When we once again make ourselves a promise to come to grips with health (from the new year, from Monday, etc.), then item number 1 in this "global" plan usually means morning exercises. However, determination often ends with the alarm. And it's not just laziness that is to blame. The root of the problem is that many people simply don't realize the importance of exercise in the morning. Everyone knows that this is useful. But what exactly and what are the consequences of a lack of movement, not everyone knows.
In the article we will explain why exercise is vital for a modern person and how to do it correctly in the morning. We will also help you choose a set of exercises and tell you how to form a good habit and avoid mistakes when doing exercises.
The benefits of morning exercises for the body
Have you noticed how many people around us in the morning are in a bad mood, not sleeping enough, irritable? The most common cause of this condition is hypokinesia, or lack of physical activity. Hence, nervous excitability and chronic fatigue. After all, an insufficient number of impulses comes from the muscles to the brain. Consequently, the nerve centers after sleep turn on in a slow mode. In addition, lack of movement negatively affects the tone of the blood vessels that feed the brain.
Over time, the situation gets worse: after a night's rest, a person does not feel vigorous, he constantly wakes up in a bad mood. The volume of the minimum necessary motor activity is recruited only by noon. Only then will strength and tone appear.
The most effective solution to the problem is morning exercises. By doing simple exercises, you help the body activate its internal resources faster and work more efficiently during the day.
The beneficial effects of charging also appear as follows:
- strengthens the heart muscle and the respiratory system (prevention of heart attacks);
- improved patency and general condition of blood vessels (stroke prevention);
- joints become more mobile (prevention of diseases of the musculoskeletal system);
- the elasticity and tone of the muscles increases, the posture is leveled;
- intracellular metabolism is accelerated;
- the work of the brain is activated, which has a positive effect on mental activity and concentration of attention;
- endurance increases;
- the vestibular apparatus is trained, coordination of movements is improved.
Important! It often turns out that exercise is limited to all daytime physical activity of a modern person who leads a sedentary lifestyle. Therefore, you should definitely not ignore it.
When to study and how to make the morning schedule correctly?
It is believed that gymnastics in the morning can be abandoned in favor of evening exercises. The afternoon is easier and you don't have to get up early. However, evening exercises, for all their usefulness, will not give the body that vigor after waking up and before the working day, which morning physical exercises will provide.
To calculate the optimum ascent time, consider the following factors:
- duration of classes: morning exercises for beginners - 10-15 minutes, half an hour - for those who have adapted to the loads;
- after charging, take a contrast shower for 10 minutes.
Exercise preferably on an empty stomach. Drink a glass of water after a night's sleep to thin your blood. The activity will be higher if you wash your face with cool water. Be sure to ventilate the room where you will be studying.
Exercising should consist of 3 stages: warm-up, main complex and completion. Distribute the load evenly. Perform exercises from easy to more difficult. If you feel faint or dizzy, it’s better to take a break and do nothing through the pain and obvious discomfort.
Warm up
Before exercising, like any other workout, you should definitely do a little warm-up. All exercises are performed smoothly, there is no need to make sudden movements.
Head-neck
Head and neck rotations. Slowly and smoothly tilt your head left and right. Then tilt your head forward, touching your chin to your chest, then back. Further - rotational movements of the head clockwise and counterclockwise. The final stage is turning the head to the right and left.
Arms
Raise your hands in front of your chest, clench your palms into a fist. Perform rotations first with the wrist joints, then with the elbows. Knead the shoulder joints by moving the arms extended or bent at the elbows in a circle, forward and backward.
Back-body
We put our hands on the belt. With the hip joint, we make circular movements in different directions.
You can perform several bends to the left and right leg.
Legs
We raise our left leg in front of us, bend it slightly at the knee and begin to twist the ankle. If it is difficult to maintain balance, put your hand on the wall. We do the same movements with the knee joint. Repeat the exercises for the right leg. We finish the warm-up by walking in place.
Complex for an easy start
There are practically no contraindications for charging in the morning. This type of activity is suitable for both children and adults. No expensive equipment or simulators or special sports uniforms are required. Charging at home is available to everyone - all you need to do is choose the optimal set of exercises for yourself. We bring to your attention a universal complex of morning exercises for beginners for 15 minutes.
Slopes
Legs are placed shoulder-width apart, with your hands try to reach the floor, then, resting your hands on the lower back, bend back. 10 times.
Steps in place
Raise your knees as high as possible. Then we put our palms on the buttocks with the back side and try to reach them with the heels with an overflowing movement. 10 times with each leg.
Swing your legs to the side and back and forth
Swinging alternately with each leg 10 times. If it's hard to keep your balance, you can lean against the wall.
Abs exercises
We lie on the floor on our back and begin to pull our bent legs to the chest (alternately, then both together). 10 times.
Further, lying on your back, raise your legs and arms at the same time. The shoulder blades should come off the floor. We turn over on our stomach, continue to raise our arms and legs. We do it 10 times.
We continue to do all the exercises in a circle for 10-15 minutes.
Plank
We complete the complex with the plank exercise. Start with 30 seconds and improve your results gradually every day. You can stand both on your elbows and on outstretched arms. Another option is to alternate between these positions every day.
