Health benefits: Jogging can help you to maintain a healthy weight, strengthen your bones, and improve your cardiovascular fitness.
Health benefits: Shadow boxing improves balance, coordination, and strength in your upper body.
Health benefits: Dancing improves your blood pressure, cardiovascular fitness, and endurance.
Health benefits: Yoga increases your flexibility, builds muscle tone, prevents injury, and even reduces stress.
Health benefits: Barre improves posture, mental focus, muscle strength, and endurance.
Health benefits: Jumping rope strengthens your bones, improves coordination, benefits your heart health, and increases stamina.
Health benefits: Improve cardiovascular fitness, strength, and even your mood!
Health benefits: Wall sits work your quads, glutes, hamstrings, and calves. Workout idea: Try 2-3 rounds of wall sits, holding your form from 30-60 seconds (and less time if you’re not able to go for that long). Variations: For more challenge, try lifting a leg off the ground, holding free weights, or holding a medicine ball between your legs.
Health benefits: Squatting builds strength in your glutes, hamstrings, quads, and back. Workout idea: Keep it simple! Try 50 bodyweight squats when you get up in the morning for a quick burst of energy. Variations: Try one-legged squats, practice jumping squats, or add weights to make this exercise a bit harder.
Health benefits: This exercise will strengthen your triceps, pecs, back, and core. Workout idea: Try doing 3 sets of 10 reps and then a final set until “failure” (or, until you can’t do any more). Variations: If chair dipping with extended legs is too difficult, move your feet in and bend your legs to a 90-degree angle.
Health benefits: Planks build core strength, improve posture, and reduce the chance of other fitness-related injuries. Workout ideas: For a quick exercise sure to get your core burning, try 3 rounds of 1-minute planks. Variations: Try a high plank or practice side planks to work out additional muscle groups.
Health benefits: Pushups strengthen your abs, arms, hips, and legs. Workout ideas: Pushups are great at the end of a workout. After you’ve finished other exercises, try 10 pushups (or however many you can do!). Variations: If you can’t complete full pushups, rest your knees on the ground and perform them from this position.
Health benefits: Mountain climbers are a great low-impact exercise that increase core and hip flexor strength. Workout ideas: Set a 6-minute timer. Perform mountain climbers for 20 seconds at a time and then rest for 10. Variations: Try crossbody mountain climbers. Instead of bringing your knees straight forward, bring them across your body and twist your core.
Health benefits: Increase your range of motion while building leg and glute strength with lunges. Workout ideas: Head outside (like to your local football field), turn on some music, and do walking lunges for 100 yd (300 ft). Variations: Try a jump lunge to make the exercise harder and to improve coordination.
This practice isn’t just great for your health, but as an added bonus, it’s great for the environment, too. Keep in mind that when you arrive, you may need to freshen your look. Bring a towel, a sweatband, and a fresh change of clothes in with you!
On top of standard health benefits, walking can increase your mood and your energy levels. It’s also great for weight loss![16] X Trustworthy Source Mayo Clinic Educational website from one of the world’s leading hospitals Go to source Lugging around your groceries is like walking with a weight—talk about a win-win!
Choose a sport that you’ve done in the past or try something totally new. Set up practices for your team—that way, you’ll become competitive and get extra fitness in at the same time.
If you’re into nature, choose an area where you can bird watch or keep a field journal, too. Or, turn your hiking trip into a camping adventure. Walk to a gorgeous spot, pitch a tent, and camp overnight.
Walking up stairs actually burns more calories than jogging (seriously!). Stair climbing can also reduce your stress levels, so you’ll head into work feeling calm and refreshed.
Finish outdoor projects like weeding, gardening, painting your home, organizing your shed, or repaving your walkways. Give your home a spruce. Reorganize your furniture, clean your home, or dust your furniture. Take on a big craft project. Create a flower wall, paint a mural, or pull together a time capsule. Have fun while you stay moving!
Make smoothies in the morning that can help you get in your daily vitamins. Bake and roast your foods instead of frying or grilling. Replace sugary drinks with lots of water. Eat less fast food. Try to incorporate a new, healthy meal into your routine every week.
