One of the big mistakes people make when they decide to start exercising is that they get involved in a favorite activity and fall into a routine that does not change much from session to session. The tend to forget about the importance of total body exercise. Different exercises target different muscle groups. If you use fitness equipment, different machines target different muscle groups. This even can apply when the only goal is to get a low impact cardio workout. There are two issues to be aware of, repetition within the same muscle groups and repetition of the same amount of time.

If you do the same thing over and over again, with no changes, the muscles adjust, and after a month or two, the benefits are lost. For example, if you only do ten sit-ups every morning, after some time, it gets easy to do and so the muscles are not being challenged. Plus you are only targeting the abs. What the suggestion is from the fitness experts is to adjust not only different muscle types but the number of times you do an exercise, the length of time on a machine and to adjust the resistance.

Generally this would mean after a month or 6 weeks, you up the repetitions, add 10-15 minutes of time and/or adjust the resistance levels to a higher level. These simple adjustments will keep the exercises doing some good for your muscles.

• When you are working at home, you do not have a wide variety of machines to hit different muscle groups, but you can make the best of what you have. Here are a few suggestions. If you have a workout CD or use Wii or something, you need to change it up a bit, and use different music and different activities.
• If you have a machine at home, like a stationary bike, change the resistance and adjust the times. If you are going for a cardio workout, you must have at least 20 minutes in your target zone, but you can build up longer times. Sometimes you might even go backwards and lessen the time and lessen the resistance to change things up a bit.
• You might think about something like a total body exercise machine. There are cross training machines that will hit different muscle groups and give options for different resistance levels. Stationary recumbent bikes can add full body element by adding hand pedals.

No matter what you do, you need to keep being aware of the importance of total body exercise and make sure you are taking the necessary steps to make the most of your workouts.