Fitness Advice for the Budget-Minded
For most people these days, fitness means spending a ton of money for gym memberships, fitness equipment and personal trainers. Thus, those who are on a budget easily give up when they think of the prohibitive cost of enrolling themselves in a workout program.
However, even experienced trainers will tell you that you don’t have to break the bank just to stay fit and healthy. It is possible to follow a fitness program without spending a fortune. And the variety of options to achieve this is endless. What’s important is that you gain a basic understanding of what fitness is really about and then tap the resources you have to formulate your own fitness regimen.
What exactly is fitness? In a nutshell, fitness is just about living without vices, doing regular exercise and eating a healthy and well-balanced diet.
People get sick because they drink alcohol excessively, take prohibited drugs and subject themselves to needless stress. Fitness entails sweating it out for at least thirty minutes of everyday. Best of all, fitness is eating more fruits and vegetables and shunning all sorts of fast food and processed junk.
Viewed from this perspective, it’s easy to see that fitness is not really cost-prohibitive. You only have to tap into your creative and resourceful side.
For starters, you can integrate working out into your everyday activities when you don’t have money to enroll in a gym or hire a personal trainer. Clean every room in the house, mow the lawn or walk to and from the office. Kids actually enable you to stay more active. You can always join in the rough and tumble fun with your little tots or arrange outings that involve lots of movement and fun like biking or swimming.
If your budget allows, invest in cheap but effective exercise equipment. Fitness aids to consider include jump ropes, resistance bands and exercise DVDs. Jump ropes are great for cardiovascular exercises while resistance bands allow you to perform strength training workouts at home. The plethora of exercise videos available in the market gives variety to your workout. If you can’t afford to buy new videos, call up friends and borrow or exchange old DVDs with them so you can add variety in your workout.
Check if a local recreation or community center in your area offers sports activities or workout classes. They usually give residents added perks in the form of discounted fees. If you are working for a big firm, ask around to see if there’s a company gym that employees can do exercises in.
Clean your diet and eat more whole foods. You’d be surprised at the amount of money you save by eating fruits and vegetables instead of all the processed food items you’re used to.
As a final reminder, take things easily. Learn to breathe and recoup when the pressures threaten to swallow you whole. Learn ways of managing your stress so that you don’t waste more money on hospitals, doctors or medicines.
Last but not least, don’t forget to look over our full P90X results and this article on the P90X drink.