Complex for men
Morning exercises for men, if desired, are performed with dumbbells (warm-up - without).
Squats
After warming up, we start the main part with squats (20-25 times). Make sure that your back is straight and your knees do not go beyond the level of your socks.
Lunges
Classic: put your left leg forward and bend at the knee at a right angle. The right leg is pulled back and also bent at a right angle. Next comes a return to the starting position and a new lunge from the other leg. Perform 15 times on each leg, keep your hands on your belt.
© dusanpetkovic1 - stock.adobe.com
Side: Spread your legs as wide as you can. Bend your right leg and tilt your body to its side, keeping your left straight. Then - the other way around. The back is straight. The number of repetitions is 10-15.
© Makatserchyk - stock.adobe.com
Push ups
Classic push-ups from the floor with the arms slightly wider than the shoulders.
Reverse push-ups
Use a chair, armchair, or bench.
Plank
Lean on your forearms, the body is as tense and tense as possible. The execution time is not less than a minute.
Complex for women
The final warm-up exercise - steps in place - continue with intense movements with knees raised. Then we rise on toes, hands up, and fix this position for 15-20 seconds.
Mahi
We spread straight arms to the side and perform swings to the arms, first with a leg bent at the knee, then with a straight one.
Squats
Feet shoulder width apart, heels do not come off the floor, back straight.
Jumping out
Jumping out of the squat. Can be done with a clap over your head.
Stretching
Sitting on the floor, we perform deep bends alternately to the left and right legs.
After that, we bend our legs under ourselves, tilt the body and stretch forward.
© stanislav_uvarov - stock.adobe.com
Plank
We complete the complex with the plank exercise. Start with 30 seconds and improve your results gradually every day.
How to motivate yourself to practice?
Start with small steps. A common mistake for beginners is to set many tasks at once. Planning to practice early waking up? Then start with a 5 minute morning exercise and do it for a month without adding anything else. You can lengthen the class time by 3-5 minutes every week. When one ritual is formed, add a new one: meditation or another of your choice.
Note! Motivation leaves, habits remain. Unfortunately, it is impossible to stay on one willpower and overcoming for a long time. Form a habit loop. Its simplified scheme: trigger (the mechanism that triggers the habit) - action - reward.
Any constant action can become a trigger, or a kind of hook. For example, washing your face, brushing your teeth, etc. Do the exercises, reward yourself with a delicious breakfast or a cup of aromatic tea. We stimulate dopamine receptors, and the habit becomes associated with pleasure.
Add pleasant emotions. Play your favorite music, think good. You should not mentally solve the problems of the coming day during class. Remember, the best morning exercise is fun exercise.
If you skip exercise or shorten the time, don't beat yourself up. Return to a stable schedule as soon as possible. Celebrate progress and celebrate success. Get some tracking habits and mark each day when the morning started with exercise.
What result can you expect?
You can hardly expect positive changes if you do exercises only from time to time. Changes become apparent after a few weeks if you take it every day or at least 5 times a week. The most obvious effect is an overall improvement in well-being and health promotion. Resistance to colds and other diseases also increases.
Interesting to know! Exercise, which is designed to invigorate, with prolonged practice, even normalizes sleep. Getting up early forms a stable daily routine, which allows you not only to get up, but also go to bed at the same time. Insomnia disappears, night rest becomes full.
Regular exercise can reduce stress levels and prevent depression. In the brain, the processes of excitation and inhibition are balanced, the mood stabilizes, nervousness and irritability go away. Efficiency, persistence in achieving goals, discipline increases.
For those who are losing weight, exercise can speed up the farewell to unnecessary fat at the expense of excess calories. Evening workouts are easier. Many people find that exercise in the morning can even help regulate appetite.
© fizkes - stock.adobe.com
Key charging errors
We have already mentioned one of the most common problems - irregularity of classes. Other mistakes: doing exercises in a stuffy room and in an unnecessarily slow pace with long pauses. The charging rhythm should be smooth, but quite intense. At the same time, do not ignore the warm-up.
Engage all muscle groups. Working exclusively with one group contradicts the purpose of charging: to activate the body's work, to charge it with energy through movement. However, those who prioritize reducing the volume of problem areas turn gymnastics at the beginning of the day exclusively into the fight against excess weight, forgetting that fat is not burned by exercise, but by the overall balance of calories throughout the day. As a result - no tone, no pleasure.
Note! If you want to lose weight, but your exercise is limited to exercise, then do not expect a quick and clear result. Add 2-3 extra strength training per week to be effective.
It is also not worth loading all muscle groups in the morning in full. It is a mistake to make a full-fledged high-intensity workout out of exercise. This problem is especially common for beginners. Instead of vigor, you will get tiredness, weakness and a desire to rest all day long. Unable to cope, a person stops morning classes and rarely returns to them because of the memory of uncomfortable sensations.
Conclusion
It's hard to believe that a few simple exercises in the morning can change your life for the better. However, this is the case. Want to be sure? Then do not wait for special dates and do not postpone classes indefinitely. Just get started! Wake up just 10 minutes earlier tomorrow morning and add some physical activity to your morning rituals. Do not be lazy to act for the good of the body and be healthy!
