Time hacks for fitness

Is it me or is life getting busier these days?  What with juggling to fit in work, cooking, shopping, doing activities with the kids or school runs, it’s getting harder and harder to fit in workouts or eat healthy.  With some planning and prepping, it can be achievable to keep healthy in your life – here are my top tips on how:

1.  Plan and prep food for a few days.  Know what you need to buy at the supermarket – go with a list.  This will make your shopping quicker as you know what you want plus help keep you on the healthier aisles!  Cook in bulk when you do have the time and divide into portions to be eaten within the next few days or frozen for a later time.  This is great for single people! Dinner left overs also make great lunches the next day!

2.  Have a few go to quick recipes that are not time consuming to make – basically you can whip them up in no time.  Eggs are super quick and probably always in stock in the household.

3.  Prepare salads – they last a few days in air-tight containers without anything mushy on them.  Tomatoes can be added in the morning of eating and add dressing when ready to eat.

4.  Have a couple of delivery places on speed dial with your go to healthy meal!  There are a couple of places I eat at regularly if I haven’t cooked or want to catch up with a friend and I know exactly what I will eat – usually chicken of some sort (tikka or teriyaki) with salad, veg or hummus.  As everything seems to take an hour for delivery in Bahrain – order on your way home or before a gym session so it’s ready to pick up or delivered when you are!

5.  When it comes to exercise – super long sessions are not that time efficient anyways.  Who has time to spend 2 hours at the gym?!  Short workouts can be effective and lots can be done at home.  Mix them up, focus on great technique and get into a habit – maybe before your day starts.  Or even 15 minutes in the morning and 15 minutes later on.

6.  Try to incorporate more movement during your day – this can be simple things like parking further away from the shops (well if indoors in the Middle Eastern temperatures!), using the stairs rather than the lift – especially if just a couple of floors.  If at work, maybe go see a work colleague rather than calling them or try to walk around the office every hour or so.  You can also incorporate some great stretches into your day whilst sitting down to help with crappy posture we all seem to be getting these days from sitting down too much!  It will also help take some strain from the neck and upper back also and relieve any stress.

Try and give these a go – its all about the planning and a bit of prep to help keep you on track.  If still needing a little extra motivation or some simple recipes or short workout ideas you can do at home, sign up for my Summer shape up bootcamp starting 1^st September.  This is a 4 week online camp with 5 workouts a week, meal ideas and lots of motivation to keep you on track with a group of like minded people.