Aside from getting your blood flowing and your heart pumping, busting a move is a great way to get those endorphins going.

“So much of the world of joy gets stuck above the neck and intellectualized,” Radha Agrawal, the creator of the joy-sparking digital dance workout platform Daybreaker+ previously told Well+Good. “But we’ve actually found that a lot of real joy can come from activating the body-brain connection through movement.”

All you need to do is start moving to the beat. But if you don’t feel comfortable just freestyling it to your favorite tunes, a new 10-minute energizing hip-hop follow-along routine for Well+Good’s Trainer of the Month Club from professional dancer and Lululemon Studio trainer Amanda Baxter will get you stepping, jumping, and smiling.

Baxter will take you through six compound dance moves that you’ll put together for a short routine at the end. If that sounds intimidating, don’t worry: Baxter teaches the moves one at a time, and makes sure to review it all. Throughout, she focuses on feeling yourself, putting your own personality into the moves, and not letting something like a hand motion bog you down from grooving in time with the beat.

“With each execution you’re gonna get a little more comfortable and more energized,” Baxter says. “Give a little swag to it, give a little sass, a little attitude.”

You can expect to be hoppin’ it out and swirlin’ it up, doing low lunges with knee knocks, and a shuffle with throwin’ some elbows. Baxter will (helpfully) remind you to breathe, since she expects your heart rate to spike. Most of all, she wants you to be having fun.

“I wanna see those big, sweaty smiles,” Baxter says.

A new mobility and stability workout for back pain for Well+Good’s Trainer of the Month series contains all of the classics, which are must-dos for a reason. They bring blood flow and lubrication to joints, and length to muscles shortened from staying in one position all day.

But one move that physical therapist Winnie Yu, DPT busts out during this 16-minute routine truly blew my mind. Well actually, it’s a Frankensteined combo of two moves.

Windshield wipers, which involve laying on your back with your knees bent, and then dropping your knees back and forth from side to side, are one of those classics that are great for people experiencing back pain and hip stiffness. “Why this is one of my favorite exercises to do is, if you think about the position of sitting all day at your desk, or standing all day at work, some of those lower back muscles and hip muscles can get really tight,” Dr. Yu says. “So if you do lower spine rotations, it’s a great way to get blood flow and mobility to the area.”

Another delectable classic is the figure four hip stretch, in which you start in that same lying down knees bent position, but you place one ankle on top of the opposite knee, then use your hands to draw that knee closer to your chest. This is a must-have move in your hip and glute stretching arsenal, with some added benefits in releasing your lower back, and even stretching your inner thigh.

Here’s where things get interesting. After going through classic windshield wipers, Dr. Yu instructs you to place your lower body in a figure four position. Then, you’ll do that same side-to-side rock, extending your knees towards the ground, while still in figure four. It’s like a windshield wiper with added oomph, creating space in your hip joint and glute muscles, and adding an extra stretch to your lower back as you twist.

You might not get your knees very far down at first, but keep at it, and your trunk will limber up. Don’t be surprised if you hear cracks or pops, says Dr. Yu. “Things will move, things will shift, it’s totally fine,” she says.

Do the whole mobility and stability routine in the video above to bring that same level of deliciousness to your upper back, too.

Really just 14 minutes earlier. That’s the length of a new routine of dynamic stretches for the morning from Well+Good’s Trainer of the Month, physical therapist Winnie Yu, DPT, who has put together her go-to moves for the morning. The full-body routine will lube up your joints and tendons, and also help activate your muscles. This will have you feeling more alert, but it will also enable your muscles to perform their very important duties of holding you up with good posture all day.

“If you spend a lot of time on your phone, or even at your computer for your day-to-day, this is a great thing you can do to prime those muscles at the start of the day,” Dr. Yu says.

Don’t worry, we know these are the first moves you’ll do in the morning, so Dr. Yu is ready to ease you into it with slow, gentle movement. You’ll start with a dynamic version of a three-directional child’s pose, meaning you’ll stretch back onto your hips with your arms in front of you, to the left, and to the right, moving in and out of tabletop position. Bringing a little movement to what’s typically a static recovery stretch is “a great way to bring more blood flow to those muscles at the start of the day,” Dr. Yu says. “Once we switch over to the opposite direction, we can hone in to each side a little bit better. You should feel a deeper stretch into those side trunk muscles.”

Next, half kneeling poses, lunges, and even some planks (don’t worry—you won’t be holding the position long), will help gently awaken your hip flexors, which can get shortened when you spend long periods of time sitting.

Finally, a standing series in which you’ll stretch your shoulders, open your chest, and create space in your lower back, will set you up for feeling “looser, more mobile, and ready to tackle the day,” Dr. Yu says.

So, have we convinced you to set your alarm 14 minutes earlier? Give it a shot: Your body will thank you for it.

Desk goblin mode also results in tightness and pain in what physical therapist Winnie Yu, DPT, describes as your “stress muscles.” These are the muscles of your neck and upper back, including your trapezius and the muscles surrounding your scapula.

There are some easy ways to release these stress muscles (and keep computer work from affecting your whole body). The first is to get up or change positions every 30 minutes or so. But you can also take a body vacation while sitting right at your desk by doing a series of stretches that Dr. Yu has put together in a new nine-minute video for the most recent episode of Well+Good’s Trainer of the Month Club.

“Every day I get patients that complain of neck pain or back pain, and these exercises are a really good way to combat some of those issues,” Dr. Yu says.

You’ll work in quadrants: Your upper back and shoulders, your mid-back and core, and your lower body. While your stress muscles are located in that first quadrant, tight or disengaged muscles in your trunk and base can affect your posture and contribute to that overall goblin feeling.

Dr. Yu starts with a series of static neck stretches. You’ll really want to hold these for the full 30 seconds to see their benefit and feel a delicious loosening up.

