We all know that being toned and skinny is major #lifegoals, but getting there can be a real fucking struggle. Like, it’s not being AT the gym or actually walking a few miles that sucks—it’s getting up the energy to do it. Like, why should I get in my car and drive to the gym when this couch is perfectly comfortable? I know you know what I mean. Because we want to be lazy AND hot, we’ve rounded up seven super fucking easy workouts you can LITERALLY do in your bed from Cosmo, Self, and Lifehack.
1. Marching Hip Raises
You’ll look stupid doing it, but your abs, butt, and thighs will thank you. Lie on your back with knees bent, heels near your butt, arms down and palms down. Then lift your hips off the bed keeping your upper body down, forming a line between shoulders and knees. Without extending your leg, squeeze your butt and lift your left foot off the bed and bring your knee over your hip. Repeat on the other side.
2. Planking
The most hated of all exercises can be done in the comfort of your own bed. I feel like you all should know how planks go by now because we talk about them in literally every exercise roundup, but one more time for the people in back. Get into push-up position, balancing on your forearms, then align your elbows under your shoulders. Lift to make a straight line with your body from head to feet. Hold for about 25 seconds, rest, and do it again.
3. Bench Press
No explanation necessary, but yes—you can do some bench presses in bed. Lay in bed and lift small 5lb weights like you would if you were actually one of those roided-out dudes at the gym. Start by holding the weights at your chest with your elbows bent and palms facing out. Then push up, extending your arms straight out in front of you. Return to start and repeat until your arms get tired, or like, three sets of 10 reps.
4. Sit Ups & Crunches
I don’t need to explain how to do a crunch or a sit-up, hopefully. These are super simple and perfect for doing in bed without actually getting up. Win.
5. Russian Twists
Sound easy because it fucking is—until you actually try it. Sit on the bed with your hands holding a pillow (if you’re a weakling) or a weight (if you’re actually legit) in front of your chest. Your knees are bent at like a 45 degree angle, heels are on the mattress, and toes are pointed up. Twist your torso from right to left so that the opposite hand touches the opposite side when you twist. Lift your feet off the bed if you’re really good at this shit.
6. Scissor Legs
This one’s fun cause it doesn’t require your head to move off your pillow. Lie on your back with hands underneath your hips and palms down. Bring your feet straight up in the air and, keeping both legs totally straight, bring down your right leg in a controlled manner. Then bring it back up and repeat with left leg. This will totally tone your abs.
7. Diamond Reverse Crunches
Alright now, this one looks super awkward, but can you really care how you look when you won’t even get out of bed to work out? Lie on you back with arms on your sides palms down. Bring your feet together and open your knees so that you have like, a diamond shape in your legs. Think back to fourth grade gymnastics where you’d bend your legs into a diamond shape and try to stretch so your nose touched your feet and you’ve got the basic form down. Now press your palms into the bed and raise your feet over your hips. From there, lift your hips off the bed and make your feet go straight up toward the ceiling. Then bring your hips back to the bed. Repeat until you can’t feel your abs anymore.
Betches of the Northeast and Midwest, prepare to bitch about the weather like never before (or at least since 2014), because another Polar Vortex is on its way to fuck everything up. In case you were too wrapped up in your own drama to notice the last one, here’s a recap: In January 2014, Mother Nature watched too much Game of Thrones and decided that winter was fucking coming for America. Not just any old winter, but the coldest one since some of us were still fledgling betches on the playground. Needless to say, everyone spent it stuck inside somewhere. The lucky ones were at home with several bottles of wine; the not-so-lucky had to abandon their cars on the side of the road like it was the apocalypse.
Once you wound up somewhere warm and drunk, it was actually pretty fun. Which is nice, because apparently a less intense Polar Vortex is predicted to hit the Midwest and Northeast this week. I say this with utmost admiration: Mother Nature is a frigid bitch.
Obviously, the only way to deal with this is with alcohol and TV. Here are 9 wine/Netflix combinations to get you through the week.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m gonna assume the first two weeks of January went a little something like this: 1) Catch a glimpse of your bloated, hungover body on New Year’s Day. 2) Lose your shit and decide to 3) start a cleanse. 4) Abandon said cleanse within 48 hours because pizza exists. Now you’re at 5) Decide to get your beach body back by exercising harder than a 45-year-old actress who just had a baby.
The only problem is that working out, while fun for about thirty seconds, takes valuable time away from other activities, e.g., drinking and/or watching Fixer Upper in bed for six hours.
But, lazy betches, science has finally come to the rescue and calculated the bare minimum of exercise you need in order to not (scientifically) be considered a lazy piece of shit. According to University of Sydney researchers, it’s possible to get all your exercise done in one or two sessions per week.
The World Health Organization says we’re all supposed to get at least 150 minutes of moderate intensity exercise per week. People who have no social lives probably do the whole “30 minutes a day, five times a week” thing, but a betch’s time is precious. We inevitably wind up cramming six SoulCycle classes into a single Saturday to make up for the week’s binge drinking. Honestly, I kind of deserve an Oscar for all the times I’m pretending I love the pain when I’m 30 seconds away from puking in the instructor’s gym bag.
In a study published in JAMA Internal Medicine, researchers compared people who don’t exercise at all (dream), people who only work out once or twice a week (reality), and people who exercise regularly (ew). Obviously, people who worked out all the fucking time were healthier, but apparently, people who only worked out a few times were also less likely to get cancer, have heart attacks, or straight-up die in general.
In conclusion? You’re def not going to get a beach bod by only working out once a week, but at least you’ll be alive to take a beach pic in the first place. Just suck in your gut, work on your skinny arm pose, and you’ll barely look like Jabba the Hutt in the Insta.
