While being self employed no doubt gives you more freedom, it seems that half of UK contractors can’t find the time to hit their local gym.
This survey was conducted with the aim of discovering just exactly how self employed people are spending their time, and although it’s encouraging that at least 50% are doing some form of exercise on a regular basis, it’s no doubt a cause for concern that so many people are still not getting active.
The exact figure was 46% that didn’t exercise according to the survey, with 48% of women claiming they struggled to find the time, while 43% of men said the same.
In my opinion I think that just about everybody out there would benefit from doing some form of regular exercise, even if it’s just an hour or two on the exercise bike every week.
I think there is a big misconception that you need to spend a lot of money on joining a fancy gym and then start working out for 2 hours every day.
Sure, there are some people who enjoy doing that, and if you really get into the fitness lifestyle then it can be enjoyable, but for the vast majority of the population even a small amount of effort will do them good.
This comes at a time when we are facing more obesity in the UK than ever before, and one of the main reasons for this is simply because people are not getting enough activity.
Many contractors, and self employed people in general, often spend most of their day sitting at a desk, and then at the end of a working day go to sit on the couch and watch some TV.
I’m not going to say it’s easy to start exercising on a regular basis, because once you get into a routine then you typically want to keep on following it, even when logically you realise something needs to change.
What you must understand is that small changes should be the main focus at first. For example, just go for 1 exercise session a week, and then determine you are going to stick with it. After a while you can then move up to more sessions, but for now the main priority is to start making a change.
This all assumes that you actually want to make a change of course. For some people, maybe they just don’t want to exercise on a regular basis, at the of the day it’s all about what you want to do.
However, if you are part of the 50% of contractors that don’t currently exercise but you either want to or need to, then my advise is just get started, even if it’s just a minimal amount of effort at first. The most important thing is you take action and be consistent.
