Post written by Leo Babauta. Follow me on Twitter.
A couple of 5th graders named Michelle and Casen recently asked me:
What advice would you give us when we know we should exercise, but we just don’t feel up for it?
My answer to them is what I’d tell anyone, child or adult:
Don’t look at it as exercise — instead, play games and sports and have a ton of fun! The main thing is just to get outside every day and do something you think is fun. You can play sports like soccer, basketball, baseball, or badminton. You can play games like freeze tag or ride a bike or do running races with your friends or family. You can go on hikes with your family or go swimming or paddling. Do lots of different things, and again, focus on having fun, and doing it often.
Michelle and Casen’s class, which has created the excellent Kids Read and Ride program, took this advice to heart and came up with 48 Fun Ways to Exercise. This is a good list for anyone:
- Aerobics
- Ballet
- Baseball
- Basketball
- Biking
- Boating
- Bowling
- Boxing
- Canoeing
- Dance Revolution
- Dancing
- Double Dutch
- Field Hockey
- Football
- Frisbee
- Golf
- Gymnastics
- Hiking
- Hockey
- Hopscotch
- Horseback Riding
- Hula hooping
- Ice Skating
- Jogging
- Juggling
- Jump rope
- Laser tag
- Paintball
- Ping-Pong
- Playing catch
- Rock Climbing
- Roller Blading
- Roller Skating
- Running
- Skateboarding
- Skiing
- Soccer
- Softball
- Swimming
- Tae Kwon Do
- Tennis
- Trampoline
- Treadmill
- Unicycling
- Volleyball
- Walking
- Weightlifting
- Wii sports games
My recommendation is to choose one of these activities, most days of the week (4-5 days perhaps). If you go out, have fun, enjoy the activity, it won’t feel like “exercise” … but you’ll be getting fit and healthy in the meantime.
Make the workout the reward.