If you have a busy life, and most people do, you know that it can be hard to find time to exercise. The demands of children, work, or school can keep you from sticking to your goal to burn fat.

An alternative many people turn to is short workouts. Do three or four ten minute workouts produce the same effects as one long one?

But wait. If your body needs about twenty minutes of activity before it kicks into fat burning mode, will short workouts even do anything? If you need to burn fat and don't have a lot of time, what do you do?

If you spend the same amount of time on your short workouts as you would on one long ones, the American Heart Association says that you will get the same benefits.

This means that if you do four ten minute workouts, you are doing the same great things for your body that a single forty minute workout can do. To make it even more effective, the AHA recommends that you make these short workouts as intense as possible.

So the key to making your short workouts count is to make sure they are rigorous and challenging to your body. Here are some ways you can do this:

1. Run like the wind.

For ten minutes, run faster than you normally do. Walkers, walk more briskly. Make sure to get your heart going.

2. Hop on the treadmill or elliptical.

You probably don't want to drive back and forth to the gym four times a day, but if you're there anyway, hop on a machine and push the intensity.

3. Hills and stairs are made for climbing.

Run up some stairs or a steep hill. Walk down and repeat. Do this for ten minutes to burn fat.

4. Have flashbacks to phys ed with jumping jacks.

5. Do ten minutes of jumping rope.

Any movement is a potential mini workout. The key is to make sure it is intense enough so your body works and so you burn fat. Adding some weights to your routine also helps.

Your body needs a variety of activities in order to burn fat. Warm up for a few minutes with light cardio, and try the following moves:

* Squats: these are the moves to get the most out of your workout. They are very effective.

* Pushups

* Deadlifts

* Tricep dips

* Squats. Squats are one of the most effective moves to tone your lower body.

You can do sets of each or combine them to create compound moves. These work more muscle at the same time. Examples of compound moves are: squats combined with overhead presses, lunges paired with chest presses, and knee lifts with tricep kickbacks.

Just because your workout is condensed, don't neglect the warm-up and cool-downs. Walking briskly to warm up, and walking at a more moderate pace to cool down is sufficient. You can also do some stretching moves to release tension in your muscles.

Exercise only works if you do it. Fitting in four or so ten minute workouts a day is effective. You will get in shape, burn fat, and have time to spare!

It is also easier to stick with a program that allows such flexibility. Knowing you can do ten minutes and have it ?count? is very motivating.

Your busy schedule may be a valid excuse for not doing a long workout each day, but not with short workouts! You can always find ten minutes somewhere.