You know you should exercise, but it would require time and energy that you just don’t have.
Your priorities lie with things like your career, your family, and the zillions of other things you have to worry about in adult life.
If you have free time, you want it to be just that, FREE.
What if I told you that just a little bit of a certain type of exercise could help you use your time more effectively, give you more energy, and improve your performance in your personal and professional life?
And you don’t even have to change your clothes.
When movement becomes challenging, and you do it regularly, it’s exercise.
Last week I introduced the ways that just simple movement like standing up from your desk could prime your brain and body to work better.
Imagine what a little bit of exercise could do for how you feel, work, and interact with others.
Years ago I had a friend who worked in a lab, observing the impact of exercise on human cells. They were looking at the impact of exercise on the management of different diseases.
After observing treadmill walkers with some pretty cool cell imaging technology, he concluded that, “It’s like exercise makes your cells glow”.
Consider how “glowing” cells could impact your ability to manage the demands in your life.
As you know, even a small amount of movement can increase your circulation, moving the good stuff in and the bad stuff out of your cells. Exercise makes this happen at a high rate and volume, exponentially increasing these benefits.
Remember those energy producing engines in your cells called mitochondria?
When you exercise regularly, you increase the number of these energy engines your cells have. More energy producing engines equals more energy, focus, and overall performance.
Your brain really likes exercise too. The area of your brain responsible for things like focus, memory, and emotional regulation grows significantly as a result of regular exercise.
This could be one of the reasons research has repeatedly demonstrated that regular exercise can be a highly effective intervention for depression and anxiety.
Consider where exercise could be a “competitive advantage” in your life.
I’m sure it all sounds good, but what about the time commitment? You know, the drive to the gym, the weights, cardio, shower, then drive home?
That’s a lot of time when you have a lot of other things on your plate.
Canadian researcher, Martin Gibala has dedicated his career to looking at how little exercise is necessary to supercharge your brain and body.
He’s found that when you exercise hard, it takes very little time for your cells to respond.
Something as short as a 30-second sprint up the stairs can alert your cells they need to improve in order to handle the stress of exercise.
Even if it’s done for a short amount of time, hardcore intense exercise isn’t for everyone though.
According to the American Medical Association, about 150 minutes a week divided between moderate and challenging physical activity gets the job done. That’s an investment of a little more than 20 minutes per day to think clearer, improve your mood, and consistently show up as the best version of yourself when it counts.
Even for my most exercise-committed, 6-pack obsessed executives, I create programs that are “an hour with your shower”.
Chose an activity that gets your heart rate up to the point where you could talk if you needed to, but you don’t really want to.
Keep it up at that rate of intensity for 60 seconds, then slow down to a more “conversational” pace for 60 seconds. Repeat 10 times while listening to a podcast, your favorite playlist, or watching a show on a stationary bike.
Do that more days of the week than you don’t, and you’ll transform how you think, feel, and perform.
Consider how that 20-minute investment could impact you and the people and things in your life that are important to you.
More energy and focus, less brain fog and anxiety.
