How to Encourage a More Active Lifestyle for Your Family
After spending much of 2020 indoors, it’s only natural for you to want to make the most of the coming year by spending it outdoors and being a little more active.
Whether it’s in the backyard, going on hikes or spending some time out on the water, there are a tonne of ways to encourage your family to be more active, and to keep safe while doing it.
As we all know, keeping active throughout the week and getting our half-hourly exercise in each day reduces our chances of heart disease, cardiovascular problems and generally gives us a better outlook on life.
This is especially important for children in that fostering a sport-focused and active lifestyle at a young age pushes this through to later in life.
That said, let’s take a look below at a few easy ways to encourage a more active lifestyle for your entire family.
Schedule an Outdoor or Active Time
As you’ll already know; nothing happens without a plan, so our first tip is to schedule a time that’s specifically dedicated to outdoor activities and exercise.
Our biggest tip is to plan for an hour or two each day, or a couple of times a week to hike a trail, play a backyard sport or get in some exercise in any way possible. Within a few weeks, you’ll see that this time becomes routine and your family begins to prioritise this new ‘exercise time’ each week.
If you’re lucky enough to live in a city, county or a country with few COVID cases or reduced lockdown measures, you could even choose to head to a local bowling alley, rock climbing centre or ice skating rink for your active time.
Convert Chores to an Exercise System
For those families who have a great at-home chores to-do list, we suggest converting these to exercise.
As an example, raking the leaves is rather strenuous activity, as is mowing the lawn, so when it comes to exercise you can build a system at home that quantifies all of the exercise minutes you and the kids are doing and keeps track of the amount of hard work you’re putting in.
With this, you can add up to an hour a day of exercise and keep your family fit and healthy and your home spick and span.
Invest in a Boat, Bike or Board
Without a doubt, some of the most fun and high-intensity activities happen on the trails or on the water, so invest in a vehicle or piece of equipment that really gets your family or the kids amped up about getting into the great outdoors.
Investing in a boat from brands like Grays or a new mountain bike is one of the easiest ways to get you out and about.
At the local lake you’re also able to keep your social distance and with a boat you’re able to have some fun with water sports and get your heart rate up without too much trouble at all.
Cut Back on Screen Time
During the pandemic it was no secret that our screen time had ballooned given we didn’t have the freedom to head outside or do too much else other than relax on the computer or our phones, but there’s still a tonne that can be done at home without a screen involved.
A big tip from us is to pull back screen time and set a limit of around three hours where you can. Leave the rest of the day for family activities, outdoor fun or those exercise-focused chores we mentioned above.
Switch Up Your Diet
To end our list, a vital tip from us to get your family more active is to work at it from a fundamental level.
We all know unhealthy foods make us sluggish and lethargic which, of course, makes us less likely to want to be active.
Start in the kitchen by whipping up some more health-focused foods and you’ll soon see everyone in the home feeling a whole lot fresher and more willing to partake in outdoor sports, backyard ball games or just about anything else that gets their heart rate up.
