How to exercise during the work day

In an office from 9 to 5? You can still exercise — maybe even with your manager’s blessing!

Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Good morning. This is Laura. Welcome to the Before Breakfast podcast.
Today's tip is about how to find time to exercise
during the work day. Lots of people want to exercise more.
We know it would be good for our health and
for our energy. Some people exercise before work or after work,
and both of these are great options. But sometimes family

(00:23):
or community commitments make this challenging. Or sometimes people know
they can only get to the gym one evening or
morning a week and they want to add more physical
activity to their lives. So I hear this question a lot.
Is it possible to exercise during the work day. I
think it is, even if you work in a normal
office from nine to five. You just need to get

(00:44):
a little creative about your time and about how you exercise.
The first thing to change is your definition of exercise.
You do not have to change into workout clothes. You
do not need to sweat hard enough to require a shower,
You do not need a full hour. Any physical activity
is better than nothing, and the easiest thing to do

(01:05):
is walk. If you can take thirty minutes for lunch,
bring your lunch three days a week and spend twenty
minutes of your break walking outside I'm also a big
fan of the walking meeting. A lot of one on
one meetings could be taken on a walking path or
a sidewalk near your office. Yes, you'll need to walk
slowly enough to converse, and you also need to warn
people at least a day ahead of time so they

(01:26):
know to bring comfortable shoes, but this is a great
way to build extra activity into your life. Just as
a side note, I think it's easier to have challenging
conversations while walking than if you're staring at the person
across the conference room table. You can also sneak in
strength training during bits of downtime. Keep a kettlebell or
some resistance bands at your desk and do some bicep

(01:48):
curls in between phone calls. If you've got an office door,
you might close it and do a few push ups
or plank poses. If you've got a little bit of
flexibility in your job and access to changing facilities, then
a lot more possibilities open up. If you can take
a thirty minute lunch break five days a week, that
adds up to a hundred fifty minutes, So maybe your

(02:10):
boss would let you take forty minutes on three days
and fifteen minutes on two. That also adds up to
a hundred fifty minutes. With forty minutes, you could spend
five minutes changing, twenty five minutes running, and then ten
minutes making yourself presentable again. That could mean renting off
if there's a shower, using a shower cap if you
have long hair so it doesn't get wet, or just

(02:32):
using some wipes at a little towel. Maybe you don't
do this on the day you're presenting to the CEO
in the afternoon, but on a normal Tuesday it could
be fine. Or maybe you take those hundred fifty minutes
and to sixty minute chunks and three ten minute chunks.
In sixty minutes, you could take a forty five minute
class at a gym next door and still make it
back for your next call, although it's possible you might

(02:54):
have to dial in from the elevator. You could also
just take one long lunch during the week, say sixty
to seventy minutes, and planned to stay a little later
or come a little earlier that day. If you combine
that with a few walking meetings and working out on
each of the weekend days, you'd still be getting way
more physical activity than the average person, or you could

(03:15):
just decide to be bold. People sometimes tell me, you know,
I'm not the kind of person who can just leave
for an hour at lunch every day to exercise. But
once a lady told me that she had decided to
become the kind of person who could leave for an
hour every day at lunch to exercise. She decided that
she had built up enough career capital to start going
to this fifty minute boot camp at one pm at

(03:35):
a gym next door to her office about four days
per week, so technically she was gone from her desk
a lot more than before. But she said, you know what,
I had my best year ever. She returned from boot
camp with enough energy to focus for the afternoon. She
was in better shape, and her company was getting better

(03:56):
work out of her. I call that win win. If
you exercise during the work day, I'd love to hear
how you make it work. You can email me at
Before Breakfast Podcast at iHeart media dot com, or let
me know on social media at Before Breakfast Pod. That's
b E the number four Breakfast p o D. In

(04:18):
the meantime, this is Laura. Thanks for listening, and here's
to making the most of our time,