One decision can change your entire life. That’s why my partner insisted that I add one more healthy morning habit to my morning routine: exercise! Now, two months later, I thank him infinitely for encouraging me to do daily exercise at home without any excuses. The first few days were brutal. For a sound sleeper whose first-morning action was hitting snooze, waking up early for exercise was a difficult dream. Yet, filled with motivation from the 2024 resolutions that I set for my well-being, I accepted this challenge with an open heart.
It took only two months to transform my mornings from grogginess to awakenings filled with purpose and clarity. Yesterday, I completed 40 Suryanamaskars, along with squats (3 sets, 30 repetitions) and yoga practices, and I boasted unabashedly about my achievement to my family. I continued to feel a powerful serotonin boost in my body, even hours later, when I wrote these words. And I realized that regular exercise will always be worth investing your time in.
Please listen to me. Ignore the sudden burst of procrastination at the thought of exercising in the morning, and start now. My dear readers, a morning call calls for a beautiful start filled with new energies, and exercise literally pumps renewed energy into your body, which doesn’t let any burst of fatigue render your body weak.
Regular exercise – a perfect organic growth habit
After a prolonged over-optimistic view of achieving a healthy and fit body through different habits, I finally let go of this mentality. Also, add a period of burnout that overtly showed its signs. I realized the solution isn’t situated in overstuffing all possible habits in your morning routine but in prioritizing that one healthy habit that can successfully make your body stronger. Don’t get me wrong; eating a healthy breakfast is still non-negotiable, especially high-protein foods for your breakfast, but a consistent exercise routine will change your life.
Exercise is an organic solution, meaning exercising daily naturally makes your muscles healthier and clarifies your mind. That’s why many insist on moving your body in the morning because it’s liberating! It alleviates magic over erratic thoughts and soothes them. Combine daily exercise with other powerful healthy habits like healthy nutrition and meditation, and the results will be unbelievable and impressive.
The famous saying “no pain, no gain” becomes true at this point. It is the North Star of your growth journey. But the benefits of daily exercise do not stop at these two things. Read the benefits of daily exercise on your health and be ready to embrace this healthy habit.
Benefits of daily exercise
The long hours of work cause many unthinkable health issues; you may not realize it yet, but persistent sitting creates these issues insidiously, causing irreparable damage to your health in later years. Plus, no control over eating limits, long lists of disorganized tasks, and no productive bodily movements—all these activities can snowball into a chaotic brain due to the absence of daily exercise, allowing no room for rest and recuperation. Now, enough with all the hard-hitting facts about skipping this healthy morning habit. Let’s know the magic daily exercise brings to our health and overall lifestyle.
Exercise boosts mental health
Dealing with long hours of stress ricochets like a boomerang, and the next moment, you get caught in its storm of exhaustion and overwhelming emotions. With each rep and each stretch, you reclaim control over your mind, release tension, and synchronize your thought process with reality. Overthinking and undervaluing yourself are the biggest deterrents to positive feelings. As stress, anxiety, and other signals constantly envelop our day, sooner or later, these emotions start meddling with our brains, raising cortisol levels in the body.
To resign from these mind patterns, regular exercise for a sufficient amount of time boosts the production of the feel-good hormones serotonin and endorphins, which counterattack the bad ones. Stop your mind from becoming prey by challenging it in the morning. So, the next time you feel euphoric or content after a good run or weight-lifting, it will be proof of your healthy decision. All carefully reviewed scientific articles corroborate what I am saying.
Exercise improves heart health
A healthy hour of exercise can help beat the perils of a sedentary lifestyle, like prolonged hours of sitting. This sacred ritual in the morning is a way of infusing vitality into your body. With every deliberate movement, blood flow increases, and oxygen fills the lungs and gets circulated to every muscle. Daily exercise is linked to optimal cardiac health by lowering blood pressure levels and reducing cardiac diseases. Prolonged hours of sitting are one of the main causes of elevated blood pressure. Hence, the synergy of early morning exercise with your body is phenomenal, and you will see it yourself once you become consistent with an exercise routine.
Exercise improves muscle health
As you wake up from its restful slumber, your body needs energy to come out of sluggishness’ grip. Proteins, being the power source for every cell, provide that energy to function. Exercise stimulates muscle protein synthesis, building new proteins to repair and strengthen muscles. Exercise also increases the flow of blood to muscles, delivering essential nutrients, such as oxygen and amino acids, which are building blocks of proteins, necessary for muscle repair and growth. Therefore, receiving these nutrients during the early hours improves overall health.
Exercise improves sleep
Quality sleep often feels like a luxury due to its seemingly impossible attainment amidst our hectic lives. Furthermore, late-night screen activities intensify their agonizing grip on our psyche, not providing a chance to reach our sleep quotient. Would exercise be the solution we are searching for? The deep-rooted connection between exercise and quality sleep lies in biology. When you engage in daily exercise, your body releases endorphins that reduce stress and anxiety levels. Your mind feels calmer and more peaceful, which makes sleep more restorative.
By consistently engaging in this healthy morning habit, your body’s internal clock and circadian rhythm significantly improve. The responsibilities do not rest, and we disrupt our healthy sleep cycles, inviting stress signs and other health problems. That’s why it is imperative to do exercises to battle these signs and protect our well-being.
Why choose mornings for exercise?
Life tests us at every step and every choice we make. These tests often come disguised as external stimuli like setbacks or workplace agitation, which are provoking in nature. In such situations, our mind, far from righteous thinking, ends up in a quicksand of weak temperament and mental distress. But you can overcome this turmoil with a regular exercise routine in the morning.
People who prefer evening exercise will ask me if morning exercise is more worthwhile than evening exercise. And I will honestly answer yes, but evening sessions aren’t any less than better. People whose entire mornings are spent commuting may not have the option to exercise in the morning. In this case, it is vital to use your evenings to the fullest. My preference for morning exercise has nothing to do with it providing optimal results; getting in physical activity is important, irrespective of whether it is morning or evening. I would mostly skip the evening exercise routine because I was tired from all the day’s tasks.
Mornings offer second chances, and if you fuel them with exercises, you will observe a positive change. You wake up early, and the sun’s pure energy nourishes your body. The morning brings serenity, and in these calm hours, devoid of any distractions, you commit to yourself. It amplifies positive vibes and brings resounding clarity. Exercising after work when you are extremely tired might discourage you from exercising. Plus, your evening hours are free for any pleasurable activity like meeting friends, relaxing with a book, or watching your favorite series. You miss these advantages with the evening exercise routine. So, I focused on waking up early, and the outcome was phenomenal for me.
Consistency matters with this healthy morning habit
We follow habits we feel good about. However, daily exercise is a mixed bag. I don’t need to encapsulate the groan all of us produce at the thought of committing to this healthy morning habit. But consistency will get you there. During our initial days, we rarely believe in its potential, but as we see new suns gracing the sky as we engage in exercise, it sweeps away our languid feelings and replaces them with an unquenchable thirst for fitness. Therefore, consistency, along with discipline, is a way towards success.
Conclusion
I started my 2024 resolutions by adding a consistent exercise routine to my morning routine. An hour of squats, yoga poses, and pranayama in the morning consolidates my pursuit of achieving a happy and healthy life instead of running after elusive promises to myself. Adding this healthy morning habit can bring you closer to perpetual calmness with more control over yourself than external stimuli. So, you are not suddenly fuming over others or snapping at someone for trivial things.