So I’m going to keep this one short and sweet. No pictures to accompany, unfortunately, because I’d feel really awkward taking a picture of my gym while I workout. So bear with me, this post is going to be just words.

So the other morning, I went back to the gym after taking a break because of work. For those of you who understand set life, you know why I took the break. For those of you who don’t – set life consists of 12-14 hour days. Intense right? So after a long day of work all anyone can really think of is just knocking out when getting home. However, a good life hack for this is to work out during prep and wrap and to eat healthy when on set. Yes, it is very easy to go over to crafty and get a tray of sour patch kids (or any candy of your choice really). As you can see, very easy to just munch on junk food when on set. So I’m going to try and give you tips on how to stay relatively healthy on set.

Well first thing is first, it all starts with catering. If you happen to work in the Production Office then you can help picking out which caterer to use. Personally, I like going with Full Moon Pickles just because they’re organic and provide vegan, vegetarian, and gluten free options. But I mean take a look at their menu and tell me you don’t want to hire them as your production caterer.

Now that’s during prep. So basically, it’s easy to stay active, fit, what-have-you during those stages of a show. Because though you’re on for the full twelve hours, you really get off around 6 because you’re dealing with vendors at that time and most (if not all) vendors are closed by that time. So it gives you a good amount of time to go to the gym or workout at home or go to some fitness classes. Bottom line: it is very easy to stick to your workout/health routine during prep and wrap.

Production/shoot is a very different story. For those days, at least if you work in my department, you should expect 12-14 hour days either on location, stage, etc. And naturally you’re not going to want to go to the gym or even bother eating healthy because well first off you’re going to get fed when you work on set (please refer to the third paragraph). And half, if not most of the time, you’re too busy helping out around set or out on runs (if you’re a Set PA) to really care what you’re going to be eating because you’re too hungry to care.

With all of that being said here are some of my tips for staying active and relatively healthy while on set:

Don’t sit around all the time. 

Stay moving. Not only is this going to keep you awake while on the job, but for those of you who are avid fitbit users, you get to get those much needed and highly craved steps in. — side note: trust when I say that those steps are highly craved. This is sometimes, especially hard to do when you’re an Office PA because all you do is sit around staring at your computer for a good 12 hours. To be fair I’m not, not doing anything, but a good majority of my job usually consists of a lot of sitting. But even if you’re a Set PA and you’ve been assigned to do fire watch or security, try to stay moving. Do little ankle lifts or something.

Try not to visit crafty too often.

Like I said before it’s very easy to find oneself in crafty getting some candy, chips, etc. to hold you over and give you an okay energy boost for half an hour. But trust me when I say the crash from a sugar high is not worth the tray full of sour patch kids.

For those especially hot days, and any day really, STAY HYDRATED.

This is self explanatory. I’m sure we all know just how life giving water is for us.

I know I said I was going to keep this short and sweet. But as I started writing this (about two days ago – sorry about that, been busy working as per usual) I couldn’t help but think, “I should try and make this post about the importance of staying active and healthy when on set.” Because I know how hard it is do this and how easy it is to just go straight home and sleep from exhaustion.

For those of you who do work production, share your own fitness/health tips in the comments below! I’d love to read what you know!