by Kennisha Amon
Getting your butt to the gym can be tough sometimes. Gym membership fees, travel, working long days, or just being plain lazy can get in the way of sustaining a fitness routine. But, there are a lot of ways to keep fit even while at home to keep your physical and mental health in check.
Here are a couple of tips to help you get started:
- Online Workouts
Luckily for us, there has a been a huge influx of fitness professionals posting workout routines online in the past couple of years. Unlike the early 2000s where the only workouts you’d be able to follow were your mom’s old Hip Hop Abs DVDs, we now have the opportunity to find an endless supply of routines on YouTube and Instagram. There’s a type of workout for everyone online! Whether you like relaxing guided yoga sessions, more vigorous kickboxing exercises, or a carefree Zumba class— chances are you’d be able to find the right fit for you with a quick entry into the search bar. And the best part is, if you’re not feeling it, you can swap over to another one free of charge!
Links: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8TOIWNAVADw&t=883s, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GFUxgIXEHAk
- Make HIIT your best friend
HIIT, short for High Intensity Interval Training, is your best friend when it comes to home workouts. They’re short and sweet but they pack one hell of a punch. Even just a 5 minute HIIT session will have you breaking a sweat. The structure of HIIT is a set of around 5 exercises with short rest periods in between. The moves are specifically designed to get your heart rate up which allows you to burn more calories in a shorter, more bearable amount of time. There are hundreds and hundreds of HIIT routines on Instagram and YouTube and the best part about them is you can pick out the movements you like the best and develop your own routines. See what you like and what works for you, list down a couple of your favorite ones and have fun!
There are timer apps you can download onto your phone to help you with your HIIT routines. These apps let you customize the amount of workouts you’ll do and the length of your active and rest intervals. There are also many workouts posted on YouTube or Instagram that have timers built in!
Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dquKB9LmKO8
- Use some stairs
Stairs offer a good level of added difficulty to your home workouts and allow you to move and stretch your body more dynamically as opposed to doing everything flat on the ground. You can switch to variations of your staple moves such as lunges, squats, glute bridges or push-ups and you’ll be surprised how much that one step up can add to the burn! Running up and down the stairs a couple of times is a good way to get some extra cardio in too.
Tip: For people who live in condominiums and don’t have stairs in their units, try checking if the stairwells in your building are open on a daily basis!
Links: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUjUiqaqtGg, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y1-uwSGuD5w
- Use a chair, sofa or bed
In line with using stairs to enhance your workouts, you can also use a chair, a sofa, or even your bed to help with your routines. These surfaces are useful to doing moves like tricep dips, step-ups, or even ab workouts by tucking your feet under or holding onto them for added leverage. There are lots of home workout tutorials online that can teach you how to have an effective workout from the comfort of your own bedroom.
Links: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJZpsTA5IbQ, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s8QEarpQut8
- Be creative!
Last but not least, be creative! It can be tough at first to gain the motivation to work out at home, especially with the lack of equipment and the ambience of a gym or studio. You might think your options are more limited at home, but that doesn’t have to be the case. Home is the perfect place to get creative with your workouts because you don’t have to be afraid to look silly or mess up from time to time. It’s the perfect time to test out new moves and push yourself to learn. Then if you decide to step out of the house and go to the gym, you’ll have a lot more exercises ready in your back pocket!
