The Best Way to Get Fit Quickly and Easily!
What’s the best way to get fit? To lose weight? To build muscle?
The short answer: whatever you like best.
The long answer: follows. I was having a chat with a friend of mine about my yoga challenge, how it fits in to my overall weight loss goal. We talked about the idea of how best to lose weight and he launched into some stats and scientific ideas about fat burning, reserves, cardio and whatnot. He said if I wanted to lose weight I should be at the gym and running regularly. We talked about the bang for the buck of time weight lifting or running versus time spent at yoga. And he’s right about all that. I would definitely get more bang for my buck by running or going to the gym. I’d lose weight faster if I invested the same amount of time in gym/running as I did at yoga.
So what’s the problem? I knew all this already, so why am I going to yoga and not using my time efficiently? There’s a key factor in what I’ve said earlier, and that’s the idea of time spent doing an activity. How likely are you to do something if you don’t like it, especially if it’s less than pleasant? Yoga I can motivate myself to do three times a week fairly easily. Gym and running? Not so much. If they were my chosen activities odds are I would be going only once a week, maybe twice, and then I’d be losing weight at an even slower rate.
The thing most people won’t tell you is, there may be absolutely nothing that perfectly fits the bill. It may be there’s nothing that really gets you pumped, as is true for me. I like yoga but I don’t absolutely love it, and most days I would rather lie back, watch some TV and relax. There is not a single physical activity I’d choose, if not for the health benefits, over relaxing. But yoga motivates me by being somewhat social, by the fact that I have a great studio nearby where I’ve built connections, and by the spiritual and meditative nature of it. If you give me the choice I will always choose relaxing over activity. But if you give me the choice of health and yoga or obesity and relaxing, I’ll choose yoga, every time.
Well, most every time.
What’s your activity?
