Investing your time in physical activities is definitely a great idea. It is both fun and good for overall health. Today, I want to present different frugal activities and if you want to add some action to your lifestyle I’m pretty sure you will find there something that fits to you.

Walking

If you haven’t exercised for a long time, then walk is a way to go. You can develop your new habit beginning with this activity. Walking is free, nice and not so demanding for beginners. Take comfortable clothes and shoes and set a track across a nice park. I walk everyday 15 minutes to the office and back. In the morning, it is a great way to get some fresh air after night and when I finish hard day at the office, 15 minutes of walk helps me to release any unnecessary stresses and tensions.

Running

Running is one of my favorite workouts. Can help you burn fat and is much tougher than walking. Important thing is a good pair of shoes and if you don’t need any other gadgets for runners, you can find it great and cheap activity. If you want to begin running, the best place to get some basic knowledge is beginners guide to running on Zen Habits.

Swimming

I prefer to swim in pools, which is not so frugal option. But if there is a good, warm weather outside and a nice lake placed near your home, it is a possibility worth to consider. Swimming is a great workout for your whole body.

Team sports

Soccer, basketball, volleyball are all great sports you can enjoy with your friends and family. What I find great in team sports is a motivating boost coming from challenge. Everybody wants to be a winner.

Bodyweight exercises

Among most popular are different types of pushups, dips and squats. Everything is for free. The disadvantage is that it is easy to lose motivation. Repeating again and again same boring exercises can be dull. I think it is good option only for a certain period of time and to boost your motivation you can run a small challenge for yourself, like each day increasing the number of repetitions. How far will you go with pushups then?

Basic yoga

photo credit: angela7dreams

I know that probably a lot of you when think about yoga, immediately have an image of impossible to perform stretches and positions. But the basic yoga is something that everybody can perform. Give it a try, because there are a lot of benefits coming from this art. Flexibility, tension reduction, improvement of circulation, coordination… Buy or even better borrow a book, search for on-line tutorials, check for yoga TV shows and DVDs and start practicing.

These are my suggestions. Did I miss something?

Next week I will post a bunch of tips that will motivate you to regular exercising, so stay tuned.

This post is written by my brother, Dominik Wrzesniewski.

I know many people who have achieved a real success. Often these successes were spectacular victories and great accomplishments. All these people show certain behavior and characteristics, which, in my opinion, first - are good prognostics of success, and secondly - facilitate its achievement. Real winners take care of matters important for success of their intention. This approach works both for bold ventures but may also be useful for smaller tasks. What is common for winners and what do they do?

Winners plan and recognize

Before each, even a fairly simple task, it is worth to prepare a plan of action. It should include key ingredients and the procedures concerning goal which we want to achieve. The degree of complexity and thoroughness of the plan is growing with the increase in the scale and magnitude of the planned projects. The plan should also include possible scenarios for various courses of events.

Winners keep focus on objective

The overall objective of the activity is always in the limelight. Virtually all the actions are subordinated to the principal objective, then it is easy to eliminate the activities and operations fully redundant, so that we can contribute to saving resources and time.

Winners think broadly

Even with a clearly defined goal; the winners always keep a good orientation in a broader context. They are focused on the main task but they do not forget about different and sometimes even loosely related matters. These cases usually make an extensive network of relationships. Taking care of subordinate elements, promotes a whole on the basis of synergies.

Winners care about the details

The devil lies in the details. Deep truth contained in it, is to acknowledge that sometimes minor elements may weaken or even completely undermine the great venture.

Winners act consistently

Even in seemingly unrelated to each other issues and areas, the operation of winners is always consistent with the whole plan and the main idea. At the level of prepared offer, used tools, communication with customers, all the elements are linked and efficiently used. Often, these actions are part of the visual identification system and organisational culture.

Winners act consequently

Focused all the time on the main objective, winners always consistently implement established milestones leading to the goal. Detailed plan for minor elements and the nodes makes achieving goal easier to control and track progress. By looking at the wider environment, in the case of the emergence of various difficulties, the winners can quickly develop an alternative solution and continue the implementation of the task.

