Back-to-school fitness tips for parents with no time to exercise

Adjusting to a new back-to-school routine is often hectic, but it doesn’t have to ruin your fitness goals. There are practical ways to stay active without adding extra time to an already packed schedule. Let’s break it down and explore ways to keep fitness an attainable goal when your daily routine changes.

How to tackle having no time

Try reframing your fitness goal from “finding time” to “taking advantage” of your new routine. First look at your schedule to see which tasks you can turn into workouts. This is called “habit stacking.” Then, think about when you have 10 or 20 minutes to yourself. In those small breaks, little bursts of exercise “snacks” can go a long way toward your fitness goals. 

Using habit stacking to build more movement into an existing routine

Habit stacking is when you add extra actions onto something you already do regularly. The goal is to find ways to meet your daily demands in a way that keeps your body moving and heart pumping. Habit stacking can look like:

• Turning house and yard work into a fast-paced, more intentional exercise to get your heart pumping

• Doing two or three curls with each bag of groceries as you load and unload them from your car 

• Taking the stairs instead of the elevator

• Parking farther away and walking the length of the parking lot to get inside

• Taking calls walking instead of sitting 

• Walking on a treadmill while watching your favorite show

• Biking your errands instead of driving

Micro exercise snacks

Exercise snacks are a popular way to fit workouts into your everyday life. An exercise snack is a short burst of exercise you can do in 5-15 minutes. The best part about exercise snacks is that your body reaps the same benefits as it would from an extended workout. That means that three different sessions of 10-minute exercise snacks is the same as one 30-minute workout session.

Your snack can include movements like jumping jacks, squats or pushups. Try looking at your schedule ahead of time and planning a routine around times of day or activities. For example, consider a breakfast workout, lunch workout and dinner workout. Read more about exercise snacks and get ideas for your routine here. 

When your routine changes, staying active does not have to mean starting over or finding a big block of free time. By stacking movement onto things you already do and adding short exercise snacks throughout the day, you can make fitness feel more realistic, flexible and doable. Start small, stay consistent and remember that every bit of movement counts.