“These muscles typically get tight when we’re working at a desk and leaning forward to a computer,” Dr. Yu says. The stretches she takes you through “are a really great way to loosen up those muscles, bring more blood flow, and improve that extensibility.”

You’ll move into side stretches and shoulder and chest openers, before hinging forward at your hips to stretch your glutes, hips, and hamstrings. In less than 10 minutes, the series can take you from a ball of stress to a lengthened and strengthened body.

In a new video for our Trainer of the Month Club, Winnie Yu, DPT, a New York–based physical therapist who focuses on the connection between mental health and fitness, demonstrates a 15-minute morning stretch routine that moves through gentle full-body dynamic stretches and a few core stability moves to start loosening up your muscles and joints and getting your blood flowing.

The best part? You don’t even need to get out of bed if you don’t want to. “You can do it from the comforts of your bed, your couch, your living room rug, virtually anywhere,” says Dr. Yu.

The routine starts on your hands and knees in a position similar to yoga’s child’s pose. In just under 15 minutes, you’ll get a great mix of upper- and lower-body stretches to open up your hips, shoulders, and back, and then you’ll end with a couple moves to fire up your core.

Depending on how your body feels, you can modify this 15-minute morning stretch to go slower or sink more deeply into the positions, or choose more dynamic movement to get your blood flowing; the number of reps you do is up to you and what kind of movement session you’re looking for. Though Dr. Yu says she typically prefers taking the more dynamic route in the morning. “Waking up after a long night of sleep…you spend a lot of time in just a static position so dynamic stretches are a great way to bring more blood flow to those muscles and lubrication to those joints to start the day,” she says.

But most important is to only go as far as feels good. “We want every repetition to get a little bit deeper into the range without pinching, cramping or even sharp pains,” says Dr. Yu. How far that is might differ from one side of your body to the other—which is perfectly normal, she adds.

If there are particular areas that you struggle with, feel free to pause the video and repeat certain exercises that hit the exact spot that needs a little extra grease. Soon, you’ll be skipping down that yellow brick road (or speed racing for coffee, if you’re anything like me) with no hitch in your get-along.

The answer is most definitely yes. For a HIIT workout with no jumping, you can always try variations of plyometric moves that involve going at a faster pace, but without the added jump. Another way to turn the volume up is to add some weight. According to the American Council on Exercise, adding even a small amount of weight “can increase heart rate by five to 10 beats per minute and oxygen consumption (as well as caloric expenditure) by about 5 to 15 percent compared to performing the same activity without weights.”

The amount of weight you grab makes a difference. When you perform fewer, slower reps with heavier weight, you’re typically building muscle. But if you perform more reps with a lighter weight for long enough to get your heart rate up, that form of strength training can qualify as a cardiovascular activity. So if you pack your interval training with short bursts of weight-infused moves, you’ve got yourself a HIIT workout.

Well+Good Trainer of the Month Tatiana Lampa employs this strategy in a new 20-minute low-impact HIIT workout. Read: No jumping!

“We’re raising your heart rate up with absolutely no jumping to keep it easy on your joints,” Lampa says.

To get to that level of HIIT intensity, Lampa progresses bodyweight moves into those same moves performed with weights, such as a standing side crunch, reverse lunges to bicep curls, dead lift cleans, squat to thruster punches, and more. You’ll wrap up with some fast feet drills to really up the cardio ante (don’t worry, no weights needed for this one), so you can get that HIIT afterburn for hours afterward. Each burst is just 20 seconds, and as Lampa says, you can do anything for 20 seconds. So grab some weights and give it a try!

That’s why Tatiana Lampa, founder of Training with T, recommends mobility exercises. Not only do they relieve back tension, but they can also loosen up stiff hips and shoulders.

Not sure where to start? Lucky for you, Lampa walks us through her 22-minute full-body mobility workout routine in this week’s episode of Well+Good Trainer of the Month Club. It’s full of feel-good movements that will have you loosening things up in no time.

Lampa recommends starting your mobility workout with a trainer favorite: cat-cows. Completing this exercise helps bring you into your body, getting a sense of how it feels today by opening up the hips, lower spine, and chest. “This is one of my favorite mobility drills to add some movement, to add some fluidity to your spine before we start to work out,” explains Lampa. It’s okay to be dramatic here: Really arch, and then really curve that spine.

For those who find themselves hunching over a lot (did someone say text neck?), thoracic-spine twists will help you course correct. “You guys are going to feel that stretch into your mid-back… If you find yourself hunching over a lot at your desk (guilty), this is going to feel so good,” she adds.

The workout intensifies with scorpions—though we promise, it’s not as scary as it sounds. You’ll feel your back, hips, and also your shoulder and chest open up. (You might even feel a tight IT band, too.) It’s so good that Lampa will have you repeat it a few times to get all the blood-flowing benefits before moving on the next side.

Throughout all these yoga poses, stretches, Pilates moves, and standing mobility exercises, pay attention to whether one side feels tighter than the other—it might clue you in to where your body needs a little extra love. Ready? Check out the full YouTube video to get started.

“In order to build strong, but dense and defined muscle, you have to make sure you keep constant tension while you’re working it,” Sebastien Lagree, CEO and founder of Lagree Fitness, previously told Well+Good. Put another way, going slowly is all about increasing “time under tension,” or the duration that your muscles are actually working.

If you move too quickly, you could be relying on momentum, which takes the pressure off the muscle fibers you’re trying to build.

Lagree’s advice pertains to both Lagree done on the megaformer and Pilates done on the mat. In this new 22-minute Pilates and strength workout from Training with T coach Tatiana Lampa, you’ll take your time throughout the full-body routine. Work with intention while doing moves like lowering down in a glute bridge, and maintain your control while you’re sliding your legs in and out on planks and lunges done with the assistance of gliders (or socks if you don’t have gliders on hand).

