One Simple, Daily Trick to Become More Productive. Leave It Up to Harvard.
Most of us feel like we don’t have enough hours in the day for everything that we want or need to do.
And exercise is typically near the bottom of the list. When we’re feeling pressured for time, it’s the first thing to go.
But we might have yet another good reason for not skipping exercise, especially when we’re busy.
Making Time for Exercise Leads to Higher Productivity
Here is the research finding, this time from the Harvard Business Review, of all places:
How Regular Exercise Helps You Balance Work and Family
It turns out that people who exercise regularly are far more likely to be able to balance their work and home life. And this is important for a few reasons.
First of all, we ALL want a better work/life balance.
Secondly – and more importantly – exercise leads to a better balance because it reduces stress and increases self-efficacy. And both of these qualities are highly desirable for our health and wellness.
It’s no surprise that exercise decreases stress; that’s something that we’ve known for quite a while.
However, self-efficacy might be even more important. Self-efficacy is the notion that we are capable of getting things done. And self-efficacy spills over from one area of our lives to all others.
So, for instance, when you exercise, it causes you to feel like you’re capable of achieving more, and that allows you to feel capable of being better at both the office and at home. That confidence allows you to better balance your life while also achieving more.
Exercise for the Brain
For a long time, the prevailing wisdom was that tons of exercise was the best way to lose weight and stay in shape. We now know that diet is much more important in many ways. Still, that doesn’t mean that we don’t need to exercise.
Much research, including the article above, is confirming that the benefits of exercise often have more to do with our brains than with our bellies.
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