No time to work out? Why the ‘good enough’ method works so well

I now know better. There were three things that changed my mind.

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The first was necessity.

I have a seven-year-old and a five-year-old. When they were born, I’d have been grateful for 15 or 20 minutes to exercise.

If I was going to stay sane and maintain some semblance of health and fitness, I quickly realised that I’d have to change my perception of what was worthwhile.

The second was knowledge.

I’ve been writing about health and fitness at The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age for about 14 years now. During that time, a body of research has emerged challenging the idea that physical activity has to be long – or structured – to be effective.

Some of the findings that stood out to me were:

• The idea of exercise snacks where we could get bang for buck with just a few minutes of intense exercise. Earlier this year a study found that about five minutes of vigorous intensity, incidental activity every day related to a reduced risk of a serious heart event or death by as much as 38 per cent.
  
• The understanding that exercise, in any way, shape or form, is integral to mood, mental health and good sleep.
• The knowledge that sitting all day every day is damaging, and is not offset by getting a “proper” workout in.
• And then the appreciation that there is value in incidental activity, and that there is an incremental benefit. Even if we can’t do structured exercise, all the bits of movement we do throughout the day add up. Especially if we incorporate a little huffing and puffing.

And what helped me to overcome the guilt of taking a lunch break on work days to go for a walk or to exercise was research finding that exercise improves our cognitive function at work, including attention, working memory and problem-solving.

There are also studies that show acute bursts of vigorous activity lower the markers of stress – things like blood pressure, cortisol levels, heart rate – and enable us to cope better with external stressors.

The final change for me was applying these findings. I made small shifts to my routine.

In practice, it looks a little like this:

• I do about 10 or 15 minutes of yoga when I wake up to stretch out and move my body.
• I get out for fresh air every day. When I’m at home, if I can’t get out for a 30-minute run, I’ll sprint up a nearby hill or a flight of stairs a couple of times – done and dusted in less than 15 minutes. When I can, I walk to pick up my kids from school.

• At work, I get up from my desk regularly to make a cup of tea or refill my water (I’ve taken to using a smaller glass, so I have to get up more regularly to refill it), I try to go for a walk at lunch and, on my way home, I often choose a bus stop that is further away to walk to.
• I regularly practise mindful breathing while I’m sitting at my desk, and take moments to stand up and look up from my computer.
• I still aim for longer workouts at the weekend and one or two days during the week, but on the days I can’t, I still get the instant mood lift from movement and I know that my brain fires better when I take regular short breaks. In fact, I find that taking a break creates the space for ideas to crystallise. I often don’t write articles at my desk but in my head while I’m walking.

I’ve learnt that my brain will take breaks even if my body doesn’t and by 2 or 3pm my brain starts to feel foggy, and I’m there, but not there, for the rest of the day.

Of course, there are days when none of this happens, so instead of perfect or even “just right”, I aim for “good enough”. And good enough takes some of the pressure off so that it becomes more of a pleasure than an obligation.

So even if we don’t always get it just right, my take home for good enough is that every moment of movement counts.

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