Exercise advice for beginners or older adults can be confusing. Starting out, there are some simple guidelines to follow that can make workouts more effective. Here are five fitness tips to help make exercising work for you:

1. Check with your doctor to make sure that you are healthy enough to engage in an exercise routine. Your doctor can approve or recommend the types of exercises that are safe for you to do. As long as you do not have a disabling, chronic illness, most exercises should be safe to do.

2. Decide on what you want to accomplish with your exercises. Do you want to lose weight? Do you want to walk without getting out of breath? Do you want to get stronger? Do you want to head off a chronic disease such as diabetes?

Once you decide the direction to go in, then pace yourself and start out slowly. Set some daily, realistic goals that will help you stay active for the long term.

3. After deciding on the exercises, it’s important to learn how to do them correctly. There are various resources that can help you to do this. Books, DVDs, health clubs, and YMCA’s all offer directions for using proper exercise form.

4. One aspect of working out that is often overlooked is the mental aspect. It’s important to get your mind prepared to be active on a daily basis. Goal setting is one way to do this. Writing down goals can be very helpful. Positive affirmations is another way to condition your mind. Thinking about the many benefits of exercising every day is a good habit to get into.

Trying a different variety of exercises can also help to keep mentally focused on your workouts.

5. Finally, allow for setbacks. Sticking with any exercise program takes a certain amount of discipline. Life often gets in the way. Some days you may not feel energetic enough to workout. Other days you may have a pressing obligation to fulfill. You might even have soreness or a slight injustice of some type.

Instead of stopping or giving up on your routine, simply start over. Depending on how long you are inactive, you might have to start completely over. In that case, just begin again, slowly and surely.

The most important fitness advice is to be active for the long haul. Make exercise a part of your daily life. Remember that you do not always have to engage in a thirty to sixty-minute routine every day. Just find some time to move your body each and every day, even if only for a few minutes.

Source by Dave Tabern