For most of us who are (admittedly) lazy, being a morning person is something of a daunting task. The confusion is familiar to us- we want to be fit and slim, right,? Yet somehow we ardently dislike sweating, workouts, and everything it stands for. However, if we only knew just how beneficial morning exercises are, it becomes much easier to stomach. Still, it’s a daunting task to crawl from the bed and get yourself to the gym at the crack of dawn. So here are a couple of morning exercises at home for you to wake up your muscles and kickstart your day!
It’s easier to do morning exercises at home when you’ve made a habit out of it. Besides that, a morning workout before breakfast burns more calories at a faster pace and lightens up your days. Start with a few lighter ones as your body is still in snooze mode, and then pump your blood out.
Before we get into it, though, it’s good to understand just exactly what are the benefits of doing morning exercises.
Morning Exercise: What are the benefits?
Weight Loss
– Before breakfast, early morning workout burns out your fat and calories at a very fast pace. This kick starts your effort to lose weight and will keep you healthy.
Helps with Sleep and Brain Functions
– This is common sense. Starting your day with a good workout session will keep you moving all day. With an active brain and body, you will become the energetic child most of us were- running all around. A morning workout will help you leave your sedentary lifestyle behind and start anew! – Sleep and exercise come hand in hand. With just a few morning exercises, boosting your metabolic rate creates a hormonal balance and consequently gives you a good night’s sleep.
You don’t always have to go to the gym for sweating sessions. You can do it at home, with Zumba’s rhythmic dance movements. Do fun morning exercises to Zumba beats! Dance it out with the rising sun while in the comforts of your own home.
Zumba is a fitness program combining dance moves with latin and international music. To help improve cardiovascular fitness, Zumba routines incorporate interval training—alternating fast and slow rhythms.
Zumba is an aerobic activity that can count towards the amount of aerobic activity the Department of Health and Human Services has recommended for most healthy adults. At least 150 minutes of moderate aerobic activity or 75 minutes of vigorous aerobic activity per week or a combination of moderate and vigorous activity are recommended. Being active throughout the day for short periods of time can add up to provide a plethora of health benefits.
Effectively working out your core can improve stability, reduce injury, and maintain mobility. Planking does this- and it’s fairly simple to do, too. The difficulty comes in maintaining the planking position- but it’s definitely one of the easier morning exercises.
By strengthening your back, chest, shoulders, neck, and abs, this exercise makes it easier to keep your shoulders back and your lower back in a neutral position while sitting or standing. These are two vital components of good posture.
Planks also help you develop isometric strength in your core muscles, which gives you the power to keep from hunching while standing or sitting for long periods of time.
There are two types of planks- high and low.
High Plank
– Get into the top or start of a pushup position. Keep your palms and toes firmly planted on the ground, your back straight, and your core tight. A saggy back or bottom during a plank can result in lower back pain later on, so be sure not to compromise your form. Do not let your head sag.
Low Plank
– Low plank. Lower down to your forearms, maintaining the same positioning and form as the high plank.
Walking is one of the best morning exercises to improve your overall health, or maintain it. Even 30 minutes a day can already increase cardiovascular fitness, strengthen bones, reduce excess body fat and increase muscle power and stamina. It can also reduce your risk of developing conditions like heart disease , type 2 diabetes, osteoporosis and certain cancers. Unlike some other forms of exercise, walking is free, and no special equipment or training is required.
Walking is low impact, requires minimal equipment, can be done anytime, and can be carried out at your own pace. You can get out and walk without worrying about the risks that come with intense exercise. Walking is also a great form of physical activity for people who are overweight, elderly or have not worked out in a long time.
Yoga is a systematic practice of physical exercise, breath control, relaxation, diet control, and positive thought and meditation aimed at developing harmony. It also is one of the most effective morning exercises.
Yoga is the art of taking control of your mind and your body. Practicing yoga while the rising sun is up, will boost your metabolism early in the morning and will ease your stress hormones. It releases your happy hormones, keeping you alive and fresh through the day. It also boosts your power of concentration and endurance which could save your worst days.
Various yoga techniques have expressed the benefits of improving body flexibility, performance, stress reduction, inner peace achievement and self-realization. The system has been advocated as a complementary treatment to help cure several ailments such as coronary heart disease, depression , anxiety disorders, asthma, and extensive disorder rehabilitation including musculoskeletal and traumatic brain injury disorders.
What exercise equipment sells for less than $20, fits into a briefcase, can be used by the whole family, and improves cardiovascular fitness while simultaneously toning the muscle? And using it for 15-20 minutes will burn the calories from a candy bar off? A jump rope, that’s what.
