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Jaiden Powers: A facilitator that helps me stay active is working out with a friend. Having someone to meet at the gym keeps me accountable and makes exercise more enjoyable. On days when my motivation is low, knowing they are counting on me pushes me to follow through.

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Jaiden Powers: A barrier I face with physical activity is feeling drained after long days. By the time I finish with school and other responsibilities, I feel no longer motivated to go to the gym. That makes it easy to put off exercise even when I know I would feel better after the workout/

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Abbie Woelber:

Having a set workout plan with specific days (like push, pull, and legs) helps keep me organized and motivated. It gives me structure so I know exactly what to do when I have time to exercise.

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Abbie Woelber:

A busy school and work schedule sometimes makes it difficult for me to find consistent time to exercise. On days when I have a lot of assignments or long shifts, I feel too drained to stick with my workout routine.

I’ve found that scheduling workouts like appointments in my calendar helps me stay accountable. Even if I only have 20–30 minutes, I remind myself that a shorter session is still better than skipping completely.

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Raschelle Magdaleno

One great facilitator is my friends. If we plan to go for a walk or go workout I stay committed and plan to make time for the gym.

Another one is being well rested for the day. If I go to sleep early and get a full 8 hours of sleep I'm capable of having more energy and motivation to workout and be able to do homework and work.

Lastly eat food for energy if you don't eat before the workout you are probably going to be tired and less motivated.

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Raschelle Magdaleno One common barrier for me is time and exhaustion, sometimes when I workout for 2 hours I'm so exhausted mentally that it's hard for me to work and do homework. It's especially hard when I have class the gym then straight to work until the evening. So I need to do better with planning in advance.

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The greatest facilitator for me is external (people). If I plan to workout with my friend, regardless of if I want to workout or not I can't let him down. Having a companion lessens the load on your integrity to workout as it spreads it across the two of you. (Super great for accountability)

Another great way to stay active is goal setting with keeping a log of your progress? Want to get to a sub 6 minute mile? How fast did you run this week compared to last? How about 3 months ago compared to now? Little wins keep you coming back.

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Cameron Grace

One common barrier but often overlooked is stress. As life piles on "wanting" to do much of anything can be hard. For me I have to set times that I am going to HAVE to workout otherwise it is the easiest thing to cut in an attempt to reduce mental load/stress.

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Alyson Edwards

The biggest facilitator in my life is my athletic career on the UNO softball team. We lift 3 times a week and practice everyday throughout the week. This has allowed me to be able to engage in physical activity daily and exercise consistently to keep up an active lifestyle.

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Alyson Edwards

A barrier I face when it comes to physical activity or exercise is time. I am a college athlete who lifts three days a week and when we go back home on breaks and continue our programs I find it harder for find a time that works best for me. It also becomes harder because the closest gym from my house is 30 minutes away, making time an even bigger factor.

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Alondra Escobedo

A facilitator could be finding gyms or recreational places that have flexible hours. Another thing that would help me is having a friend with me while exercising. It would definitely make me motivated and help me be consistent.

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The biggest barrier for me is time.

When I am assigned workouts on my own by coaches, sometimes it is really hard to find time throughout the day to complete them.

Another barrier is taking care of my body. I do not get enough sleep or nutrition to sustain me through intense training days.

-Julia Thomas

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Alondra Escobedo

One barrier that I face is finding time to be active. This is a common barrier that college students often face. I am a full-time student, and I also work part-time. So, it is difficult to make time to go to the gym.

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The biggest facilitators I have found in my exercise and athletic career is other people.

I swim and run for UNO, so I need people to keep me accountable. My biggest facilitators are my coaches because I will not train at practice to my best potential without their constant push and encouragement.

When I workout on my own, I will not even attend or go if I do not have anyone go with me. So, my friends help me stay accountable and facilitate.

-Julia Thomas

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Myah Essman

A facilitator, I would say, is my roommates and one of my classes. I am in RT this semester, so it helps that I have a set time twice a week that I go to class and work out. My roommates also help because they want to go to the gym together, which encourages me on the days I struggle to go with them.

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Myah Essman

A barrier I often face is my mental state, or, like mental capacity, some days. After doing all of my school work, my 2 jobs, and taking care of my dog, I often don't have to mental capacity to go to the gym and workout. I just want to sit down for longer than 5 minutes.

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A facilitator I would say is my ADHD. I find it hard to sit for a long time, so I try take breaks between homework and school to be physically activity. I will go for a walk, ride a bike, play some pickleball and many other activities to keep myself moving and to take a much-needed break. I also enjoy at home workouts so those videos allow me to be active in the comfort of my own home without the fear of people judging me and looking at me at a regular gym. At home videos also allow me to fit in workouts with my busy schedule.

