Let’s talk about how you can have a great, no equipment, small room friendly, fitness/wellness experience, every single time you try to… this will either be liberating you to work on your fitness no matter where you are and regardless of how much time you have- or it will freak you out as a wellness business owner (who honestly, needs this knowledge to pivot and thrive in the new normal).
So either way… read on! You may learn what you lack and where you’re strong enough to take on the hype and copycats yet again. I truly do believe in you!
So my background has always been in health, beauty, fitness, and wellness. As a fitness coach, I’ve worked for over 18 years in the training environment, boutique fitness environment, where I teach everything from barre, pilates, yoga, cycle. You name it, I’ve either taught it or still I’m very active in that fitness community. For me, I wanted to share this because I think there’s a lot of misperceptions out there about how to have a great workout experience at home. And since so many people are working out at home more than ever before, I thought I’d break down three ways to always ensure you have a great experience.
Improve the experience and outcomes
The first is to use intensity instead of just time as your guide. A lot of times meeting people and staying pretty active myself and still working in those industries, I hear folks always talking about duration of workout. And I’ve got to tell you, it’s probably one of the least important aspects of your workout. There is science to back this up, but there’s also clear like no nonsense understanding from the fitness community, from the training community that tells you that intensity is more important than time. So that means you don’t have to have 60 minutes to get a great workout in on a regular basis, and that’s great news for you more than likely. You can do an intense 20 to 30 minute exercise and really get the benefits that you’re looking for more times than not. Now, that doesn’t mean if you have a little extra time that it wouldn’t be great to be able to look at the different parts of your body that you want to work on, or different goals that you want to attain and put that time towards it.
It just means that consistency and intensity are more important than doing something that may be too tough or burns you out, or just doesn’t feel good to get the result that you want. You can still achieve that. The second aspect of your fitness life that probably needs to be enhanced is that you do a full body workout every single time. If you identify with wanting to be leaner and tone and not necessarily have any specific body part goals, this should resonate with you. It’s important that since we use our body, our entire body, every single day, all day… it’s more important and functional is multiple body parts at the same time, that’s called compound movements, than it is for you to simply go crazy on arm day, and leg day, and core day, and everything else. It’s not as functional. It wastes a lot of your time. And frankly it leads a lot to injury and overuse because really your body doesn’t work like that, right?Your arm is not in a vacuum, and so it doesn’t actually give you the level up or the results you want.
Look, if you’re a body builder or looking to do that, kind of strength training, I’m not against it wholly. I just believe that if you’re looking to have the best, no equipment, low impact, apartment friendly, general average, everyday girl workout, that is not the thing you need to focus on. You need to get something in consistently. You need to love it, and it needs to be appropriate and intensity. And now you know, it’s got to work the entire body. So the last aspect of this is that I really believe the best workout is the one you’ll do most often. The one that you’ll push yourself a little bit more in and frankly the one you’ll enjoy the most.
Consistency + intensity = The best mix
So again, I’ve worked in this industry for so long, I’ve exercised so many hours of my life. And I can tell you that there are exercises and things that I’ve done that I know may be great for my goal, when I had one, and it’s just not enough to help me to stick with it, enough to get the results I’m looking for. People who know my skillset would often ask me, “What’s the best workout,” or, “I’ve heard insert workout here is amazing. What do you think? What should I be doing to fix this and make this better,” and all that weird stuff. And actually the response I give is consistently this, and it’s consistently underwhelming for most people and it’s that you must love what you’re doing. That means you can cross train it. It means you can try different disciplines. I don’t believe because you love yoga that you have to only be a yogi.
I think it’s important that you cross train and try different things, that you practice a little bit of muscle confusion, which means you don’t just do the same thing all the time. You mix it up and I believe it makes you more well rounded. It makes your body more adaptable and helps you to reach your fitness goals a lot faster. So those three things should help you to figure out what workout is best for you. Should you play that next on-demand video? Should you get your butt into some sort of in-person environment, if that’s available to you, and everything in between. But I think if you keep it to those three very simple ways to enjoy to intensify and honestly, to complete your workout on a regular basis, I think you’re going to love the you that you are and that you look like. Let’s talk more, soon!
xoxo KK
Without hard work, almost nothing really comes to fruition… success is no accident. Be intentional and do what you can, now! KK FIT TIP #1139