Prepare yourself for a core blaster right off the bat with dead bugs, hollow body/teaser moves, and planks. Standing poses, like single leg dead lifts with rows, will give you “a lot of bang for your buck,” as Lampa puts it, because you’ll be working your whole body.

It’s all in service of building that resilient muscle that will make you stronger in the long run.

“The beauty about strength and Pilates is that we’re working under time under tension,” Lampa says. “We’re recruiting slow-twitch muscle fibers, which are great to incorporate into your workout routine.”

So how can we keep our backs happy? By warming up our core (so it can kick in and do its job!) and practicing good form, says corrective exercise specialist Tatiana Lampa, founder of Training with T. By ensuring you have a good foundation, you can reap all of the benefits of lifting while preventing injury. In this new episode of Well+Good’s Trainer of the Month Club, Lampa takes us through a 20-minute strength workout that’s full of tips to make sure each move is not only safe, but effective.

One exercise that she swears by for building power is bent-over rows. The exercise involves standing, leaning forward, pushing your hips back, and bringing the weights up and back by bending the elbows. However, if your form’s off, that leaning can quickly leave your back screaming. The key is to keep the spine in a neutral position. “Notice that I’m looking at the top of my mat. I’m not craning my neck here, so maintaining that neutral spine the entire time,” Lampa says.

During any standing strength moves, Lampa recommends shifting your body forward a little bit further over your toes than you usually would. Your muscles will engage and, Lampa says, you’ll “instantly feel that change.”

To take the pressure off during dead bugs—an abdominal exercise that involves moving your opposite arm and leg away from each other while lying on your back—keep your core super still and press your spine down into the mat. If it starts to lift up, instead of sending your leg out, modify the move and tap your heel down onto the floor with a bent knee instead, she explains.

The workout gets juicier and builds with squats to overhead presses, deadlifts, and pushups. While these exercises sound tough, Lampa offers variations you can take to maintain good form and keep that low back—and the rest of your body—safe. Don’t be shy to modify: It will help you build the strength you need to push heavier weights, and ace your next workout. Watch the video to get started.

But that means it can also be a hotspot for pain if not everything is working in shipshape order.

When we talk about the low back, we’re referring to muscles surrounding bottom section of the spinal column. But, just like in all the rest of your body, those muscles don’t work independently. Shoring up your lower back also means working on your core (front and back), glutes, hips, and hamstrings. And strength isn’t the only piece of the puzzle.

“Anything that affects how well these muscles function, like joint mobility, weakness, or injury, may play a role in how efficient the low back muscles work, too,” Leada Malek, DPT, CSCS, previously told Well+Good.

That means tight muscles in the legs or the back, or an immobile spine or hips could be contributing to low back pain. So, to both combat and prevent it, you want to train both mobility and strength.

This lower back–friendly HIIT workout from trainer Charlee Atkins, founder of Le Sweat, does just that. Atkins begins with a mobility warmup that includes moves—like knee circles on your hands and knees—that Atkins says she herself does before every workout. She adds in a side plank with a hip extension intended to “work the obliques in addition to challenging the hip mobility, which will make your lower back feel a lot more supported in all the exercises we’re doing today,” Atkins says.

Two sets of three exercises each done twice through follow the warmup. Throughout it all, she includes mobility elements alongside muscle strengthening. For example, leg lowers “build up hip mobility and core strength,” and a sumo squat with a lean also requires engaging your back muscles and mobilizing the spine to keep the shoulders in line with the hips.

In just 16 minutes, you’ll fit in a serious cardio workout that could also prevent pain down the road. That’s a win-win in our book.

That’s because boxing—or, shadow boxing, if you’re without a bag or partner—is all about doing multiple things at the same time. You want to be grounded but light on your feet, in a rhythm but unpredictable, fast but still powerful.

Fear not: With the right coaching, you can do it. In this 20-minute cardio shadow boxing workout, Rumble trainer Beth Gold will help you unlock the key to putting power behind your jabs, uppercuts, and other punches.

Your base is where it all begins. Boxer stance is when you have one foot forward and your dominant foot stepped back. But you “don’t want to be on a tightrope.” Gold advises that you want to stay nice and grounded in that split stance. Make sure your knees have a soft bend, your weight is equally distributed between both feet, and you’re spreading evenly through all four corners of your feet.

Until, that is, it’s time to move. Gold walks you through how your body weight should be shifting, and the muscles besides just your arms that should be engaging when you’re throwing a punch—without letting the power of the punch throw you off your base.

“I’m not coming up to my toes, I’m staying low, staying grounded,” Gold explains.

This is how Gold articulates the sometimes invisible mechanics that make the difference between just thrusting your arms out there and cutting through the air (or, maybe eventually your opponent) with power.

“As you throw your jab, think about springing off your back foot, and rotate your shoulder down,” says Gold.

Gold has plenty more tips to be channeling your inner butterfly-slash-bee in this 20-minute workout that’s sure to get your heart pumping. It’s also low impact, which means “it’s going to be super easy on your joints, but you’re still going to get a really good sweat,” Gold says.

Barre classes are typically celebrated as low-impact, strength-based workouts you can do while using little more than a ballet barre (or something like the back of a chair, for the folks at home). By repeating seemingly gentle movements until your muscles shake, a good barre class will sneakily challenge nearly all your muscle groups while taking it easy on your joints. And by upping the tempo, you can keep your heart rate elevated the whole time, and check the box for cardio-focused fitness, too.

No matter the style of workout, the American Heart Association recommends getting in at least 30 minutes of aerobic exercise at least five times a week for cardiovascular conditioning. If a repetitive sport like running or biking isn’t your cup of tea, why not try a cardio barre routine?