-Jalin

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There are many barriers that prevent me from being physically active or even exercising. One barrier that I consider hard to overcome is time. There just never seems to be enough time in a day to do all the thing I need to do let alone want to do. I work every day most of the time right after school or with a short break in between. I feel like I am always on the go, with barely anytime to take a break and breathe. If I do have time I am squeezing a quick assignment in or a quick nap to restore my energy to go to work. Often times I spend a lot of time after I get off work (pretty late) doing homework. By the time I even think about working out, I am so tired that all I want to do is sleep. Another barrier I face is I am scared of judgement from other people at the gym. I don't want people watching me.

-Jalin

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A Facilitator for me to exercise is overall how I feel when I work out. I feel so much better mentally and physically when I am consistently working out, that it makes me want to exercise and find time to do it. For me I also love using it as a little break from all my school work and other possible stressors.

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A barrier for me in being active is that I often have a difficult time fitting in time to go to the gym or exercise in general. Since I have a busy schedule on top of it switching daily, I do not have a specific time in the day that works for me to go everyday of the week.

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My facilitator relates to my barrier in which I make it a goal to meal prep at the beginning of each week. When I do this I am able to ensure I can properly fuel my body by having meals I can pack before leaving the house. This has a very positive impact on how my workouts tend to go.

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A barrier I often face is having to go to the gym straight from work, which can mean I have not properly fueled my body before. I then feel tired and weak my entire workout and find it difficult to have a productive workout since I did not have time to get food before.

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After I overcame cancer and completing radiation treatment, as a Division I volleyball player I faced a major barrier to physical activity: lingering fatigue and decreased endurance. The treatment left my body weaker than before, making it challenging to maintain the high level of intensity required for collegiate training and competition. Workouts that once felt routine became exhausting, and I had to carefully balance rest with exercise to avoid setbacks. This barrier affected my ability to exercise consistently, slowed my progress in rebuilding strength, and required me to adapt my training approach in order to safely return to peak performance.

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Like my barrier my biggest facilitator is my mental health. When I am getting regular exercise and proving to myself I have the ability to do hard tasks it makes other areas of my life feel much easier. It also helps with my self esteem as I see my progress boosting my confidence and self image. I often go with friends too which makes it fun and give me another reason to go.

Jayden Pinkerton

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Jayden Pinkerton

The biggest barrier I find in my life when it comes to exercise is my mental attitude. Being a student and still working 5-6 days a week I have enough free time to get exercise but it does not leave a lot of free time for me to do things I enjoy. This leads to times where instead of going to the gym at the time I usually do I will skip so I can have fun with friends or do something that I have not had the chance to do. This used to be a big problem for me but as I got more focused I have not been affected by this as much.

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My biggest facilitator would be my roommate. We go on walks throughout the city, which has many hills. On our days off work, we go on a morning walk, and then later in the day we work out at the gym. My biggest tip would be getting into a routine to help yourself stay accountable, and this will help with having a designated time to get physical activity in. As well as working out with a friend, this will help make working out fun if it seems daunting at first!

- Johana Lopez Garcia

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A barrier for me would be time. I have packed days every day of the week. I will be in class in the morning, code for my research job in the afternoon for a few hours, go back to class, and some days I will sleep for 3 hours to then work my overnight shift at the hospital. This can be a lot some days and I tend to value rest more on days that are busier. I used to exercise consistently for 60-90 days a day, so this change has definetly taken a toll on my moods and body. I will be finding ways to allow exercise to be a priority on either the early mornings or in between classes.

- Johana Lopez Garcia

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A barrier for me would be time. It can be hard to find time to be physically active throughout my days. Some days I'm in class all morning than working all after noon and by then I'm exhausted with my day and don't want to do anything else. It can also be difficult because a lot of days I have a lot of homework or studying to do. It is definitely something that can be fixed and I hope to become more motivated or find a schedule that allows me to get in more physical activities.

-Jocelyn Oltman

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My biggest facilitator for physical activity is being able to do it with friends. I find exercise way more enjoyable when you surround yourself with people that you feel comfortable with. My friends and I often love to go play pickleball, sand volleyball, go to zumba classes, or even just lift together. Not only does have someone with you make it more fun, but you are have someone to motivate you and push you past what you would do for yourself.

-Jocelyn Oltman

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Having classes in H&K make getting in physical activity easy since there are 2 gyms in the building, and so when I'm done with class I have easy access and no reason not to just swing by the gym.

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One barrier for physical activity would be schoolwork because if I didn't have to do homework or go to class, that would free up a lot of time to go to the gym and save me a lot of energy to go to the gym.

