Health Care

By Caroline Radway

At the beginning of any fat loss programme, many people come to me feeling unfit and overweight but also low on energy and stressed. Exercise will increase your energy levels and reduce your stress levels, but at this very point in time, when you most need to reduce stress levels, the idea of taking on more tasks can seem daunting and likely only to increase stress levels further - it can become a catch 22, as you feel too stressed to fit everything in.

So how do you deal with this catch 22 situation? How do you make sure that adding an extra time commitment into your already busy life doesn't increase your stress levels even further?

Firstly, you need to take some time out of your busy life, and assess where you are and where you are going. Goal setting and analysing what you want from life as a whole can often make us see life from a slightly different perspective. A lot of the things we are busy doing are not the ones that we really want to be focusing on, or the things that are most important to us. It is this that makes us stressed - that nagging feeling that we are really busy, but not managing to do the important things.

You need to make the commitment to becoming healthier and remind yourself what the results will be - it's not purely about aesthetics and looking good, but it really is about being healthier and more energised. You need to prioritise your health in order to effectively deal with all that life throws at you and remind yourself that once you have made the time to fit in exercise, you will have more energy and be able to achieve more throughout the rest of the day.

Until your health and fitness is high enough on your priority list you will always find other things that get in the way. When you have fully accepted its importance you can then set about making time - as this is the key, time is not something that is just found!

Once you have acknowledged that you are going to make health and fitness a priority it is time to look into how you can create space in your life to fit it in. Are there things cluttering up your life? Are they all really that important? Could you spend 30 minutes less time on the internet or watching TV in the evenings and use that time to squeeze in a training session? Can you delegate certain tasks? We often feel that 'to get a job done properly I might as well do it myself' but sometimes we need to let it go, allow someone else to 'learn' to do it for us! It may not be perfect, but it will free you up some time!

Consciously looking at the way we respond to stressful situations can make a huge difference, too. Are you stressed because you are in a rush, or rushed because you are stressing? I practice a lot of yoga, and often have to remind myself when in traffic between clients that while a few good deep breaths won't make the traffic move any faster, or get me there any quicker, it certainly will make me calmer and the journey more enjoyable - I can't change the time I arrive by being stressed, but I can change the way I feel when I arrive!

Another important element is matching your exercise intensity to how you feel on a particular day. If you are truly frazzled, then a really intense session may just wear you out even further, so choose exercises that are more energising, or perform a strength training session with plenty of rest between sets, rather than an intense circuit style approach. There are days when I know that I need yoga, rather than anything else, in which case that is what I will do. My body and mind thanks me for it and I ensure I am ready and raring to go for my next intense training session.

This is not an excuse to slack off just because you can't be bothered, mind you, and you will often find that once you get started your energy levels increase! Just get started with your warm up and have a plan, but be prepared to alter it slightly if need be.

On the subject of recovery, you must make sure you get enough. With the correct training plan, you do not need to exercise for hours every day to get results. You are far better off training intensely for 3 hour long sessions a week (or 4-6 shorter sessions) than training for hours on end at a mind-numbingly boring level. This is perfect for the busy person in today's hectic world as you can rest and recover, safe in the knowledge that you are actually increasing the efficacy of your programme by recovering properly.

Exercise is a vital tool for reducing stress and increasing energy, so it is worth making the time to fit it in. You will soon wonder how you coped without it!

Caroline is a Personal Trainer, Yoga Teacher and Kettlebell Instructor based in the UK.

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