How can I make time for exercise and spend less time on video games?

If you play videogames too frequently, you may want to find a way to interact with other people for motivation. Ask a friend or neighbor to join you in regular hikes around the neighborhood or to shoot some hoops at a community court.  I cannot stress enough the benefits of having someone to help along the way.

If you enjoy video games, maybe you should try one of the exercise programs utilizing video games to get you started.  Both the Wii system and the Xbox Kinect are good platforms for this type of game.  There's Wii Fit, My Fitness Coach, Golds Gym Cardio Workout, Kinect Sports, Your Shape Fitness Evolved (Kinect), Biggest Loser, Jillian Michaels and many others.  You can involve a friend to play with you and compete with each other to make it more fun or compete against yourself.  While I think it would be a great idea to move away from the video games and try some other physical fitness experiences, its great to start with something you truly enjoy.  Since video games are something you really enjoy, it might help you to stick with your exercised program if you utilize them to get started.  Then once you get comfortable, you can venture off into new forms of exercise!

Managing time starts with an awareness of how you are spending your time. The first important steps is to figure out exactly how much time you are spending playing video games. People find it extremely helpful to keep a time diary. For three days write down everything you do during the time with the corresponding time and length of time. For example, 8-8:30 eat breakfast, 8:30-9:30 work, 9:30-Noon video games, Noon-1 lunch, 2:30-3:30 meeting, 4:00-5:00 work on project. If you look at this you'll notice that there are several blocks of unutilized time between 1-2:30 and 3:30-4 and then a large chunk of time from 9:30-Noon used for playing video games.

You shouldn't have to utilize every second of everyday but this does show that there is time available during this day and that a large chunk of time is used to play video games. People think they don't have time but realize they either do, aren't managing their time efficiently or are so busy that it feels like there isn't any underutilized time available. Once you become aware of how you are using your time then you can better manage it. If your goal is to spend less time playing video games and more time exercise maybe try bargaining with yourself. For example, for every 30 minutes of exercise you get 30 minutes of video game playing. 

Put the controller down, and get out of the house! You should record your time spent playing video games over the course of a week and see how many hours you spend behind the television. Surely, there is an hour you can set aside everyday before pressing the power button.