Why You Don't Have Time to Exercise

This isn’t an article to make you feel bad for not exercising. That just isn’t my thing. This is an article explaining why you might have found it hard in the past to find time to exercise. And it may just uncover some deep-seated habits that have held influence over other, possibly least expected, areas of your life too.

"Regardless of how rich and successful, everyone has the same 24 hours in a day."

I look at those people like Richard Branson and Tony Robbins and I think, “How do they do it? How do they find time for everything in their life?” It’s not like they have any more hours in their day to me. Well maybe Tony does. He seems to be super-human. But how do they fit business, family, friends, functions, events and even philanthropic work into their busy day, and still have time to look after their health?

Of course they outsource. You simply couldn’t do what they do without outsourcing. They have massive companies comprising thousands of staff. But they didn’t always have such big companies. They started somewhere. They started with much less money than they have now. And chances are, they were just as busy, if not busier, back then to what they are now. Regardless of how rich and successful, everyone has the same 24 hours in a day.

How to Have Time to Exercise

• Schedule it
  If you want to make time to exercise, you absolutely MUST schedule it. There’s a common saying that, “What doesn’t get scheduled, often doesn’t get done”. It’s true! Scheduling is so important. If you don’t schedule exercise into your day, it’s far too easy to either forget about it or ignore it. However, when you put it in your calendar, it gives you some accountability. And it makes it so much more likely that you’ll do it.
  
  
• Prioritise it 
  When it comes time to exercise, and you see it on your schedule, you must prioritise it. You simply can’t ignore it. But how do you do that?
  
  
• Value it 
  How the heck do you just change your values? Well, first you need to define your values. I like to consider these core components (areas) of life:

Personal (Hobbies, intellect, spiritual)

Career

Family

Social

Finances

Health

(There’s different models with slight variations on the number or areas and modification on the areas, but this is what I use)

Now:

1. Work out how you spend your time.
   Write down everything you do on a typical weekly basis. Categorise each activity into one of these 6 areas. Add up the hours and establish how many hours you are spending on each area.
2. Create your ideal schedule.
   Work out exactly how you would like to spend your week. If left to your own devices and money was of no concern, how would you spend your time. Again, categorise the activities and add up how many hours you would spend on each area.
3. Where does health fit on your first schedule (your actual schedule)? 
   If it’s in the bottom three, you’ve got a pretty clear idea as to why you may be finding it hard to find time.

   But more importantly…

4. Where does it fit on your ideal schedule? 
   If it’s in the bottom three for this one, you’ve got an even clearer picture as to why you find it so hard to find time. You’ll have an understanding now for why you may always forget about it or ignore it, even when you do get it on your actual schedule.

So what can you do?

My latest course, How to “Stay on Track”, is part of my $12 Mind Your Body membership and takes you through this process step-by-step and then teaches you systematically how push health up to a higher value.  After doing this, you'll find you have the time to exercise, achieve your goals, and live with more energy.

Follow this link to sign up today.  

Question: What gets in your way of exercise? Is it lack of time? Is it something else? What would make you want to exercise? Leave your questions and comments in the discussion section below.

[Image source: Armando Lungu]