(Akiit.com) If you’re working well towards making fitness a part of your life, you want to start looking beyond how to get started. You know about what kind of exercises you should be doing and how intensely. But there are other things besides the workout itself that influence how effective it is. We’re going to look at just a few of them now.
Your head
Emotional and mental health play a huge role in how well we exercise. Firstly, we need to recognise that motivation is a chemical trick our minds play on us. If we’re not motivated or we’re stressed, exercise can be the furthest thing from our mind. It’s a vicious cycle that can be reversed, however. Exercise is one of the best things for better mental health. The more you put into your exercise, th 
more positive mental results you get from it. However, if destressing helps you get motivated to exercise, make time for it. Sportsandthemind.com and similar sites list all kinds of ways you can look after your head and your body all at once.
Your diet
It should be no surprise that how you diet can hugely change the results you get from a workout. First of all, you need to consider the simple laws of thermodynamics. If you eat more calories than you burn off, you won’t be losing any weight. Then there’s the nature of supplements and the nutrition that make working out more effective. Protein powders are as popular as they are for that very reason.
Sleep
Similarly, obvious to anyone who does their research is how important sleep is to exercise. In fact, sleep is important to every facet of physical health. You need energy to tackle your workouts properly. You also need sleep to recover properly from them as well. Without that rest, your body will be sore for longer and develop less from every session. If you absolutely have to take a short night’s sleep for some reason, consider the amount of time carefully. Sleep cycles last about an hour and a half. Waking up in the middle of them can result in grogginess staying with you for a long time at the start of the day. For this reason, it’s actually better to get three hours sleep than to get four.
Routine
The most important thing of getting yourself into a better exercise routine is… the routine itself. Not what you do, but how often and consistently you do it. It’s no good intense workouts if you’re unlikely to do them often. You need to set yourself up with a routine you can stick to and potentially build on gradually. Examinedexistence.com and similar sites can tell you why routines are so important, precisely.
We all want to make sure our efforts are as effective as they can possibly be. A whole range of physical factors need to be addressed to make sure we get the best from our workouts. From our emotional and mental health to our sleep patterns, it’s essential to take care of yourself.
Staff Writer; Latasha Love