In my fitness consulting business, I get the opportunity to talk with
people from all walks of life about their health, fitness, and weight
loss goals. Whether their goal is to lose weight, gain muscle, stick
to a diet plan or program, improve their cardiovascular health, or
simply to maintain their current fitness level they all have one
common enemy---TIME.
For most of us, the #1 challenge in the quest to stay in shape and/or
lose weight is not exercising itself but being able to actually fit an
exercise program into our busy schedules.
So how do you do it? How do you balance the demands of family, career,
important errands, relationships, organizational responsibilities, and
working out? I have found that there are five keys that will help you
to be able to fit a consistent workout plan into your already hectic
life.




Commit to a specific schedule

When you fail to plan you plan to fail. Don't try to haphazardly fit
your workouts into your schedule without any rhyme or reason. Don't
think you're guilty? If you've ever told yourself "I'll workout as
soon as I get some time", you were in direct violation of this key
principle.
In order to set yourself up for success, you will need to take the
time to literally write your workouts into your weekly schedule. In
order to be effective, you will want to be following your exercise
program at least 3 days per week. Anything less would be kidding
yourself.
Therefore, right in the midst of all of your appointments, "to-do"
lists, etc., should be a written plan for your weekly workout routine,
so that you will never be in the dark as to when you committed to
yourself to go.

Utilize the weekend

Take advantage of the fact that it only takes 3-5 days per week to put
together an effective, results-producing workout. One trick to help
you pull it all off is to workout on the weekends. One of the benefits
to this course of action is that your schedule is more flexible and
under your control during this time.
What is also means is that when the hectic weekdays roll back around,
you will only be responsible for working out 1-3 days during the work
week.

Keep your workouts as a high priority

One of the biggest mistakes that even many people who have scheduled a
workout program into their schedule make is allowing it to be bumped
off of their schedule to easily.
Although things will occassionally come up that will cause you to have
to reschedule the workout you had planned, you must be vigilant in
making sure that only the most important emergencies are allowed to
temporarily take you off of your plan.
In the event that one of those important emergencies does happen and
you can't make it to your workout, reschedule with yourself to make it
up on the next possible day that you are available to do so. If your
own health, fitness, and efforts to lose weight are not a priority to
you, they certainly won't be so to anyone else.

Enroll others in your goals

Don't go at this alone. Let the important people in your life know
what you are up to. Your spouse or love interest, parents, children,
co-workers, and close friends will often pitch in and help you to meet
your fitness or weight loss commitment to yourself if you make them
aware and ask for their support.
Leverage these relationships to delegate some of your normal
responsibilities or even allow you to shift appointments that you have
with them as you restructure your schedule for your workout. If any of
them are into exercise or trying to lose weight themselves, don't
hesitate to form a buddy system with them as you move forward with
your program.

Don't beat yourself up

No matter who you are, there will be times in your workout program
that you just aren't able to keep it up as you would like due to
outside demands. Don't be too tough on yourself when that happens.
Remember that it is what you do consistently over a long period of
time, not what you do in spurts, that truly counts. Just make sure
that you get back on the horse full force as soon as you can and
continue to press forward, doing your best to avoid slacking off
again.


No matter what goals you have for health, fitness, or weight loss, you
CAN fit an effective exercise program into that hectic schedule of
yours and be amazingly successful at getting the exact results that
you want!
To Your Best Body,
Lawrence ColeYour Lifestyle and Fitness CoachYourbestbodyNOW.com
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