To be very honest up until recently I never heard of this before. Basically it’s doing 5-10 minutes of exercise throughout the day. Oh, you can do a more general workout say for 30-45 minutes for sure. But often after these long workouts we tend to revel in the fact that our workout is done for the day and rest on our laurels.
My 5 minutes in the morning starts with a short stretch and then 50 air squats and 20 pushups off of the back of the footboard of my bed. Research supports the fact that these 5-10 minutes of exercise throughout the day lowers blood sugar and helps fight against obesity. I would say from experience that it does. Now, why do this? It creates the habit and when done consistently you will always be aware of the fact that even if you did nothing else you did a few minutes of structured exercise for the day. There is something called NEAT. This stands for Non Exercise Activity Thermogenics. That is the amount of calories you burn justmoving. So the obvious point is you will burn more calories when you have opportunities to walk more or do a few squats during the day It’s all about consistency and the ability to sustain something. You may decide that exercise is better for you in the morning and begin to schedule an exercise routine that you can stick to. I know folks who have tried to exercise for an hour 3-4 days a week. They discovered that this wasn’t
sustainable and abandoned the program.
Get Your Copy Of Functional Fitness
By exercising a few minutes in the morning, at lunch hour, and then later in the day you can get 30 minutes of exercise (remember I am talking about 50 squats and 20 pushups which you can do off of a desk). Do a little bit more walking and you will lower your blood sugar and burn a bit more fat than if you remained sedentary. By the way if you find yourself sitting for more than one hour at a time set a timer for yourself or invest in a watch with a timer and one that counts your steps to give you reminders on when it’s time to start moving. It all starts with that morning mindset. Get up and get moving. This becomes more important with age because as you age you should be looking for the biggest bang for your buck; the least amount of exercise which nets the greatest benefit.