By Sarah Smith

Developing and sticking to an exercise routine is one of the hardest parts of becoming physically fit. Making that trip to the gym and applying yourself becomes harder to do as your life becomes filled with more responsibilities, which is why many people fail when they try to become fit. These tips comes from Urban Outsource, the gardening experts.

The good news is that there’s one activity that you can perform at your home using a shovel, spade, or pruning tool. You need only have the patience and the mindset to become a gardener to enjoy the fruits of your labors.

Why Does Gardening Aligns with Physical Fitness?

Gardening is an accessible, enjoyable activity that produces tangible benefits that you and everyone whom views your garden can enjoy.

The reason garden care aligns so well with trying to become physically fit is that gardening is physically demanding in the first place. You’re working with the dirt, moving it, planting sprouts and seeds, and doing every other activity that goes along with building and maintaining a beautiful masterpiece.

Even when you go to clean up your tools, you’re still burning a good amount of calories. It only takes a few changes to make your gardening experience a few degrees more intense to begin burning just as many calories as light to moderate cardiovascular exercise might.

Getting into the Exercise of Gardening

Becoming a gardener is one thing, but moving a fond activity to become one that burns serious calories is a slightly different thing.

The first thing you need to do with your gardening to turn it into an aerobic exercise is to begin by stretching. You need to go through the same stretching that you would in the gym to promote blood flow, to raise your metabolic rate, and, above all else, to minimize your chance of accidental injury.

You’ll then need to start with the typical garden maintenance activities you’re already familiar with. The only difference is that you should greatly exaggerate your movements while you care for your garden.

For example, take an activity that’s as simple as digging. You should make your motions wider while placing a greater emphasis on lifting the shovel higher or making your movements more explosive. The idea is to burn extra calories by making your gardening more active.

Digging the same foot-deep hole, covering it up, then digging it up again is a practice known as double-digging. The beauty of this is that it aerates the soil, which helps your plants while giving you an incredible workout.

An important principle to keep in mind is that your gardening workout should be structured. You only want to spend 30 minutes or so doing aerobic gardening before you take a break

When you’re ready for clean up, take the time to wind down while you perform maintenance on your gardening tools. Appreciate what you’ve done for both your garden and your own body by being active.

As time progresses, you’ll end up with a beautiful garden and a physically fit body by enjoying your role as an aerobic gardener.