How to Form an At Home Workout Routine

When people talk about working out it’s common to assume they mean at the gym. The gym is a great place for people to have all the workout amenities they need in one place. This doesn’t mean that all effective workouts have to take place in a gym. Many people have gym anxiety and don’t feel comfortable going to the gym. Some people have kids and can’t find time in the day to leave the house for an hour or more. Some people don’t want to pay an extra bill monthly for a gym membership. This is when you can take advantage of an at home workout plan. When people can’t make it to the gym it’s very common for them to decide not to workout at all. This can become an endless cycle of not working out because you can come up with excuses everyday why you can’t. I’ll explain how you can enhance your mind and body when you implement an at home workout routine into your life.

Create a Welcoming Workout Space

Working out at home can be a wonderful time and money saver, but it also has its challenges. The hardest part of at home workouts is finding the motivation to start the workout. When you’re at home it becomes very difficult to get up off the couch, move to a different room still in your house, and workout. It’s hard for our brains to differentiate when to switch over from doing tasks in the house to working out. One reason people go to the gym is because it’s a completely separate establishment from home or work. It’s much easier to turn our brains off and just focus on working out. You have to kind of trick your brain into focusing on working out when you’re at home. Whenever you walk into your designated workout room, or pull out your mat wherever works best for your house, that means it’s go time. You need to train your brain to stop all the noise of work and tasks that might be on your mind. When you’re ready to workout, that should be the only task on your mind. If you start to realize that you didn’t do the dishes or you’re worried about a big work presentation, that’s when your brain can trick you into thinking that you don’t have time to workout. Put exercise into your daily schedule to eliminate the guilt of taking a half hour to an hour to workout. Create a welcoming environment in which you enjoy going to. Creating a space that feels peaceful and separate from other worries in your life can help you feel excited for your at home workouts.

Start with a Workout Video

Working out at home can be fun, accessible, and save you time and money, but a lot of people don’t know where to start. The best way to ease yourself into working out at home is to start with an online workout video. There are tons of free workout resources that are available if you look for them. My favorite place to find free workout videos is YouTube. Just type in whatever workout you’re interested in trying such as pilates, weight lifting, HIIT, or anything else. You can type in beginner or advanced if you want to make a more clear distinction of what you’re looking for. There will be a lot of people trying to sell you their workout guides, but if you are not far along in your fitness journey just use workout videos to start out. Once you get used to specific movements and find what suits your body best, then venture out into guides that you are willing to pay for. Start out with easy to follow workout templates or videos that don’t force you to create a workout for yourself.

Find Your Favorite Type of Exercise

One of the biggest reasons people stop exercising regularly is because the type of exercise they’re performing is not bringing joy into their life. Working out is meant to be challenging, but when you’re finished there should be endorphins and serotonin that push you to keep going back. If you don’t know your favorite type of workout yet, then you should try one of each and narrow down your favorites. One person might love running, but another might dread it. One person might love LISS workouts, but another might not find them stimulating enough. Find the type of exercise that makes your mind and body happy and healthy, but don’t limit yourself either. Just because you found the type of exercise that you enjoy most doesn’t mean that you have to only perform that type of exercise. You can mix it up and toss in different types of exercise for each day because they all do something different for your body. Whatever keeps you motivated and excited to workout is the one that you should focus on. There is a reason that different forms of exercise were created, so get out there and find the one that’s right for you!

Slowly Increase the Difficulty

The best way to see progress with at home workouts is to perfect a specific type of exercise, then increase the level of difficulty. For example, if you do push-ups everyday, set a goal of a specific number of reps. Keep doing the same amount of pushups with the correct form for every workout until you feel like it’s becoming easier. At your next workout, raise the number of reps and keep hitting that same goal until it becomes easier again. You can keep raising the amount of reps you do or you can perform incline push-ups, decline push-ups, or a different type of push-up to make it more challenging every time. This creates a type of progressive overload that is important to build strength and endurance. This is also what will transform your body the most. If you are challenging yourself each workout to get better and keep setting new goals, then you will see massive changes in your physique. You can utilize this method in every type of exercise you do. Don’t be afraid of failing because that is how you get better. Don’t get upset because you couldn’t get back up after that last squat or push-up. Get up and try again in your next workout. If you are failing on some of your last reps, that just means that you are making progress in your fitness journey. Keep going wherever you are in your journey and keep making your exercises more challenging. Prove to yourself that you can smash fitness goals that you never dreamed of doing because you pushed yourself past what’s comfortable.

Creating an at home workout routine can be really tough at first. If you give it time and keep showing up each day to workout, then it will become a habit. It will take patience to try and stop your brain from pulling you away to do other tasks. Once you see and feel the benefits of working out, you will want to keep showing up to do it. Take advantage of your own home and create the workout space of your dreams with whatever room you have available. Your body will get used to working out in the space that you created specifically for it. Having an at home workout routine can enhance your life, so take advantage of free workouts and your own space.