I will be the first to shout it from the rooftops: I hate being active. Who else hates it?🙋♀️
Unfortunately, it is necessary. I’m all for the body-positivity and love-your-curves movements, and I’m not talking about that. I’m not promoting skinny as a cure-all body type for all people.
However, Barbie had this right: Activity must be included in your life.
The obvious way is to go to the gym. It’s good for breaking down fat and building muscle. If the athletic form is what you’re going for you and/or you get endorphin highs from mastering your newest challenge, go for it.
This is not me. Thankfully, there are other options for physical activity that are not the traditional “exercise”.
I’ve got a list of my favourite here for your perusing.
1. Play With the Dog (or Other People)
Anyone who has a dog knows. Dogs have this way to micromanage our lives to their benefit:
🐶 Out in the morning and before bed for bathroom breaks
🐶 Slobbery toys dropped into your lap while you’re busy with something else
🐶 Teeth penetrating into your fuzzy socks hoping to pull you to the floor to wrestle
And we fall for it. We take them out or hold onto one end of the toy or wrestle with them. We laugh at their ability to manipulate the situation so that the human is now giving them attention.
Well done, dogs.
But the fact is, that’s exercise. Especially if your dogs are mine’s size…
[picture]Even hanging onto one of the toys while either Fluke or Folly is pulling on it is a workout. Nevermind actually wrestling with them.
So, yeah. Getting on the floor and actually wrestling with them is a helluva workout.
Good thing is, the “exercise” doesn’t come from dog weight; it comes from their energy level. It’s likely you’ll have a much more intense workout with a Australian shepherd than a Great Pyrenees.
And if you don’t have a dog, find another friend who hates the gym.
2. Take a Walk Outside
As anyone who fully locked-down during COVID can tell you, walking can change the game. When you’re trapped inside all day, there’s nothing better than escaping the cement walls.
The same should hold true for any cubicle-trapped employee now. There’s nothing worse than staring at the same four walls all day long, especially if you don’t have a window to let in some natural light.
Indoor plants can help lower anxiety and promote productivity, but nothing outdoes fresh air.
So, take a walk.
It doesn’t have to be a long walk. You don’t even have to leave your property.
If you’re anything like me and need an accountability buddy, take a friend. Or your dog. (Your dog will 100% keep you accountable.)
3. Yard Work
By far the most intense non-gym exercise you can do is yard work. Anyone else try to pull kudzu out? Ha, good luck with that.
Even those calorie-counter apps understand. A bunch of them have “yard work” as an option under Daily Activities. An hour of yard work burns way too many calories to not be considered exercise.
And honestly, it’s kind of win-win. You end up with a curated yard and a fabulous, toned body to match!
4. Clean Your House
If it’s a hundred degrees outside (or just too damn cold to bother), do your “yard work” inside. Renovation housework can burn the same amount of calories as fighting with outdoor weeds. Tidying still makes you get up and move.
so, the inbetween action of cleaning, you’re definitely working your body. It’s direct, long-term activity of usually repetitive motion: bending over to pick up kids’ toys, back-and-forth pushing of the vacuum, crawling and reaching to scrub the floors.
Neither #3 nor #4 are fun to me in any way, but at least I get to claim I did exercise today. 🙂
5. Yoga
If you’ve never done yoga, you’re missing out. I know you’ve heard that before. But if you think it’s super easy, why aren’t you doing it? You can do the damn easy positions and skip the gym.
For those of us who know better, we understand full well why yoga is considered a substitution for the gym. Unless you’re working towards a goal or just enjoy exercise, you’re probably not doing both a full gym workout and a full yoga session in one day.
For me, yoga is more about stretching my tight muscles and building balancing strength. I mean, it’s basically replaced my childhood hippotherapy.
And don’t get me wrong, I miss the horses, but yoga is exercise I can do in my house without even getting out of pajamas. That’s a plus.
6. Stretch
And if you can’t bring yourself to accept any of these others as “workouts”, then you should just accept that your a gym-lover and call it a day.
That’s cool. You don’t have to replace the gym just because I say you can.
But on those days you can’t get out to the gym because you’re feeling ill or whatever, stretch.
Pull out that exercise mat and stretch. Trust me, it’ll feel amazing.
7. Play a Sport
I know—I’m sorry—this one’s a little like exercise, but I had to say it.
The good news is, sports don’t have to be football or basketball. Not all sports have balls to chase.
👉 Gymnastics requires high-energy tumbling and extreme balance control. (As someone who used to do it, this is nothing to sneeze at.)
Not all sports even require running.
👉 Horseback riding requires leg strength you wouldn’t believe. Climbing trees require general balance skills, but nothing’s like having an animal with a mind of its own underneath you.
👉 Some sports allow you to roll around on wheels, like skateboards or rollerblades. Some have blades under your feet instead, like figure-skating or hockey.
👉 At least one sport demands only that you jive to music. (A personal favourite.)
Organized sports require a certain love for the game. Sometimes you can find that love (and usually make a few friends along the way). I found it for a while, but I don’t have it anymore.
Now, I mostly avoid sports.
Overview
Ultimately, it’s about movement not exercise. So long as you do some kind of movement, you can check off that box on the to-do list.
I will be. 🙂
