Move more: small moves, big shifts

I used to think I was doing everything right!

I exercised regularly, ticked the boxes in my weekly mental training plan, and felt quietly happy that I was “keeping fit.” But what I didn’t realise was how I was (or wasn’t moving) the rest of the time mattered too.

Different life phases bring different types of movement. A decade of long hours daily spent sitting at a desk, more regular movement whilst bringing up small children but moving without thinking how and repeating patterns like holding toddlers on only one hip for long periods. Then more reduced movement after the Lego bricks no longer needed to be cleared up and more time sat a laptop again.

Like so many people, I equated being active with exercising, and as long as I’d done that, I didn’t need to think about the larger chunk of time that was the rest of the day.

It wasn’t until years later, after pain forced me to look more closely at how I actually lived, that I began to understand the bigger picture. Exercise is valuable, of course, but it’s only one piece of the movement puzzle.

“I’d been training for fitness but not for life. I was strong in narrow ways and weak in all the ones that really mattered.” Move Well for Life, Chapter 1

That realisation changed everything. I started noticing how long I stayed in one position and how sluggish my body felt when I finally stood up. The stiffness wasn’t from doing too much but from not doing enough and not sufficiently varied ways of moving.

Why moving more matters

Sedentarism is often called a silent killer, but it’s also one of the easiest habits to turn around. You don’t need to overhaul your life and suddenly become an athlete, you just need to bring in more movement moments.

Your body doesn’t care whether those moments happen in a gym or your kitchen. What matters is that you interrupt stillness regularly. Frequency trumps intensity when it comes to building consistent habits.

A walk to refill your water glass (instead of having a jug next to you), a kitchen sink stretch while you’re waiting for the kettle, a quick reach to the top shelf using a calf stretch - all of these switch the lights back on in your body.

When you start to see movement as something you sprinkle through your day, rather than something you schedule, everything changes. Energy returns, stiffness eases, and you start to feel more alive in your own skin. You even start trying to find more and more opportunities to get creative!

How I began to shift

When I first started to pay attention, I realised I needed to tune in to the feelings that my body needed movement AND respond to them; feeling fidgety or just a low level of discomfort in parts of my body, also noticing when my mind was ‘slowing’.

I realised that for me, to make it stick, it had to be about moments I was doing something anyway - going to get a drink, to the toilet, to the door, doing a quick task or to make a call. I tied movement to them all, so that without having to create a list or schedule, these moments in the day all become linked with different movements.

It became less about working out and more about waking up, giving my body permission to do what it’s built for.

Try this today

Notice how your body feels right now.
Are your legs heavy, shoulders tense, breath shallow?

Every thirty minutes or so, add one minute of light movement. Stand up and rebound - lift and lower your heels rapidly, letting them just skim the floor before rising again. It’s a simple calf-raise rhythm that fires the muscles in your feet and lower legs, boosts circulation, and gives your body a burst of low-level impact that it loves. And let the upper body be relaxed and just respond.

Top tip: add a smile and when you’ve done a stint (your calves will let you know when you can stop!), applaud yourself for making the choice to move.

You’ll be surprised how quickly that tiny action lifts your energy and mood.

A small step that opens a bigger door

You don’t need a lot more time or more intensity, you just need more awareness and a willingness to start creating small habits. The way we move through the everyday hours is just as important as what we do in our workouts.

This idea; Move More, is the 1st principle of my Move Well Wheel, the framework I share in my book Move Well for Life: Unlock the Life-Changing Power of Everyday Movement (click here to pre-order!). It’s a simple reminder that our bodies thrive on frequent, varied movement woven naturally into daily life.

Next week, I’ll explore the 2nd principle; Oppose Repetition, and why doing the same movements over and over can quietly limit your freedom to move well.

Small moves, big shifts - it really can start that simply.