5 Ways to Boost Daily Movement

It was a beautiful, quiet Sunday winter morning at my friend's cottage recently. Three of us were on a guys weekend and I was up early before the other two. I was sitting in the comfy chair in the living room, sipping my coffee as the "Christmas snow" fell outside. Mother Nature was painting a BEAUTIFUL winter portrait that morning let me tell ya!

I was catching up on some articles I had saved in Instapaper. One of those was an article from Participaction, and I thought I'd throw in my own Zenergy take on it to add some thoughts. You can find the entire Participaction article here.

The article is titled "5 foolproof hacks to get more steps". They mention the Canadian 2025 Report Card on Physical Activity for Adults, and how only 32% of us are hitting the recommended MINIMUM of 7500 steps per day for health and wellbeing. That's a scary stat eh? 68% of Canadian Adults are NOT meeting the MINIMUM daily movement for health.

The article's 5-foolproof hacks are:

1. Record and reward every effort you make

2. Harness the power of getting active with others

3. Change up your routine

4. Turn inconveniences into convenient movement opportunities

5. Remind yourself that getting active is important for your mental health and wellbeing

I'm going to share my own list of 5 ways to boost your daily movement. Remember, I'm speaking in terms of general health, healthspan and longevity. For the record, I don't disagree with anything listed above. A couple of mine are tweaks to these and some are additions that may help create an "ah-ha" moment or even a thought of "OH! Good way to look at it - I'd like to try that". 🙂

1. Movement provides so much MORE than aesthetics. In the modern world and our comparitive society, we see movement primarily as a means to changing our aesthetics. While that certainly is true, it runs much deeper than that. Regular physical activity provides; mental health benefits such as increased mood, focus, concentration and clarity of mind, boosts our overall energy, creates greater physical independance at any age, decreases risk of injury, creates a deeper understanding of our own physiology, balance and stability, mobility, decreased pain/discomfort, pain management, promotes increased oxygen delivery throughout the body... And so on.

   
   

2. Listen to your body TODAY. Goals are great, but focusing solely on where we WANT our body to be is NOT a sustainable approach. It often creates more frustration and anxiousness in our efforts. The consistency and trusting the process IS what will move you towards your goal. Our progress is NOT linear. In fact it's anything but. There will be "good days" and "not so good days". It's OK!! Instead of forcing things, listen to what your body is telling you TODAY. If you're "not really feeling it", do less (but do something). If you're feeling great, do a little bit more. Not only will this keep your energy balance intact AND strengthen your practice of listening to your body, but you'll also feel better moving each day. When it feels GOOD, you'll keep coming back to it.

   
   

   

3. Set up your environment to take the thinking out of your daily movement practice. Putting the energy into setting up our environment to succeed in our movement goals, will create consistency and less stress surrounding your daily practice, and can also lead to MORE movement without thinking about it. Over time, ALL movement adds up (big or small). Things like having your walking shoes and jacket in PLAIN SIGHT by the door so you CAN'T miss it, moving often used dishes/kitchen items down low so you have to squat down often to get them, putting your yoga mat and/or foam roller beside your favourite sitting spot in the living room, put a dumbbell outside the bathroom door so that every time you come out of the washroom you do 1-set of an exercise... These sorts of little tweaks to our environment create automatic reminders CONSTANTLY and decrease the chance we'll "forget" or "get too busy". This also pre-plans ahead of time, so there's no digging something out of the closet so you can do your exercises, because it's already out and ready.

4. Feel GOOD first. I may sound like a broken record, but the statistics speak for themselves! Most of us have approach our health and physical activity in a FORCEFUL, "I have to do 'x'" way and look where we are - 68% of Canadian Adults ARE NOT hitting the MINIMUM daily movement for health and wellbeing!! 😳 If you want to move more without the stress attached, aim to FEEL GOOD. Get the "have to's" or "should do's" out of your head and do something EASY, DO-ABLE for you and don't get caught up in what "everyone else is doing". As the stats show, MOST of us aren't doing enough, so STOP stressing about what "they" say. Do things you enjoy. Do things you think you MIGHT enjoy. Try it out! Move in ways that you think "this is too easy - it can't possibly work" and then do it DAILY. Take in how GOOD, feeling GOOD feels.

   
   

   

5. Get away from the "block of time" and incorporate movement throughout the whole day. Same deal as my previous point; how we've been approaching movement and health is NOT working, so change it up! Get away from the mindset of "workouts", "programs" and "plans" and start building habits of movement throughout your day. It could be something like my pushup habit I've shared here previously in a few posts, opting for more manual power chores (like cutting the lawn or shovelling), walking to work or the store instead of driving, parking far away on purpose instead of circling 6 times for the closest possible parking space, approaching your exercises in VOLUME over the whole day (eg: 3 sets of 10 reps of squats by the end of the day, rather than all in a workout)... There are so many possibilities!

Our approach to our healthy lifestyle habits have ignored the fact that the guidelines for general health are MINIMUMS. There are STILL too many of us with the mentality of, "oh good, I've done 150min of activity this week so I can just STOP now" or "I've done my 45minute 'workout' so I'm good for the day". Our physiology doesn't work that way.

We need to start experimenting with ways to create greater consistency of movement throughout the entire day.

The bonus to this, is that when THIS is your approach, we usually CAN'T physically overdo it. Our body will tell us. This opens the door for SOME increased intensity in our activities, and balancing that with SOME lower intensity activities throughout our day.