This is me at Christmas with my son, who was six months at the time. The first year you have a baby, you don’t have a lot of time, money, and sleep. Even though I could technically afford a gym membership (we have one in our area that is $10 per month), I truly did not have the time. I already worked full-time as a teacher and didn’t want my son in daycare in the evenings too, or getting to spend even less time with me. I opted to exercise at home with my son, and if I can do it, anyone can do it!
Check out our post on How to Lose Weight for Free too! These basic principals and freebies are how I lost all of my baby weight.
These tips for exercising on a budget are going to help you to stop making excuses for not getting fit. Exercise really isn’t an expensive habit to form. Not when you set your mind to it, and learn ways to get fit without an expensive personal trainer or gym membership.
Tips For Exercising On A Budget
Stream workout videos. One of the cheapest ways to begin exercising on a budget is to use your streaming programs or Youtube to download videos to workout with. Hulu, Netflix and Amazon Prime all offer various workout videos for you to view and use. These can fit easily into your budget as well as your lifestyle.
Get outside with your family. One of the best cheap ways to exercise is to get outside with your family and just play. Whether you are playing soccer together, riding bicycles, going to the park or going for walks around the neighborhood this is a dual purpose way to exercise on a budget. It also sets a great example for your children to include exercise in their daily life.
There are also some wonderful apps and websites that are free to use when you exercise. Check out our Top 10 Health & Fitness apps. Map My Run is by far my favorite app and I love Spark People (which also has an app) for the accountability.
Use your body weight for resistance. If you don’t have the money to invest in free weights for strength training, you can begin with your own body weight. Squats, lunges, calf lifts and even bicep curls can all be done without weights and using your own body weight as resistance. They may not be as much weight as you need for highly toned muscles but they are a great place to begin. Using your own body weight will help.
Stop making excuses. If you say you don’t have time to exercise you are just making an invalid excuse. Instead of letting your body go to the point you will fall ill, have back injuries or chronic pain later on – stop and make the time now. From a simple 10 minute walk twice a day, to an hour 3-5 times a week you can gradually begin including exercise in your routine. Stop making excuses.
We also purchased exercise equipment in the past, and do have our treadmill, elliptical machine, and weight lift gym. However, you can often find equipment like this in local yard sale groups and at local yard sales!
Exercising on a budget is all about utilizing what you have at home already at your fingertips. Avoid the excuses and set your mind on your ultimate health goals. Use your home, the family hobbies like bicycling or soccer and thing like your own streaming programs to get your exercise in with ease. Getting fit does not mean you have to spend hundreds of dollars a year on a gym membership or fancy equipment. It simply means you have to focus and get started.
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