Here are some practical suggestions Iíve learned along the way to help make exercise a daily habit:
Set a time. Decide whether youíre more likely to stick with it in the morning or lunchtime or evening, and stick with that time. Iíve set the time of 6:00 a.m. every day, and I work nights, so i go straight from work. Iím trying my best not to vary from that time. If you donít set a time, youíre more likely to put it off until you have more time or energy, and then put it off until the next day. Soon, itís not a habit at all.
Send yourself a reminder. I use Memo to Me, but there are a number of ways to send yourself an email or text reminder, so youíll never forget. Then, when you get the reminder, do it right away. Donít brook any delays.
Start small. This is perhaps the most useful suggestion of all. When I start exercising, I always start with lots of energy, enthusiasm and ambition. I think I can do more than I can. However, doing too much in the beginning leads to burnout, which leads to quitting your habit. When you first try to make exercise a daily habit, chances are, your body wonít be used to that kind of stress. The key: only do 20 minutes in the beginning, and do it nice and easy. Nothing hard. Even 10-15 minutes is fine at first, if youíre just starting out. The key is to get out there, get your body slowly used to daily exercise, and form that habit.
Progress later. Once your body is used to daily exercise, you can slowly start to increase the amount and intensity of your exercise. Wait at least two weeks before starting to increase ó thatís the minimum your body needs to adjust. Once it begins to feel way too easy, you can start increasing the length of your workouts, to 30 and then 40 minutes, and eventually up to an hour. Once you do that, you can gradually increase the intensity ó running faster or harder, for example. Try not to increase both distance and intensity at the same time.
Make it pleasurable. If you associate a habit with pain, you will shy away from it. But if itís fun, youíll look forward to doing it. Thatís why, in this beginning stage of my new habit, Iíve been focusing on pleasure. I go slowly, enjoying the scenery, the fresh morning air, the beautiful sky as the sun rises, the quiet time of solitude and contemplation. Itís actually something I enjoy doing. An mp3 player with some great music helps.
Lay out your gear. The fewer obstacles and less friction there is in forming your new habit, the more likely you are to be successful. If you have to not only wake up early but get a bunch of gear together while half awake, you might just want to go back into bed. But if you lay out your workout clothes and shoes and watch and mp3 player, or whatever you need for your exercise, youíll be ready to go with no friction at all.
Just head out the door. My rule is just to get my workout gear on and get out the door. I donít worry about how long I have to go or how hard it will be. Just get out and get started. Once Iíve done that, itís a piece of cake.
Mix it up. One thing I do is golf everyday, but in the gym i try a variety of cardio exercises. But perhaps just as important is that with each sport, Iím using different muscles, especially with swimming. Sure, some of the same muscles are used, but theyíre used differently with different stresses on them. What that means is that Iím not pounding the same muscles, every day. That gives them a chance to recover, because without recovery, youíre just breaking your muscles down over and over.
Have a relative rest day. Again, recovery is very important. Which is why you need to give your body a chance to rest. If youíre taking it easy, and only doing 20 minutes, you should be OK without rest days. But itís still good to have one day of rest, where youíre not doing the same exercises as the other six days. You donít want to skip the day completely, because then youíre not being consistent with your habit. If you need more rest, you could just do 20 minutes of walking, or even just a session of meditation. The key is to do something every day, preferably something that gets you moving (meditation isnít the best example, but at least youíd be doing something) and keeps your habit formation going.
Donít skip a day. Itís easy to say, ďNo problem, Iíve been doing it for five days Ö Iíll just skip today!Ē But that will make your habit formation harder. Consistency is key, so try not to skip a single day. If you do, donít beat yourself up, donít judge, donít feel bad ó everyone messes up sometimes, and habit formation is a skill that requires practice. Just start your 30-day challenge over again, and try to identify the obstacle that led to your skipping a day and prepare for it this time.
This idea might not work for everyone but it has worked for me, so if you have any suggestions or comments to add please feel free add as th journey is a work in progress!!!