I'm busy, don't want to workout all the time but still want to stay in shape. How can I do that?

That's what this pillar will help you to answer. 

Along with understanding why you should always pay attention to your body in order to maximize your daily energy and productivity. 

The first place we need to start is with a massive pet peeve I have. It's when people come up to me and say the following...

"I don't have time to workout."

Honestly, I get it. We are all busy. We all have lots of things to do. I can see why people find it hard to make time to get into a fitness routine.

The mistake comes in thinking that going to the gym will take away our time from doing other tasks.

In reality though, working out will UPGRADE our ability to have more energy, confidence and focus in the hours we do work.  

This added focus and energy will allow us to get more done in the same amount of time then we could previously. 

The statement should then really become, "I don't have time to NOT workout."

Getting into the momentum of having a good fitness routine will keep your confidence and energy high almost all the time. The best part is, you don't need to actually spend that long to get good results too.

HOW FITNESS UPGRADES YOUR PRODUCTIVITY

Tim Ferriss wrote in his book, The Four Hour Body, about an occasion where a group of entrepreneurs were assembled on Richard Bransons private island to brainstorm growth options for his Virgin Unite project.

​Branson was asked the question, "how do you stay more productive"? He leaned back, thought about it, then said "work out."

Sounds awesome, but how does it work? Let's dive into it. 

Working out is one of the single greatest mood enhancers you can do. ​

I can be having the worst day. Maybe I'm low on energy, maybe I got rejected from a proposal, maybe I failed at something and am feeling low on confidence.

We all have these moments, but going to the gym and having an awesome workout immediately flips my mood around, almost without fail.  Why does that happen?

These two represent a pretty powerful one, two combo when they hit us.

The best way to get them is via exercise.

 When you're more confident and more focused, your less likely to procrastinate and less likely to let fear get in the way of you doing something. 

Working out once will release these temporarily, but working out routinely will have these firing all the time and keep us in a far more confident and productive state.

It's why fitness is a keystone habit of high performers and should be one of yours too.

Aside from so many other positive effects it has on us, it's a must to maintain our moods and energy in a highly elevated state. 

Almost every successful entrepreneur and startup founder I've ever talked to takes their fitness routine seriously for this exact reason. 

Tim Ferris's  book is an encyclopedia on this subject, check it out below if you have not. 

START EACH DAY WITH DYNAMIC STRETCHES

Even though we physically wake up in the morning, our bodies and muscles need a good jolt as they haven't really moved much in awhile. 

One of the first things you should do in the morning is a serious of dynamic stretches to give your body that kickstart.

It's also just a great way to alleviate day to day muscle soreness all together.

To make it easy on you, here is the exact routine I do each morning. Feel free to print it out to reference it when you can. (Link to a PDF copy is below). 

It hits basically every muscle group, only takes 10 minutes and makes a big difference towards your day ahead. When you feel tight and sore all day, everything just tends to suck more so lets avoid that.  

A WORKOUT ROUTINE FOR THE BUSY

I've been into the fitness world for years now.

Becoming a personal trainer, I've taught bootcamps, devoured books on the subject and been to a number of conferences. I've tried every type of workout there is, so let me tell you what works and what doesn't.

I used to be guilty of working out for hours upon hours each week. However when it comes to fitness, quality over quantity holds true so let's get into how to do it in the shortest amount of time while still getting great results.

You have just over ten thousand minutes given to you each week. 

If we take out about 3000 of those minutes for sleep (assuming 7-8 hours of sleep each night) you still have 7000 minutes left of which you can spend.

Can you spare 90 of those 7000 minutes?

That's all you really need if we do things properly.​

Remember our friends of BDNF and beta-endorphins above? Well, we can activate those in as little as 10 minutes, the key is to do a routine with HIGH intensity.

Your objective should be to get in, give the workout everything you got and then get out. 

The higher​ we can crank up the intensity of the effort we put in (while still being smart on our own limits), the greater the response in beta-endorphins as pictured above.  

Specific exercises are also known to give  a much higher hormone response as they call a greater demand from a wide variety of muscles when doing them.​

Doing heavy deadlifts or squats, or sprints is exhausting but we are rewarded for our efforts, in more then just a shrinking waist line and greater strength. 

Pulling from the list above, we could create a sample 90 minute workout routine for the week. ​

The idea is to show that by doing the right things, with the right intensity, it doesn't take a lot of time to get the effects we're looking for. 

I personally work out for 3 hours or 180 minutes each week as I can fit it into my routine.

However, if all you did was the 90 minute weekly workout above, you would be in far better shape than most and get the mental benefits to boost your productivity as well.