Well, we’ve got just the video to recommend: For Well+Good’s Trainer of the Month Club, Nicole Uribarri, founding instructor and program director at Bande, picks up the tempo with a challenging but low-impact 20-minute cardio barre workout you can do from your home. But be warned: You’re gonna need your water bottle for this one—hydrate, hydrate!

Uribarri sets the pace right away with big, smooth movements that get your heart pumping in a series she calls a “plank cardio blast.” This sweat-inducing intro starts off with knees-to-chest and shoulder taps in plank, leading into a push-up flow—and it’s all technically still the warm-up. Next, using a light grip on the bar, Uribarri moves into a high-tempo lunge series targeting the glutes and abs.

While the pace of this workout is no doubt bringing the heat, each move is focused on control as much as tempo. The moves may seem pretty simple, but the intensity comes from the quick transitions and big movements. (Looking at you, plank cardio blast!) Make sure to meet your body’s needs by modifying if you feel pain or aren’t quite there yet.

“I want you to do you, I want you to give me your best—whatever that is today,” Uribarri says. “Remember that this moment is temporary, this is a brief moment of your day to focus on you.”

Barre is no doubt a total body workout, and Uribarri lets this shine in the last 8 minutes with a leg-lift series before finishing it out with our favorite—the plank cardio blast. This is tough, y’all! You’re definitely going to feel that heart pumping.

“Toward the end of the workout, your mind is going to tell you to stop,” Uribarri says. “You don’t need to. Stay in it, say yes! Your body can do a little bit more. Exercise is a celebration of what your body can do. Enjoy these moments and enjoy the fact you have the facility and the resources to move in this way.”

Things that support your heart health, according to Haythe, include watching your stress levels, moving more, quitting smoking, logging enough quality sleep, and getting treatment for mental health challenges when you need it. All of these efforts are undoubtedly proverbial spinning plates in the air that can’t always be perfectly balanced. But avoiding an all-or-nothing mindset about heart health is super important. Making small, deliberate changes to protect your cardiovascular well-being is the key to creating healthy habits that are actually sustainable in the long-term.

If you’re not sure where to start, how about adding a little bit of yoga to your weekly routine? The practice has long been studied for its cardiovascular benefits, and it’s been proven that yoga’s mix of deep breathing, mindfulness, and low-impact physical activity can have benefits for your heart (as well as your metabolic health and mental health). In December, for instance, a study in the Canadian Journal of Cardiology found that people who did just 15 minutes of yoga five times a week for three months significantly improved their blood pressure and resting heart rates, and reduced their cardiovascular risk—benefits that weren’t seen among a control group that did stretches instead.

This might partially be explained by yoga’s focus on controlled breathing. “Slow, deep breathing helps you tap into your parasympathetic nervous system, which controls things like heart rate and blood pressure,” Nicola Banger, PT, OCS, a physical therapist with the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York, told Well+Good after the study came out.

“There is also an interesting mind-body connection,” Kapil Parakh, MD, a board-certified cardiologist and medical lead for Fitbit, previously told Well+Good. “Yoga can help reduce stress, which, if unmanaged, can lead to negative health effects, including an increased risk of cardiovascular disease.”

Have we convinced you yet to roll out your mat? Well, you’re in luck. In this episode of our Trainer of the Month Club, yoga instructor Val Verdier leads us through a 9-minute, heart-opening yoga flow that will help you tune in, release stress, and take some deep, life-giving breaths.

Verdier says she particularly loves to do this sequence whenever she wants to get her blood flowing and her body warmed up—like before a run—but she doesn’t have a lot of time. The series swiftly flows through some classic moves like bridge pose, tabletop, downward dog, cobra, and child’s pose. Throughout, Verdier affirms different ways to do the positions, describes how they help open up the heart, and, of course, she encourages steady breathing throughout.

This flow is designed to get your heart pumping, so be prepared. If any of the movements proves to be a challenge, just return to your breath—it will help you center your energy, and support a healthy heart.

In this new 10-minute full-body workout from Well+Good Trainer of the Month Elisabeth Akinwale, a certified personal trainer who is leading our ReNew Year movement plan, the intervals will be short—just 20 seconds!—and you’ll move at whatever pace works for you. Seriously, there’s no need to push it. Rather than speeding through the moves, the focus is on being intentional about your positioning so that you really get the most out of the work.

Akinwale sets the tone right away. During a round of jump speed skaters, the first of six moves you’ll perform twice through, Akinwale stresses the customizable nature of the exercise.

“You get to choose how dynamic you want to make this movement, but your goal is to have control when you land and really work on some of that lateral power and balance,” Akinwale says.

Maintaining control during a movement isn’t just about your muscles. During dead bugs, burpees, and alternating pike touches, one of the goals is to intentionally breathe throughout, despite the fact that you’re working on your core.

“It can be hard when you’re using your core to not hold your breath, but that’s one of the skills you want to build, is to be able to hold tension and position, but still breathe,” Akinwale says. (And there’s no need to be quiet either, she adds. Embrace the pant.)

After the six-move series, you’ll round out the workout with some final moves that combine stretch and strength, further promoting balance within the body.

Ultimately, keeping a handle on the way your body is moving during an exercise will help prevent injury and ensure you get the most out of a workout. So stay tuned in and move with intention, always.

In particular, combining hip flexor and glute strength with hip mobility will give you a longer, more powerful stride. Hip flexor strength will enable a forceful knee drive, while hip mobility will allow you to access the range necessary to engage your glutes. Taken together, these are precisely what will put that pep into your step.

To that end, Well+Good Trainer of the Month Elisabeth Akinwale, a certified personal trainer who is leading our ReNew Year movement plan, has designed an 8-minute full body workout complete with mobility and strength moves specifically designed to support runners and walkers.