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Some facilitators in my life are volleyball and scheduling. I play volleyball here at UNO and it keeps me very active, but off-season is where I start to lack in activity. Because of this, volleyball ends up being one of my motivators. I know that if I get out of shape the next season is going to be even harder physically. It also pushes me to try and better myself for the next season because we obviously have big goals like winning. My other facilitator is when I schedule things out. I basically make a checklist with times and follow that. I find myself so much more productive and efficient. I've found it helps when I go to class, do some homework, then workout in between to relax my brain, and finally save my studying for the rest of the night because I can eat dinner while working on things.

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Barriers for physical activity in my life would be time because of homework and lack of energy. After a long morning and afternoon of classes, homework and studying I have no motivation to go work out. I get tired and just want to go home, make dinner and go to bed. I think this is certainly fixable problem; I just find myself being too lazy to make the change.

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A facilitator in my life would be that I have friends who have a very consistent workout routine. Working out with them helps me be more motivated to be active because I enjoy working out with others. We are able to hold each other accountable to get in the gym.

--Brianna

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A barrier to physical activity in my life is that I am so tired from my busy schedule that I cannot get motivated to be active at the end of the day. My lack of energy causes me to put off exercising, and it is difficult to convince myself to be active. One thing that could help is to not save physical activity for the end of the day, but to fit it in earlier, before I am exhausted. It would also be helpful to think of exercise as a brain break, rather than working my brain.

--Brianna

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A facilitator in my life would be the enjoyment I get from the workout. I already enjoy going on bike rides and taking walks. There are also some very easy-to-do workouts with biking and walking.

--Maeve

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A barrier in my life for my specific workout would be the weather, mostly. If it's too hot or it's raining, I don't want to go work out. I usually bike or go on like five mile walks to work out.

--Maeve

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Some barriers in my life would be my school and work schedule and hours that my gym is open. With the amount of things that I have to accomplish throughout the week sometimes working out gets lowered on my priority. When I do have time sometimes my small town gym is not open. This makes me be creative in how I am active which sometimes makes me feel less motivated.

-Peyton

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Some facilitators in my life include having a gym nearby, having a big family, and dogs. If I did not have a gym nearby I would be less motivated to workout. Additionally having a bigger family has allowed me more opportunities to stay active whether it is playing games or walking my dog together.

-Peyton

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A facilitator for me would be hitting my step count for the day. I am a server at a few resturants, so its pretty easy for me to hit 10k steps so I shoot for 16k that way, after work, I am not just laying around doing nothing.

-Zoe

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A barrier that I have found to constrain me is low energy/motivation when not working out with other people. I played a team sport pretty much my whole life, and we would have team lifts, or small group team lifts, so I would always have my friends by my side working out and encouraging.

-Zoe Sundermeier

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One facilitator I incorporate in my life is a step count. My goal everyday is to hit 10k steps. This makes getting steps in more exciting and makes me more motivated to get it done. Another facilitator is working out with my boyfriend. We go to the gym together at the same time in the morning before our busy days. This helps keep me accountable in getting up early to get my workout in. Another facilitator that helps me is tracking my workouts. This pushes me to show up the next day and try to progress in weights/reps that I did the last time.

-Karli Goodall

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A few barriers I face when it comes to exercise is time and energy. Right now, I am in a moment of my life where I am constantly go-go-go. I have many things I am tying to juggle within just a day. It can be hard to find time where I can go to the gym and get a lift in or even just walk. Being so busy causes me to feel pretty tired, sometimes even exhausted. My motivation is not as high in these moments. Most of the time I will still show up but I am not able to get as effective of a workout in due to how tired I am.

-Karli Goodall

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A couple of the biggest barriers for exercise in my life are probably the time constraints and the weather conditions. Both are things we all deal with, especially being students (heavy time constraint), a lot of us working job(s) (time constraint), and living in Nebraska (extreme hot and cold weather). The best way I've learned to combat the weather barrier is trying out gyms that have indoor bikes, functional training, and other things that I'd otherwise enjoy doing outdoors.

-Joe Neihart

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A big facilitator for physical activity and exercise in my life is my social support. I have two sisters the same age as me, a girlfriend, and campus organizations like Exercise is Medicine, which help keep me motivated!

-Joe Neihart

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Shee

I started working out with my girlfriend, and I love that she keeps me accountable for all my reps and sets. We also spend about 30 minutes on the treadmill, debriefing each other about how our week has been and what’s coming up.

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Shee

One of the barrier I face is not having enough energy and working out alone. When I feel exhausted as i'm working out I tend to pull out my phone and play with it. I also don't keep myself accountable when i'm alone and I don't push myself.

To get better at this I try my best to get 8 hours of sleep and limit myself on my phone.

