Did you know that the average person sits for over eight and a half hours a day?

Sitting for too long disrupts your metabolism, can affect your mental wellbeing, backs up your bowls, can lead to varicose veins and is bad for your circulation.<

Truth!

The good news is, a few simple fitness hacks can make a big difference (and burn a bunch of extra calories in the process)! That’s right… a little extra movement throughout the day can burn up to 350 EXTRA calories per day.

Hack 1. Multitask

If you’re on a conference call or just chatting with a friend, march in place or walk and talk. Keep a pair of 3-pound or 5-pound weights at your desk and get in some arm moves between meetings. While you’re waiting to switch laundry, do squats. Cooking dinner? Grab a resistance band and do side-to-side shuffles or strength moves. Turn your idle time into toning time.

Hack 2. Breathe and squeeze.

While you’re in the car, standing in line or sitting at your desk, “breathe and squeeze”™! Exhale, relax your ab muscles and buttocks, then inhale deeply, pull in your ab muscles, squeeze your booty, and lift your pelvic floor, tighten and hold for 5 seconds. Exhale, release and relax. Do this 10-20x to strengthen your core, pelvic floor and glutes. No joke, isometric moves like these really work!

Hack 3. Start and end each day with 1 minute of movement!

This is by far our favorite and something we do Every. Single. Day. Simply choose an exercise, set a timer for 60 seconds and get your heart pumping, blood flowing and sweat going. Need some ideas? We’ve got an entire page dedicated to one-minute moves and an entire library of moves for you to choose from!

Hack 4. Get in more steps

Burn off extra calories by picking the parking spot furthest away from the store. While you walk in and out of the store, contract your core and practice those isometrics we were just chatting about.

Hack 5. Set a timer to walk (or stretch) it out every hour.

Force yourself up and out of your chair, or away from your desk periodically. Literally set a timer and get up and walk, march in place, do a few squats or stretch. It’s good for your mental wellbeing, your metabolism and your spinal health.

Fitting in small spurts of exercise can make a BIG difference.

We challenge you to add in these five fun fitness hacks this week. You’ll feel more energized, increase your metabolism, get your circulation flowing and strengthen and tone. You WILL see results!

If you don’t have a fitness plan in place, in addition to these “little extras,” there’s no better time to join our 28-Day Challenge or 12-Week Cycles than now, while it’s still fresh in your mind!

Let's make time for exercise — together!