After a quick mobility warm-up, you’ll cycle through three moves done three times. The most directly applicable to running is a set of high knees moving forward to the front of your mat (followed by gentle backpedaling to return to the back of it). Akinwale clues you in throughout about how to make the most of this exercise.

“When you do your high knees, you really want to strike the ground with that mid foot and try to flex the foot as you come up and use those arms to really get yourself pumping,” Akinwale says. Her tips: Be aggressive with the arms, and think of punching down with the feet.

The second move in the set is an alternating plank lift, in which you’ll lift alternating arms and legs while in a plank. Keep it controlled, and stretch your limbs long to get the most out of it. “This is building that anti-rotational strength that you need for stability when you’re running,” Akinwale says.

Next up is flutter kicks, during which Akinwale really wants you to flex your feet to help strengthen your shin muscles. (Because nobody wants to get stopped in their tracks by shin splints.)

Finally, you’ll round out the workout by shifting onto all fours, and, working one leg at a time, kicking back and then bringing the leg around to the side as you bend the knee and open up your hip. There’s that hip mobility for ya. It’s all coming together now.

This is called agility, or your body’s ability to be “quick and nimble while maintaining control,” Corey Phelps, a Washington, D.C.-based fitness trainer, previously told Well+Good.

Agility combines the ingredients of speed, control, and balance. It also requires building strength so that your muscle fibers can spring into action on a dime.

A new full-body agility workout from certified personal trainer Elisabeth Akinwale, who is leading Well+Good’s ReNew Year movement plan this month, will help you strength train with this goal in mind. The 9-minute session is all about maintaining control and then building up to increasing the speed.

“Focus on quality over everything else,” Akinwale says. “And then we start to push the intensity where we can.”

You’ll begin with some muscle-activating and joint-opening squat open ups, which combine a deep squat with a spinal twist and arm raise. Next you’ll move into the full-body work, which include moves like extended V crunches, Supermans, and more. This section will also have you imitating the fast footwork of a football player with some ladder X jumps (no ladder required), and will prompt your body to repeatedly recruit your muscles in changing directions with moves like plank side steps.

Take it at your own speed until you feel confident enough to pick up the pace, and you’ll soon be as nimble as the agility goals mascot, the cat.

Well, that’s up to you. Often called AMRAP workouts (for “as many reps as possible”), this way of structuring a training session allows you to easily adjust the intensity level to wherever your fitness is at, and however you’re feeling that day. You’re in charge of how much energy you give it. An AMRAP can be a chance to completely fatigue your muscles, or to take it slow and steady to zero in on your form.

“AMRAP workouts are about achieving your goals—big or small—through dedication, hard work, limited distraction, and focus,” Jason Khalipa, author of As Many Reps As Possible: Succeeding In Competition, Business, and Life By Making The Most Of Every Single Minute previously told Well+Good.

Certified personal trainer Elisabeth Akinwale, founder of 13th Flow Chicago, gives a series of AMRAP intervals in this new eight-minute, full-body workout video to kick off Well+Good’s four-week ReNew Year movement program. “You can take it however fast or slow you want—that’s up to you,” she says.

Akinwale designed this multidirectional strength workout specifically so that it can be easily customized to your fitness level. You’ll be circling through reverse lunges, Supermans, windshield wipers, and a handful of other exercises to work multiple muscle groups in multiple planes of movement. She spends 30 seconds on each move, allowing you to do as many repetitions as feels comfortable in that timeframe. “Any speed that works for you, works for me,” she says. “It’s your workout, so you can make what you want out of it.”

Some exercises will inevitably come easier, and you’ll be able to flow through them quickly. Others may force you to slow down to get the hang of proper technique. Just make sure you’re not rushing so fast that you aren’t going through your full range of motion, or your form starts to fade, or you get so exhausted you have to stop all together. Akinwale says, “Our goal is just to move consistently throughout the interval.”

If you sign up for the ReNew Year plan, you’ll get a week’s worth of daily workouts like this one delivered to your inbox every Sunday this month, all programmed with Akinwale’s expertise as a trainer, former gymnast, Olympic weightlifter, CrossFitter, and social worker.

One thing she underscores: Don’t feel like you’re being “soft” if you have to ease off the gas during a workout. True strength is being in tune enough with your own body to know what it needs, and honoring that. “If it’s feeling like too much, just slow it down a little bit,” she says.

If you’re following the ReNew Year program, we’ll be coming back to this same workout multiple times so you can not only get more comfortable with each of the exercises, but also so you’ll get a solid sense of your progression as the month goes on. “You can push it even further next time,” Akinwale says.

“This is guaranteed to wake you up and get you feeling energized for your day,” says Spencer.

Exercise feels so great first thing in the morning because it increases blood circulation, which sends oxygen to your brain and throughout your body, naturally helping you wake up and get going. It also helps you improve brain function because it stimulates the release of proteins and hormones responsible for nerve development and plasticity in the brain.

Spencer keeps those brain-boosting benefits at the forefront with a workout that challenges both your body and your mind. Right away, you’ll work through poses lying down, featuring classic Pilates moves like tabletop legs and glute bridges. But Spencer throws in some compound movements and coordination to get your noggin’ in on the action, too.

“We’re getting that brain to work a little bit to help us wake up for our day,” Spencer says while leading single arm, single leg extensions. “I know we’re all busy multitaskers, so starting your day with a little multitasking in your body, you can’t go wrong.”

Other moves such as a “double rainbow,” which involves tapping opposite corners of your mat with your extended arm and leg while on hands and knees, and squat to lunges, continue the multitasking action.

