Building strength is about helping your body cope better with everyday demands – sitting, standing, lifting, carrying, pushing and pulling. And you can do a lot for your health with very little equipment, space or time. You do not need gym membership, heavy weights or complicated routines. In fact, some of the most effective strength work uses simple movements you already do in daily life.

Key Movements to Support Your Health

• Push movements – using your arms and upper body to push something away
• Pull movements – drawing something towards you, important for posture
• Standing / squat movements – getting up and down
• Hinge movements – bending at the hips to lift safely
• Core stability – supporting and controlling movement
• Leg strength & balance – how we walk, climb stairs and move confidently
• Carrying & holding – real-life strength for everyday loads

Carrying movements help build practical, full-body strength. They challenge your grip, shoulders and core, and support the kind of strength we use every day. Think about carrying shopping bags, luggage, laundry baskets or anything life hands you. That’s real-life strength - and it’s worth training.

You don’t need specialist equipment or heavy weights for this to be effective.

• Hold a weight in each hand (dumbbells, kettlebells or even shopping bags)
• Stand tall with your shoulders relaxed
• Keep your chest open and your stomach gently braced
• Walk forward in a controlled, steady way
• Turn carefully and walk back

That’s a farmer’s carry. Start light and focus on posture and control. The goal isn’t to rush - it’s to move steadily and stay upright. You don’t need long distances for this to be worthwhile. A good starting point is 20 to 30 seconds of walking, rest, and then repeat once or twice.

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How Far Can You Push Yourself? How much money can you raise for cancer research? And can you inspire other people to move more?

They’re the brilliant questions that 55-year-old Belgian runner Hilde Dosogne asked herself – and this is AMAZING - before running a marathon every single day of 2024 (that’s 366 with it being a leap year), while also working part-time and looking after a family of five!

In running all those marathons, Hilde raised more than 75,000 euros for BIG Against Breast Cancer, and broke the world record!

The hardest part? "Physically, it was in the beginning because I was very tired. My body had to adapt to the physical restraints, and I realised I needed much more sleep than usual… But then I started to do naps during my lunch break, and that helped a lot. But the toughest part was actually the mental part of being at the start line every day again. And it was… really tough because I was also working part-time and I also have four children and a husband, so that made it even more difficult."

Follow Hilde at @marathonwoman366 on Instagram, or Strava.