Training During The Holidays

As many of you know this time of year is full of holiday events, family dinners, and lots of shopping. For many students, myself included, December is a crunch time to get things done as the semester comes to a close.

For that reason I have spent less time writing (and training) and more time studying for exams and laboratory assignments, hence my hiatus from blog posts. I've decided to set a few minutes aside to have a conversation with you. For me, I must shift my training from having a great deal of volume in my workouts (many exercises, sets, and reps), to a modified maintenance program which includes the core exercises for strength (squat, bench press, deadlift, rows, and shoulder press).

Although during this time my workouts are generally only 30 minutes in duration, it is better than putting it off completely. If all you have is 10 minutes to exercise in a day, then exercise for 10 minutes! Maintaining the habit of exercise is extremely beneficial, for when we have a little more time do dedicate toward training, our subconscious has already attributed an appointed time dedicated for training. It takes much less effort to will yourself to train and work toward your goals because those habits have already been integrated with your psychology.

An interesting statistic: we have 168 hours in a 7-day week.

112 hours we spend awake. Assuming we sleep 8-hrs, so this could be more.

Subtracting 40 hours on average for work we are left with 72 hours of free time.

Mind that this includes weekends: 72/7=10.3 hours per day of free time (ON AVERAGE). For most individuals who work a 9-5 this is more like 8 hours during the week, and 16 on the weekends.

Every day we should experience some sort of planned exercise, some form of an elevated heart rate in one way or another. I'm not saying go through a high intensity workout 7-days a week, but even on rest days go for a walk or do something low intensity that still elevates your heart rate.

If we spend 30 minutes per day (3.5 hours/ week) exercising, which is still greater than the current recommendation (2.5 hours/ week) for exercise: we would spend less than 5% of our FREE time exercising. That is such a small amount of time comparatively speaking.

Examining physical activity from this perspective makes it easy for me to spend a few minutes training, even when life seems to accumulate and make me feel pressured. Take the time out of your day to improve yourself, after all it's only 5%.