Of course, if that’s a bit too much so early in the day, Spencer includes plenty of modifications that take the “rub your tummy and pat your head” factor out of the Pilates equation. Overall, it’s a workout that will get your blood pumping, your brain working, your spine lengthening, and your muscles awakening. Good morning, sunshine! We know you can handle it.

This new standing Pilates workout from East River Pilates instructor Brian Spencer will make your whole body quake in just 11 minutes. You’ll use two light weights (Spencer opts for two-pound toning balls), and the power of your brain to activate and engage.

“When it comes to strength training, this is my number-one efficiency hack: Use your brain!” Barry’s CEO Joey Gonzalez previously told Well+Good. “If you focus on the targeted muscle group while you’re performing the exercise, you can activate and challenge those muscles exponentially more.”

That brain power is key to getting the most out of this workout. There are just four base moves, with variations of arm exercises you’ll do while hinging, lunging, squatting, and squat-lunging. Making sure your glutes are turned on and your core is tight will not only ensure good form, it will make moves that appear to be arm-focused challenging all over your body.

For example, during the first move—a static hip hinge with arm reaches—Spencer advises that you “should be feeling so much in your shoulders, hamstrings, glutes, and abdominals.” While the hamstrings are “working like crazy, we’re finding length in the postural muscles, we’re engaging those abdominals, and we’re strengthening up the low back.”

A series of chest-opening, back-squeezing, and shoulder-working arm moves done in a lunge (with the front leg glute powering it all) follows the hinges. Next comes arm reaches and twists while in a squat, and Spencer finally brings it all together by adding a lunge to the squats while maintaining the arm reach and twists.

If it sounds challenging, that’s because it is. But it’s four moves, and 11 minutes, and then you’re done. Talk about efficient.

This attitude is relevant for both the literal and figurative idea of finding balance in life. But today, we’re focusing on physical balance, which is really “a host of different variables that are all orchestrated in the brain,” Lara Heimann, PT, previously told Well+Good. That means balance is your brain’s ability to synthesize information such as environmental and sensory cues that help you locate your body in space (a concept called proprioception), and then translate that to your muscles so that you can keep yourself upright.

One way to improve balance is to work on the muscle groups that play a big role in keeping you grounded, which include your feet and ankles, calves, and glutes. Pilates instructor Brian Spencer of East River Pilates is here to lead you through a 12-minute balance-building routine that focuses on these often overlooked areas. That involves concentrating on where you’re placing your weight in your foot so you can call upon the small muscles in your feet and ankles while also recruiting the larger muscles that support them.

“If you’re ever like, How can I really help my balance?, a lot of times it’s by strengthening all the muscle groups that help you support the weight in the back of the foot like squats, and in the front of the foot, like your calves,” Spencer says.

The bread and butter moves he builds upon in this series are squats, calf raises, and single leg standing poses. That might sound simple, but Spencer puts them together in a way that’s specifically meant to challenge both your strength and your balance.

“Balance is all about correction,” Spencer says. “It’s not really about never wobbling. It’s always about being like, How do I self-correct when I’ve gone a little off course?” Wise words to keep in mind for exercise, and for life. We hope giving yourself time to do this routine helps you find a little more balance in both.

Practitioners know that most Pilates exercises, big or small, work your muscles in non-obvious ways. That’s because coordinating your breath to the movement is an integral part of the workout, challenging your core—and other muscle groups—with every inhale and exhale.

“We’re waking up the deep core with that exhale and that inhale,” explains Pilates instructor Brian Spencer of East River Pilates.

In this new 25-minute video, Spencer takes us through a well-rounded Pilates workout designed for beginners and more experienced practitioners alike. He begins with the foundation of mat Pilates: the ability to find a neutral pelvis and thus engage your core. But what the heck does that actually mean?

“When we find our neutral pelvis, it will just mean that the pelvic bone and tailbone are stacked with a little space under your lower back,” Spencer says. Helpfully, he adds that your pubic bone is located a few fingers below your belly button.

Once you’ve gotten a feel for your foundational core position, if you’re finding staple moves a bit confounding, Spencer shares some common variations that can be helpful starting points.

For example, to work up to table top, you can begin with heel glides. This involves laying on your back with a neutral pelvis. Then, you lift your toes, which engages the hamstrings, and you pull your legs in and lead them back out. This mimics the movement of leg lifts and lowers in table top position without the added weight that holding your leg off of the floor requires.

“I love a good heel guide,” Spencer says. “It’s an extremely effective exercise for building coordination of breath and abdominals.”

Spencer leads us through similar ways to work up to classic Pilates moves like roll ups and roll downs, forearm and side planks, and more. But really, once you’ve mastered the neutral pelvis, the world of mat Pilates is your oyster.

Both stretching and working out in the morning get our blood flowing, which helps our organs (including our brains) function properly, and sends oxygen to parts of our body that might be stiff after a night of sleep. More intense movement can reduce that a.m. brain fog, while gentle exercises may awaken our “rest and digest” parasympathetic nervous system, setting us up for some calm and focused hours ahead.

A new morning workout from Charlee Atkins, trainer and founder of Le Sweat, both creates space in our bodies and activates our muscles. In this 10-minute mobility-focused workout video, Atkins zeroes in on helping your hips, spine, chest, and shoulders move throughout their full ranges of motion. To do that, she combines stretches with strengthening exercises to get the benefits of both types of movement.

For example, a set of isometric split squats works your lower body and increases mobility, since the position includes a front body stretch. The move you activate, the deeper the stretch.

“We’re really firing up that back glute to open up the hips,” Atkins says.

Other mobility-focused moves include windmill stretches to mobilize your shoulder joints and spine, side planks to awaken your core, and an ending set of step jacks for a little cardio burst to get your heart pumping.

And, of course, what would a morning movement session be without some downward dogs? It’s a cross-species classic for a reason.

