How To Stay Active During The Winter Months

 As January comes to a close, you may be thinking of those New Year’s Resolutions you set at the beginning of the year and how sustainable they are. For many, trying to be more active in your day-to-day life is on the list of things to do this year. A big obstacle to overcome while staying active is finding motivation during the winter season. Those snowy and chilly days make it hard to want to go outside at all, let alone go outside to exercise, so here are three ways to help make staying active in the winter a bit easier: 

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Make Goals With A Partner

Enlisting the help of a workout buddy can help make staying active more exciting. It is easy to skip out on reaching your daily goals if you are on this journey alone, but having another person you are reaching these goals with will add a layer of accountability. Find someone that motivates you and makes going out in the snow worthwhile. It could be your work-best-friend and you go to the gym every day after work together, or it could be your neighbor and you take a long walk together in the mornings. Whoever it is and whatever you do, finding someone to make these activity goals with will have you looking forward to your workout plans. 

If you can’t meet up for every workout, use an app to connect with your fitness partner. Logging your workouts and stats can keep both of you motivated to continue exercising together and apart. If you are both competitive people, having a routine together can help keep you eager to reach your goals, especially on those solo days when you want to reach them first. A healthy competition with a workout partner is a great way to push you to reach your goals and keep each other accountable.

Create An At-Home Space

Not only does the snowy season impact your motivation to stay active, but the ongoing pandemic also takes a toll on your comfortability with working out in communal spaces. Creating a space at home for you to exercise safely and conveniently can help retain your motivation for working out all year long. Having a dedicated area, like a spare room, garage, or a place in your basement, can help you stay focused on your fitness goals regardless of the weather.

Dedicating an area to your own workout space can get pricey depending on what you want to do for exercise. Focusing on cardio or building muscle means having equipment like a treadmill or a set of weights, all of which can be expensive. Consider selling the furniture in the room you are transforming into your gym. That money you earn can buy the equipment you need. Selling that furniture will also help increase your motivation for working out in the room you specifically designed for your gym. Declutter any other dust collectors and items you no longer use to make some extra cash. If you are a homeowner, you may consider looking into how to refinance a mortgage to help put some money towards equipment for your fitness space. Finding ways to save gives you the opportunity to purchase the gym equipment that will help you stay excited about working out from home. However, not all plans work out perfectly. 

Have a Backup Plan

When creating a home gym is not an option for you, it’s time to get creative. If the roads are too snowy to hit your local gym, or your workout buddy isn’t available for your daily routine, getting inventive on how you can stay active can help you keep your momentum going. You can also find workout routines online that you can do from your home, with or without a home gym setup. By searching through thousands of home workouts, there is a good chance you will find some you like. 

Another way you can facilitate a workout without leaving your home is by making your chores an opportunity to exercise. In the winter, that can be especially easy to do on those snowy days you need to shovel. Shoveling is a great source of a cardio workout. You can even make doing your laundry a time for exercise by leaving a trail of the clothes you need to wash and making yourself go up and down the stairs to retrieve them until your washing machine is full. Adding extra steps to each of your chores that requires you to use your stairs or just gets you moving, in general, can be your workout on those lighter days. 

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There are many ways you can stay focused on your fitness goals even in the iciest of weather conditions. Finding what motivates you best will be the start to making exercise habits that can last a lifetime.