How to Stay Motivated and Keep Active Past Your New Year’s Resolution

How to Stay Motivated and Keep Active Past Your New Year’s Resolution

Posted by Human Solution on Dec 31st 2013

The New Year is upon us! What will you do to welcome in 2014 and wish 2013 farewell?

I’ve planned to get back into running, and training for a couple 5k runs and the eventual Beach to Bay Marathon Relay in Corpus Christi (the largest relay marathon in the United States, because Everything's Bigger in Texas) in May that I’ve got planned with a team of friends. Well, speaking of May, I plan to ramp all that up as the weather warms up, but that shouldn’t be too long here in Austin. Heck, it could be 70 degrees outside tomorrow! In Texas, you never know what to expect.

In the meantime, I’ve got a plan to get active and stay fit inside the confines of my warm office. If it isn’t already evident, I tend to lean on the lazy side in the winter, as I imagine many people do as well. I’ve already had a treadmill desk for quite some time now, but maybe you just got one for Christmas or your company was able to splurge and spend the remaining end of year budget money. Sometimes, motivation to stay active is tough to come by. Just having the treadmill desk doesn’t ensure that I will be using it.

Here are a few things that I do to mitigate that:

Get rid of the clutter. A messy desk is just one more obstacle between you and your treadmill. I think of it like a car. If your car is nice, shiny and clean, you can be proud to drive it and show it off. The same goes for a treadmill desk. Keep your desk looking nice and your desk will do the same for you!

Bring your shoes to work. It isn’t recommended to walk on your treadmill in your loafers, nice dress shoes or boots. In fact, there are many things wrong with that. It can hurt your feet for one, but also hurt your co-workers’ ears. Shoes that aren’t meant for walking or athletics are too loud on the treadmill and will not help maintain proper care of the treadmill belt.

Bring an extra pair of tennis shoes to work and leave them. Then, you won’t have the excuse that you forgot your shoes or your feet hurt and just looking at them should serve as a visual reminder to put them to use!

Be competitive with yourself. I am a highly competitive person, even with myself. It helps to keep me motivated. When I go for a run today, I want to have run faster or longer than I did yesterday. When I go for a run tomorrow, I want to best my efforts from today. You get the picture. I like to carry this on with me to work and my treadmill desk.

The control panel on the LifeSpan Treadmills we sell keep track of your Time, Steps, Calories Burned, Distance and Speed when in use. The included software can log your daily usage as well and let you know just what to beat the next time you step on the treadmill.

We’ve also previously blogged about using our treadmill desks as the perfect pre/post workout routine. Whether you run or walk during your lunch break or like to take off for a jog as soon as you are off work, a treadmill desk is a great warm-up or cool-down routine. I’ve also found that walking on my treadmill desk the day after a big workout really helps to loosen up my muscles and reduce soreness.

See how else you can stay active and ergonomic in the office by visiting us at TheHumanSolution.com!

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