How to Move More During the Day – 12 Ways

Moving your body more can help you shed stubborn weight while keeping your body and mind active throughout the day. Unfortunately, too many of us spend most of the day sitting. After a long day of sitting at our desks, we often come home from work just to do more sitting. We sit at the dinner table and then maybe more sitting on the couch. However, sedentary lifestyles are harmful to health. They can increase your risk of obesity and heart disease, so it’s essential to get enough movement in your day. Here is how to move more during the day.

Walk More

Walking more than you currently do is a great way to get your blood flowing. It’s a low-intensity, healthy way to get more movement into your day. To make your daily walking routine pleasant, choosing proper footwear is crucial. Make sure to put on a pair of comfortable casual sneakers designed for walking. Just don’t forget about sun protection, wear quality sunglasses and protect your skin during your long summer walks.  Even if you work a desk job, you can take a break every few hours to stand up and walk around. Go grab some water at the furthest water fountain. Or even schedule walking meetings if you don’t want to lose any productive work time. However, taking a quick walking break can often improve your productivity when you get back to work.

You can also get into the habit of pacing around while you’re on the phone. Walk your dog after work for some relaxing end-of-day movement. You can also walk more by choosing to take a walk around the block after work or dinner. Walking is an exercise that’s gentle on the joints and can promote weight loss. Therefore, it’s a great place to start if you’re trying to move more. It’s one of the key answers to how to move more during the day.

Stretch

Stretching offers tons of benefits, including making you more flexible. It also decreases your risk of injury while helping you restore and relieve pain. For example, you can relieve shoulder pain by stretching. It can also help you relax in the morning or at night. While yoga involves more than stretching alone, you can start learning how to stretch properly by taking a yoga class for beginners.

Dance

Instead of sitting around, you can choose to turn on your favorite song and dance. Dancing can help you burn calories while working out every muscle in your body. Plus it’s fun and can help you unwind. It can be a social activity, something you do with your family, or something you do on your own. While you might not be able to start dancing in public, there are ways you can incorporate dance into your daily life. For example, you can start the day by turning on music and dancing to relieve stress and promote weight loss while getting more movement. It’s a great opportunity to watch yourself move in the mirror to see how cool you look ;). no matter how you look it’s fun to rock out and get some movement.

Cook More

You burn more calories and move more when cooking than sitting in a restaurant waiting for your food to come to the table. Instead of ordering food every night, consider cooking to get more movement into your day. While cooking might not let you break out into a sweat, it can help you move more each day. It will also help you stand more, which can improve your posture. 

The food you cook yourself will also likely be healthier. You will know what exactly is going into it. Restaurants often add a ton of butter, fat, and sugar to their foods to make them taste better. This is fine every once in a while, but if it happens often those extra calories will really add up.

Stand More

Standing promotes movement because your body may naturally want to move around when you’re standing. Anyone can stand more, even if you work in an office. You can get a standing desk and a stool to help you stand throughout the day. I like to switch between standing and sitting just because it adds variety. It also prevents stiffness from staying in one position too long. Plus the act of standing and sitting is movement and an especially helpful one similar to squatting.

Clean Your Home

Cleaning is another great way to burn calories without exercising. While you shouldn’t intentionally get your house messy, there are things you can clean every day to help you get more movement. For example, one day, you can vacuum the carpets while the next you can fold the laundry. These simple movements won’t make you sore, but if you do them every day it can be a helpful way of getting some movement. Plus when I think about the fact that I am getting two birds with one stone, it makes cleaning feel less like a chore.

Play With Your Pet

Playing with your pet is a great bonding activity that can help you get more movement in your day while improving your pet’s physical and mental health. Whether you have a dog or cat, you can find toys they like to play with. For example, dogs might enjoy playing a tug of war game with a rope, and other dogs might enjoy playing a game of chase in the yard. Whatever your pet loves to do, they’ll appreciate the activity and friendly bonding experience.  As mentioned earlier, an end-of-day walk can be a great activity to create a bonding experience that benefits you and your pet.

Exercise

The number one answer to how to move more during the day is to exercise. You can go for a run, get on the elliptical, or strength trainer to help you get into the habit of exercising. Remember, if you’re starting a new workout routine, it’s best to take it slow. A personal trainer can be extremely helpful in guiding you. If you’re not used to intense exercise, start slow and work your way up in terms of intensity. The great thing about an exercise program is you can set time aside just for you to exercise your body instead of having to find time throughout the day. This allows you to add a large amount of movement to your day. The best solution is often combining an exercise program with all the other small movement breaks discussed above.

Go Shopping In-Person

If you enjoy shopping online, you might have forgotten what it’s like to shop in a real store. Visiting a few stores is a great way to get more movement into your day. Instead of shopping from the comfort of your couch, get up and go to the mall. Window shopping at the mall is a great way to get in more activity while doing something you enjoy.  It’s a great opportunity to get your body moving and interact with people – something a lot of us may miss due to changes from the pandemic.

Take the Stairs

Anytime you see an elevator, you should find the stairs instead. You can strengthen your legs and glutes while burning some extra calories by taking the stairs. It is an amazing exercise and often won’t take you any more time. It’s a free exercise on equipment available to everyone!

Drink More Water

As you already know, staying hydrated is healthy. However, it can also help you get more movement into your day. The more water you drink, the more you’ll need to stand to take water cooler breaks and bathroom breaks. If you’re someone who spends all day at work drinking coffee, start switching to water so you’ll be forced to take more of those stand-up and walk breaks.

Get a Fitness Tracker

A fitness tracker can inform you of how much you have moved over a particular time period. Even the simplest tracker can track your steps to tell you how many calories you’ve burned. Using fitness trackers is a great way to monitor your activity and help you stay fit. They can also serve as a tool to help you guilt yourself into moving more. When you see how few steps you’ve taken in a day, you may feel more motivated to get up and get moving.  If you have a personal trainer that uses FitSW, you can connect your fitness tracker to FitSW in order to allow your trainer to monitor your movement/exercise data. They can then tailor your program based on this data.

Get Active 

Instead of sitting for most of the day, prioritize self-care by finding ways to incorporate more movement into your day. Anyone, no matter their fitness level, can start moving more and burning calories, whether you’re at home or work. Movement can improve your health while keeping your mind and body fit, so there’s no reason not to start moving more. Now that you have more ideas on how to move more during the day, get to it!

Guest Author

Marné Amoguis – Marné Amoguis holds a B.A. in International Business from UC San Diego. She is a contributing writer at 365businesstips.com where she loves sharing her passion for digital marketing. Outside of writing, she loves traveling, playing music, and hiking.