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I'm a coach at a CrossFit gym, so that's a strong motivator for me. It gives me a push to show up even when I don't feel like it. Additionally, I like working out with other people because the community feel is nice. Being active doesn't feel like work; it's more a hobby.

-Elizabeth Rokusek

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I think a barrier I struggle with is time and energy. I like to stay extremely busy and active, but then I burn out and get exhausted. I struggle with moderation and consistency. I want to do so much and end up getting too tired out.

To get around this, I try to get enough sleep and plan out my day/week so I don't do too much and risk burning out (and consequently doing nothing).

-Elizabeth Rokusek

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Being on dance team helps keep me active and motivated since practices are already built into my schedule. I also have the support of my teammates, so it can be nice to get together and do something active with them.

-Macyn Norris

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A barrier I face is finding the time and energy to be active outside of dance team practices and workouts because of my busy schedule with work and school. I try to plan out times to move and be active around my existing schedule, even if it's short, so I don't become overwhelmed with things I want to do.

-Macyn Norris

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A facilitator for my situation would be to not be too hard on myself. As well as surround myself with positive people and a great support system.

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A barrier that I constantly face is wanting to workout at least even 2x a week but it's just impossible with this semester. After four long years I think I am finally burnt out that it takes me several minutes to finish a small paragraph from a textbook. With that being said it is my last semester and I do not want to fail any of my classes. I had commited myself to going at least 3x a week and I had started going to the gym but about 2 weeks ago I completely stopped going because of the loads of assignments I have going on and the fact that I can not focus. But behind my brain all I can think about is wanting to find time to go to the gym and balance school work at the same time

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My dance team practices are often late at night, which makes it hard to balance sleep and still have energy for other workouts during the day.

I focus on recovery, stretching, hydration, and planning rest days—so I can still get enough energy and not burn out from late-night practices.

-Lilly Michel

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Having a supportive group of friends who like to stay active. This helps us stay accountable and makes staying active more fun!

-Lilly Michel

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Priscilla Gonzalez Diaz

Since there are some days I don't have time to workout I still have a step count that I challenge myself to reach daily. That way I am still being active in some way.

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Priscilla Gonzalez Diaz

A barrier that I face is finding time in my schedule to workout and sticking to it. As a full time student who works 20+ hours a week I find myself getting burnt out quickly and I can never stay consitstent because some days I have more time then others.

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Rebeca

One of my tips is to keep track of how many miles you have done. I track mine using Nike Run Club, but there are other apps available. This gives me motivation to keep exercising as it shows your pace, miles, time etc.

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Rebeca

I will give myself the goal of going after class or work. I can accomplish this by having my partner or a friend accompany me, as this will help keep me motivated, as I will have someone by my side to keep me accountable.

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Rebeca

A barrier that I face is working out consistently due to work and school. I sometimes go days walking and running, doing 4 miles each day, but then I stop because I get too busy with work and school, so I don't pick up my habits again until the weekend, but even then, sometimes I do not go.

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Brady Walter

Whenever I have week plan and a specific schedule of times when I could go to the gym, it really helps me. Without this, my body will choose to do other things other than exercising.

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Brady Walter

One barrier that I have when it comes to working out is how much time I have in my day. I have a full class schedule and work a part time job so when I do have time I try to make the most of it.

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Kayla Temba

However I would call my mum or my friend and they would push me to remember that it would be possible as long as you're consistent with everything you're doing and being true to yourself.

My favorite tip is to remember that you can always have or try to build a support system to keep you going because on your bad/worst days they would be there for you to reach your goals!

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Kayla Temba

It would feel impossible that I can't reach my goal so I wouldn't perform physical activity to my ability because I would see no reason if i'll stay stuck

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Sometimes the gym is very busy and the piece of equipment I want to use is taken, so I have to figure out another exercise to do.

-Caleb Christensen

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Whenever I workout with friends it motivates me to push myself harder and helps me get a better workout in.

-Caleb Christensen

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I have a workout partner who I lift with. This holds me accountable and helps me push myself in the gym.

- Jackson Crain

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Finding time to consistently exercise each week is difficult while balancing everything else.

- Jackson Crain

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I have a lot of gaps between classes which makes it easy to find time to exercise.

-Madysin Frost

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I have a lot of previous injuries that make it difficult to perform certain exercises / workouts.

-Madysin Frost

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My OT gave me 5 exercises to complete at home to help with this really tight and uncomfortable knot behind my right shoulder blade. However, 2 of the exercises required a resistance band which I do not own so I was unable to complete 2 of the exercises to help relieve the knot.

Does anyone have any suggestions to over come this barrier (lack of resistance bands)?

- Maggie

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I take two 15 minute walks during the work day, one in the morning and one in the late afternoon. After my walks, I have a boost of energy that helps me stay on track at work.

-Maggie