Wake up. Go to Class. Workout. Repeat. If only it were that easy… College is a strange anomaly where some weeks you’ll find yourself with enough time to finish a 10,000 piece puzzle. Meanwhile, other times you’ll be eating a PB & J at 11 PM for dinner because that is the only thing you have time for.

Time in college is like an ocean wave coming onto shore. You’ll always know the wave (time) will be there but never sure how much will come towards you making each day different from the next. While we don’t know what our schedule always looks like the words “I don’t have time to workout” is nothing more than an excuse. We all have the time to incorporate fitness into our lives but the burning question is how? Let’s discover together how we can make fitness part of your schedule starting today!

Establishing your schedule

There are so many frequently changing events that if there is one thing every college student should know its that nothing is ever set in stone. If someone were to ask you to give a detailed layout of your school week (Monday-Friday) do you think you could?

Breaking things down the best way to make a schedule comes down to 3 simple steps.

Step 1: Lay it out

Think of everything in your schedule. This is going to include all things from your personal life all the way to school and work. Anything and everything that happens in your day on a reoccurring basis should be featured here.

Step 2: Organize it

Once you have thought of everything that occurs in your day organize it into a series of categories. This could look like classes, workouts, practices, co-curriculars, work shifts, meetings, etc.

After establishing these categories we are going for the elementary school teacher approach and color coding everything. While it may seem a little overkill to color-code a schedule, this allows for you to easily see what categories are taking the biggest priority in your day.

The last part of step two is to organize it into an hourly schedule. It’s great to have a general list of your day almost treating it like a “to-do” list. However, the problem with this approach is it’s not able to hold us accountable. Instead, try this: Create a schedule that is within the hours of your school day in which you are attending different activities. Once these events are over with and all you are left with is free time you can set this time as its own “category”

Step 3: Logging your progress

There are many different ways to log your weekly calendar. Some prefer the old-school approach of a pen and some good ol’ notebook paper. While others couldn’t imagine not having their schedule in their phone as is everything in their life. Either way, you must establish what works best for you, however, I would recommend using an online tool as you can make quick adjustments when need be.

Some great sources to use are:

• Google Calendar
• Microsoft Outlook
• Free College Schedule Maker
• Canva

From this step, you can see where you have time to input fitness into your day! Remember working out doesn’t need to be an all-day activity rather try to shoot for something between 45-90 minutes for a solid workout. Great times to fit this in your schedule are gaps in between classes, right before your first class of the day or after the last class of your day, and before dinner time.

Key Takeaways:

Most importantly, it’s ok to veer off your schedule at times, priorities take need first. However, when you find yourself with endless hours of scrolling through Tik Tok. Be disciplined to yourself and make sure your personal fitness becomes a main priority in your schedule.

Time discipline is key to enhancing your fitness journey, think if you were to start today imagine where you could be in 6 months. Let that sink in. Now giddy up because after you hit the books today the weights are next.