making exercise “obvious” was the hardest concept for me in the Atomic Habits list, I want to share it how I made it through to help you crush your goals.
Connect habits (or chores) you already do every day with habits that will make exercising super-easy.
For example:
We have to feed the offspring dinner every day. When I prepare or clean up dinner, I pack tomorrow’s breakfast and lunch.
I shower every evening (I teach freshmen gym. Ew.). When I get ready for my shower, I set out all my clothes for the next day’s needs.
We carry our phones everywhere. Instead of remembering a notebook or a printout, download a workout calendar from one of the millions of online free options, and drop it onto your phone home screen. This eliminates forgetting something AND helps with the decision-making step coming up later.
I use our basement regularly and setting up a home gym helped with my obvious part too. The term “gym” loosely means empty space (harder than it sounds), an old TV connected to Les Mills and YouTube, a speaker, a collection of hand weights, an amazon bench, a hand-me-down yoga mat, and a pair of shoes.
If I want to go to the gym before work, I have a few steps to make sure my recliner-brain doesn’t win:
Set my workout clothes in my bathroom and put my work clothes in my gym bag
my gym locker is stocked with running shows plus shower, hair, and make-up essentials
Pack my breakfast and lunch completely and put it in my work bag (a different bag than my gym bag)
Coffee is set on delay, travel cup is set out and ready
To decide when to set my alarm I did some simple backwards math:
Arrive at work by 7am, 5 minute drive, 15 minutes in the locker room, 60 minutes to exercise, 5 minute drive from home, put on exercise clothes, 15 minutes with my coffee cup. = Set alarm at 5am = go to bed at 9pm.
These steps are incredibly specific because taking as much decision-making out of the process can help us when it’s time to show up and meet our goals.
Feeling skeptical about the morning thing? I was, too! If you’re hoping to make mornings the time for your workouts, be sure to check out my blog about how to make 5am not only do-able but also something to cherish and look forward to.
Step Three: Stop Making Decisions
In The Power of Habit, Duhigg writes, “When a habit emerges, the brain stops fully participating in decision making. It stops working so hard, or diverts focus to other tasks. So unless you deliberately fight a habit—unless you find new routines—the pattern will unfold automatically.”
For busy women who are making decisions constantly, it’s vital to remove them as much as possible while we form our new habits.
When I read Thinner, Leaner, Stronger, by Michael Matthews, I was pleasantly shocked at the ease with which I adopted my new workout routine and how quickly I began to see the results I was after! He gives a plan for exactly what to do, when to do it, and for how long, and (for research nerds like me) he tells you exactly why. Combining that with the research in the habits books, I realized that:
Following a pre-determined plan makes working out much easier and enhances my ability to reach my goal.
Based on the thinking you did in the previous sections of this post, research workout plans in that field. Searching for a “race plan” for biking or running often gives cool printable calendars with happy little checkboxes. Be sure to pick something well-rounded to maintain safety (running plans should always include resistance training, core training, and flexibility training) and something that you can easily follow when you don’t know what to do.
My top recommendations are
Les Mills On Demand Plans and Challenges (free with a $15/mo subscription to the website). It has everything you could hope for for at-home videos and on-the-go audio workouts to follow for running or at the gym. Their free training plans are super easy to follow daily checklist but for those of us with outside hobbies, there are lots of alternatives and swaps if you crave more flexibility.
Michael Matthews’s Thinner Leaner Stronger workout plan (free bonus with the purchase of the book). Matthews is currently the ultra-guru in the field of fitness and training research. He took the time to analyze all the data and smashed it into easy-to-follow plans that are guaranteed to get you amazing results.
Trail Runner Magazine has all things outdoor running/hiking dialed in. When I was running trail half-marathons, their plans helped me train in ways that we safe, happy, well-rounded, and joyful.
Be sure to scour the internet for plans that incorporate your favorite methods of exercising. For fun and variety, you could even take two calendars and smoosh them together into your own plan.
Ultimately, the goal is to create a plan to follow so you always have an option on the list when you don’t know what to do or when you don’t feel like figuring it out. The key to my success has been maintaining the pursuit of a goal (and a written plan with it) while allowing for grace and flexibility when I want to ski, paddleboard, or just spend more time in happy-baby.
Step Four: Let It Be Known!
Once you determine your favorite method and time for working out, it is imperative that you make it know when you are working out to your family members for a a few reasons:
Coordinate anything parenting tasks. My husband has taken care of the kids’ needs in the mornings for a few years now making it possible for me to do what I need without stress, guilt, or worry in the morning. Same goes for afternoon biking and evening yoga classes.
Ensure that you will not be interrupted. Kids LOVE to bug you when you’re doing something. It took some time but I’ve learned to say, “This is my workout time. If it’s not an emergency, don’t interrupt.” Of course, we make sure everyone is safe and relatively occupied but other than that, ignore the ignore-able. Side note: one time my son was “so hungry” that he rolled around on the floor of the basement for food for lunch almost 15 minutes before he realized I wasn’t stopping my kickboxing video. I made lunch after my video. He ate. I won.
Put it on the calendar. This increases the chances of doing so by 97%. That statistic is not scientific in any way (I made it up) but I believe it. Writing things down is scientifically proven to improve our likelihood of doing it though! Pencil in your workouts every Sunday, or Wednesday - whenever - and relish the end of the week when you have more boxes checked every time you show up and find joy in a healthier you.
Last words
The blessings I need to care for in my life all benefit when I feel healthy and fit. Every single thing. Sometimes I feel guilty when I “ignore” my family to workout but that has become less frequent with this mindset shift I invite you to consider:
Daily exercise helps me be my best self. Showing up as my best self as a mother, wife, teacher, friend, daughter, and Christian, is SELFLESS, not selfish.
I know that your determination to care for everyone else will carry you through this task too because you want to be a provider for your family.
Caring for yourself is the most important ingredient to selflessly caring for everyone else. Another bonus I didn’t realize about working out every day: I am setting a great example for my children who are discovering their own love of fitness because of me and my husband’s dedication to joyful physical activity.
Thank you for spending your time with me today. My mission at Discover Superior Joy is to meet you where you’re at and help you achieve your goals. Please reach out anytime.
Sincerely,
June
P.S. 🙉When I was researching for this post, one stupid article said, “Busy moms can seize micro-moments for exercise in the smallest windows of time. Doing squats while waiting for water to boil or incorporating calf raises during dishwashing are simple yet effective ways.”
🤣 Squats in the kitchen while the water boils?! Sure, it’s exercise, but come on!
In another post maybe we can talk about what to do while the water boils but it ain’t gonna be squats. Dancing to Janet or Whitney? 🕺 Now we’re talking 💃
Never have I ever man-splained anything, and never will I ever. Promise.