Mixing up your exercise routine this way can help you avoid hitting a “fitness plateau,” or when your strength gains start to slow down because your body is less challenged by a movement it’s gotten used to.

“Your body is very smart and it will learn how to become efficient at doing the same movements,” Jeanette Jenkins, trainer and Marshalls clothing rep, previously told Well+Good.

The idea of making variety a part of your fitness routine often refers to the need to incorporate multiple elements for a well-rounded workout, such as strength training, cardio, and mobility work. However, it also applies to the movements themselves, since your body will get used to being pushed in the same ways over and over again.

Which is why in fitness, as in life, variety is the necessary spice. And Charlee Atkins, trainer and founder of Le Sweat, is here to be your salt bae with an efficient routine that packs a challenge into every rep.

A lot of the moves Atkins employs include elements of classics like crunches and planks. However, she turns these bases into compound movements that work more areas of your core, such as the “crunch combo” that will fire up both your upper and lower abs. A “quarter get-up” is like an oblique focused roll-up. And the final set of bicycles includes a twist that Atkins promises will “change your life on bicycles.”

Press play to find out how to turn these ab moves on their head, and strengthen your core in under 10 minutes. As Atkins says, “Let’s hit it.”

The solution? Well, you should ideally be getting up to stretch and move every 30 minutes or so. But if you want to start livening up those hips in a more targeted way, you can work on your hip mobility, or your hip joint’s ability to move through its full range of motion.

“Hip mobility is critical for healthy movement and injury prevention,” Corinne Croce, DPT, physical therapist, previously told Well+Good. When you’re immobile in one area, your body may try to compensate in another place, which can cause pain and injury.

Tight hip flexors, for instance, could cause lower back pain, since they originate in the lower back. Hip mobility is also especially important for runners since tight hips could impede your stride from reaching its full extension.

But where to start? Trainer Charlee Atkins, creator of Le Sweat, has put together a 12-minute hip mobility workout that’s perfect for beginners.

“If you’re looking to loosen up your hips, but don’t know how to get started, this is the workout for you,” Atkins says.

Key to some of her moves are two patterns of motion: rocking and rotating. For example, in the adductor stretch, which involves kneeling on one leg while the other leg goes straight out to the side, you’ll rock back and forth to help mobilize in the side-to-side plane of motion. But you’ll also rotate the foot of your extended leg, which will mobilize your hip in a circular motion. Other movements Atkins will walk you through, like lying-down leg lifts and squats with calf raises, combine this rock ‘n rotate pattern to help get you loose in 360 degrees.

This kind of movement might be challenging at first if you have especially tight hips. Atkins’ advice? Find the edge of your range of motion, but don’t go past it. To do that, slow down so you can listen to your body’s cues.

“Slow it down, see as far as you can go, and then slowly release,” Atkins says. Aaaahhhhh.

For that, you need 360 degrees of strength, from both your back muscles, and your core (which actually encompasses some of your back muscles, like the erector spinae and multifidus along the spine).

“A main role of the back muscles is to keep the spine erect or extended,” Erin Policelli, a physical therapist and founder of Stretch Kinetics in Atlanta, previously told Well+Good. “In contrast, the abdominal muscles are their antagonist, and act to flex the spine. If you think of the constant force of gravity that is pulling us, the spinal muscles are needed to constantly work to keep us upright.”

That’s a big responsibility, so it makes sense that we would need to work out those stabilizers, just as we work out our larger muscles.

To do that, trainer and creator of Le Sweat Charlee Atkins has put together a 15-minute bodyweight workout specifically meant to set your body up for having good posture. You’ll do exercises meant to activate your upper body, such as T-pulls and Y-pull downs, in which you work to bring your shoulder blades together. That will strengthen your back and lats, which you’ll need to keep your shoulders from rolling forward. But a lot of the workout will be compound moves that work your upper body, back, and core all at once.

“A lot of posture is going to be core exercises,” Atkins says.

That involves some of the best exercises for posture, such as bird dogs, dead bugs, and cat cows. You’ll move your spine slowly and with control, which will require the muscles to hop to attention.

Doing these small movements that require creating tension by squeezing your muscles and pushing and pulling your limbs in opposite directions might not be as flashy as heavy lifting or HIIT. But it’s just as useful if you want to stand tall.

But there’s a lot more going on in the body during a run than just getting the heart pumping extra hard. When we run, our leg muscles are in flexion (bent) for an extended period of time. So in a post-run cooldown, you may want to counter that motion with stretches that extend the muscles.

While the research is not clear on whether a post-run stretch improves recovery, it’s undeniable that it feels great, which is a benefit that you definitely shouldn’t discount.

“[Cooling down with some stretching] gives the person a few minutes to switch gears between what they were doing and what they are doing next, to reflect on the work they did, and build confidence and trust around their exercise routine,” Kaitlyn Baird, CEP, a USA triathlon level 1 coach and an exercise physiologist at the Sports Performance Center at New York University Langone Health, previously told Well+Good. “If you ask practitioners in the field, the cooldown is most certainly an important part of any training session.”

You also know what your body needs. For example, Barry’s trainer and Nike running coach Sashah Handal says that she sometimes feels her lower back compress as her muscles fatigue during a long run. So in her cooldown, she includes stretches that bring space to her spine and her hips.

That’s just one of the ways you’ll stretch in this 12-minute after-run cooldown video, led by Handal, who is Well+Good’s Trainer of the Month.

“This cooldown is geared more on flow and breath, similar to a yoga sequence,” Handal explains. “Focus on really digging deep into the movement, and trying to settle into the stretch.”

You’ll begin with a series of forward folds that release your hamstrings and open the spine and the shoulders. Knee hugs and twists come next. And then you’ll move into a bit of a yoga flow with downward and upward dogs, as well as hip openers like pigeons. Throughout it all, remember to breathe, and if a stretch feels particularly yummy, stay in it for as long as you’d like.