It is a highly effective form of respiratory cardio exercise. If done regularly, it strengthens your calf muscles and helps improve the elasticity of the tendons and fascia that surrounds them. This reduces the risk of injury to the lower legs. Jumping rope is a great calorie-burner. You’d have to run an eight-minute mile to work off more calories than you’d burn jumping rope.
If you haven’t used a jump rope since elementary, it can be somewhat shameful. It demands (and builds) coordination. Initially, you should practice foot and arm movements separately.
Hold both rope handles in one hand and swing the rope to develop a feel for the rhythm.
Next, without using the rope, practice jumping.
Finally, put the two together. You’ll probably do well to jump continuously for one minute.
Strengthen your abdominal muscles with this cool and straightforward morning workout. This is considered one of the best morning exercises, as the workout strains your abs and burns the calories out.
The purpose of abdominal crunches are to tone the body’s core muscles. The exercise helps strengthen the core muscles , improve posture and increase muscle mobility and flexibility.
Abdominal crunches are extremely important for posture improvement. If your posture is optimized, you will find that in daily activities you are not only functioning more effectively, but that you won’t suffer from any kind of pain in the lower back or back muscle injuries.
To perform a crunch, here are the steps:
Lie flat on your back on a floor or mat
Bend your knees, keeping your feet flat on the floor, hip-width apart
Place your arms behind your head, and lift your shoulder blades off the mat gently
There is a reason people say squatting is the best exercise out there. It’s a compound movement that activates multiple different muscle groups. It is also a primitive movement that transfers into the movements of everyday life. Squatting is anabolic as well- which means it helps the body build muscle mass.
The squat is a dynamic strength training exercise requiring multiple muscles in your upper and lower body to work together at the same time. Many of these muscles help you get through daily tasks like walking, climbing stairs, bending over, or carrying heavy loads. They also help you do athletic activities. Adding squats to your workouts can help boost your exercise performance , reduce your risk of injury and make it easier for you to move throughout the day.
Squatting doesn’t discriminate—anyone from a teenager to a senior citizen can and will benefit from squatting.
Squatting properly is relatively easy.
Stand with feet slightly wider than hip-width apart, toes pointing forward or slightly turned out.
Keeping chest up, shoulders back, push knees out as you sit back and down like you were going to sit in a chair. Do not let knees go forward past ankles. Lower until your butt is in line with knees, thighs parallel to the floor, or as low as you can.
Keeping chest tall, push through your heels to stand back up.
The power push-up is one of the most simple morning exercises you can do at home. This exercise will help you lose weight, improve your metabolism, and strengthen your muscles. It uses nearly every muscle in your body- and if done correctly, it will reduce the risks of future injuries.
The beauty of push-ups in general is that you can do them anytime, anywhere. The convenience of having no-cost and no-hassle is but one of the many benefits of push-ups. This strength-training exercise involves several muscle groups simultaneously, helping you maintain a healthy weight, strengthening bones, and managing blood sugar and blood pressure.
It also helps reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease. In order to perform the power-push up in particular, there are a few steps you have to follow that differentiates it from the normal push-up variant.
Place your hands on the mat, shoulder-width apart, your fingers facing forward.
Brace your torso, and extend your body completely, so that you are in the “planking” position. Make sure your head and spine align.
While maintaining the same body position, lower your body slowly towards the mat while allowing your elbows to shift outwards.
Once your chest or chin has reached the level of the floor, push upwards until they are fully extended.
Start your day off the explosive way with knee tucks.
Knee tucks are a fantastic way of strengthening your legs, flattening your belly and getting some quick, intense cardio benefits. While knee tucks fire the whole leg and the glutes, they also work the core hard.
Knee tucks need total body strength to lift your body weight off the ground. Every time you perform a workout which involves many muscle groups, you effectively burn more calories than just doing single muscle groups individually. Knee tucks are highly recommended because you get a chance to tone the lower body at the same time , in addition to cardio.
Here are the steps to performing Knee Tucks:
Stand with feet hip width apart and knees bent.
Jump up and pull knees toward the chest.
Land both feet together softly and with knees slightly bent.
This exercise benefits your lower body and heart the most. It gets blood pumping through your legs, making moving throughout your day much, much easier.
Forward lunges are a staple lower-body exercise which is great for beginners as well as for advanced practitioners. Using nothing but your own body weight or holding a pair of dumbbells for an added challenge, it can be used to build strength and muscle once you get a hang of the move.
To do a forward lunge properly, you must :
Stand with feet a hips-width apart and with hands by your side.
Take a big step forward with the right foot and bend at the knee until both knees form angles of 90 degrees while holding hands in front of your body.
To push back to the starting position push down into the right heel.
Repeat.
These were some of the best morning exercises you can add to your morning routine at home, even as a novice. Now start regularly getting up for a healthy and refreshing morning!
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