Winners apply the principles of social impact

Most of our activity is undertaken in contact with other human beings. Many decisions important for venture depend on their goodwill. Therefore, gaining their goodwill is definitely a must. Speaking to the individual by name, being genuine and open smile do their job in all circumstances.

Winners believe in themselves

If I do not believe in myself, who else will? This wise truth shows that winners’ faith in themselves, their capabilities and the entire project is the fuel for its implementation. Both themselves and others involved in the process will certainly feel the power flowing with enthusiasm and genuine commitment to the task. Great achievements emerge from passion!

photo credit: jot.punkt

Achieving goals is a matter of motivation. Unfortunately, lack of motivation can happen to all of us, but we cannot afford that this will stop us on our way to success.

My recent way to kick motivation is especially interesting for people who spend a lot of time online. I find it easy, nice and effective. What it is and how it works?

Read about it, watch about it, discuss about it….

…about your task, about what you have to do and about your goal.

Let’s say that I should go today to the gym, but my motivation to do so is about zero. What I do? I read some articles about strength training on my favorite blog concerning this topic.

Need to kick myself for a martial arts training? I watch a kung-fu movie or I visit Youtube for a good fighting, action-packed clip.

Feeling lack of motivation to work on my blog? I read Problogger.

Do you see the pattern? Get interested in your task by reading about it on blogs or other sites. Watch movies or clips; get involved into discussion on forum or chats. This way you gain knowledge which would be helpful in achieving your goal, you set mind in your goal’s direction and you increase your motivation.

Of course, you must do some trials and errors. Some channels will very easily trigger your motivation, some not. Sometimes tasks related to your goal are so unattractive, that you will find it hard to motivate yourself in anyway. But in many cases I found this idea working pretty well.

Good idea for start is to look into our childhood and find this pattern there. Do you remember how much you wanted to play football after watching a good play at TV or how much you wanted to be a kung-fu master after seeing Enter the Dragon? Do you remember how much you wanted to travel across the world after reading a great adventure story? Find out how this idea worked on you in the past. Feel it again. Then it would be way much easier to use it today. Since now, consciously.

photo credit: scottfeldstein

One of my most effective methods to start a new project, habit or any activity is to begin with one, very small and simple step.

I learned this idea from one of my favorite blogger Leo Babauta of Zen Habits. If you have never ever read Zen Habits, I highly encourage you, to do so. This blog covers topics like achieving goals, productivity, being organized, GTD, motivation, simplifying any many others. You can start with Leo’s latest post about simplifying life, where he lists his best articles concerning this subject.

Why one simple step?

• Easy to set and execute
• Engages you and puts you on track toward your goal
• Gives you a momentum for next steps

For me, it is usually enough. This first step is both easy to set and to execute. You can reward yourself right after it. Having finished first step, you are already involved in something new and you have already successfully performed your first task. It is quite motivating, it pushes you further.

Sometimes, we can’t see a clear path to our goal. Very often we hesitate to start, because of that. Our small step is also helpful in such case. Even after very small step, our goal is getting closer to us. Therefore, we would be able to see new directions and possibilities. We can take another small step and another one. Three steps later, we would see and know much more than before the first step. From that point it should be also easier to see the path leading to the goal.

I used it many times. This blog is a perfect example. I was thinking about starting it since January 2008. For over a month I took no action at all. There were always so many things on my head, I was afraid of failure; I didn’t actually know how to start.

Then, one cold day in February, I decided to buy at least a domain with my name. Small, simple step. It triggered me very well. With domain I took also a hosting and then all things got the right momentum.

It is good I took this step and bought the domain and hosting. Otherwise I would probably hesitate quite a long time with starting my blog.

photo credit: Alé

Where can you use this idea?

Be creative, use your mind.

Open a saving account. Then start saving money.
Borrow a book about investing. Start investing on a stock market.
Buy a domain. Launch your own online business.
Register to a new social media. Use it to promote your online business.
Start exercising 5 minutes per day. Subscribe to a fitness club.
Buy a bottle of mineral water. Drink it during a day.
Start writing your post/article with preparing a good headline.
…

As you can see, there are endless possibilities. I’m sure you will be able to fit this idea into achieving any of your goals.