“Allow yourself to completely release, completely surrender,” Handal says. “That’s all we can truly ask for from a cooldown.”

“As you run, one leg is hitting the ground while the other leg is moving forward, so running is technically a single-leg movement,” says Barry’s trainer and Nike running coach Sashah Handal.

That’s why Handal says it’s key to train one side of the body at a time—so that each leg can build endurance on its own. Otherwise, it’s too easy for the stronger side to take over while strength training, leaving you lopsided.

“We want to make sure each of those legs are prepped,” Handal says.

In her latest workout video as part of Well+Good’s month-long celebration of running, the United States of Running, Handal shares her favorite moves to mobilize, activate, and prepare the body for success on long runs. You can do this 15-minute video as a warm-up for a run, or on days in between runs as part of a running-specific strength training routine.

You’ll start off with some dynamic stretches to lengthen and wake up the muscles. A couple of these involve standing on one leg and playing with balance, which helps build the small stabilizer muscles in your feet and ankles. Handal’s advice for this section? Go slow, and don’t worry if you lose your balance and need to put a foot down. Just pick back up where you left off

Next, you’ll start to work on those single legs. You’ll begin with my all-time favorite dynamic running stretch, hinges. These mimic a stride in slow motion.

“You’re almost emulating what a sprinter would do, and you’re creating momentum in opposing direction that is really challenging for the balancing leg,” Handal says. “But the slower you move, the more control you access, and the tighter you brace your core, the better this will become.”

From there, you’ll do a variation on a hinge with some more full-body strength challenges, which will “warm up the glutes, the hamstring, the quad, the core, basically your whole body,” Handal says. And you’ll round out that side with single leg raises in a bridge position as well as oblique work in a modified side plank. Then, you’ll do it all again on your other side.

Your body is strongest when all the parts are moving together, but it’s nice to know that you can stand on your own one foot when you need to.

“That workout gave you all you needed to really build endurance on one leg at a time,” Handal says. “Hit your next long run with tons of confidence and feel super successful with your ability to really go the distance.”

It turns out, this is something you can both prepare and train for ahead of time by warming up correctly. In this 10-minute mobility warmup for runs, Barry’s trainer and Nike running coach Sashah Handal will lead you through activating exercises for all of the muscles you’ll need to recruit as you log those miles.

“When you’re running longer distances, and those quads get tired, you’re going to need to pull in all the muscles to get you through your full distance,” Handal says. Our quads and the front of the leg are the default muscles we use most in distance running, but to actually go that distance we’ll need our glutes and hamstrings to chip in. That’s why “it’s really important to make sure that you’re activating and warming up the back of the leg,” Handal says.

That way, when I say, “Okay muscles, time to kick into gear,” they will know what to do.

To prep our muscles for these runs, Handal includes three elements in this workout: stretching, strengthening, and building heat. These are precisely the ingredients necessary for a good warmup: You need to get your blood pumping, you need to get your muscles ready for action (or, to “activate” them), and you need to lubricate your joints.

That last point is essential: Mobility refers to the range of motion of your joints and their surrounding systems. Since the main joints you’ll be using in a long run are your hips, Handal includes plenty of hip openers along with moves like lunges that also wake up your leg muscles as you find the mobility you’ll need to run with an efficient stride.

Can you feel the heat? Good, you’re ready to run!

Coordination is your ability to move smoothly, quickly, and with control. And it’s actually something you can train through practice.

Enter: The Shoe. In Well+Good’s newest Trainer of the Month Club video, Barry’s trainer and marathon runner Sashah Handal will lead you through a series of exercises meant to strengthen and activate the muscles that are crucial for your run, including your core, quads, hamstrings, and more. But she’ll also challenge your coordination with the addition of a shoe that you’ll weave up, under, over, and through your body.

For example, you’ll do a lunge exercise, which is already working your quads, hamstrings, and glutes. But you’ll pass the shoe under and over your bent front leg to add an extra dimension to the move.

“This pass through is just enough time to add a little bit of tension through that front leg and load up the muscles that you’re going to need once you start to run,” Handal says.

You’ll also thread the shoe under your side in side planks, weave it through your legs in a squat, press it out in front of you to activate your upper body, lift it above your hips to meet your leg in a side crunch, and more.

Of course, the shoe doesn’t have to be a literal shoe. You just need to grab something lightweight and small enough to comfortably hold in one hand. If you’re a runner, using a shoe just reminds you what your goal is.

“The shoe just makes it more exciting and more motivating to get you out the door and onto the pavement for your run,” Handal says.

In this case, three shoes are better than two!

This Afro dance-inspired workout from Kiné Camara will get you sweating before you know it. If you’re unfamiliar with Afro dance, you can check out Camara’s introduction to some common Afro groove moves to get the basics down. Want to dive deeper into the choreography? We’ve got a whole routine for you right here. But if your flavor is more about moving and having fun without having to worry about the finer points of learning a dance number, this is the video for you.

After a warmup meant to get you “nice and loose” featuring hip thrusts and chest bumps, Camara combines footwork, upper body activation, and non-stop energy to get your heart rate up and your muscles working. A trick to making the most of this workout is stay low (aka deep in that squat) and keep your base active but strong.

“Your thighs should be burning now,” Camara advises about a third of the way in. “If they’re not, get lower and wider.”

Camara also says not to worry about the specific moves too much. It’s all about staying active, and expressing your emotions through movement. “This doesn’t need to be a perfect example or reproduction of what I’m doing,” she says. “Don’t just do the action, feel it. Feel that passion.”

But if you are getting overwhelmed by the footwork, Camara has some advice: “Just shake your booty, keep moving, and have a blast.”

Now those are words to live by.