Get up off that thing!!

How many times have you heard that regular exercise is good for you? That it will help you lose weight? But, what else is daily exercise good for? With so many of us working from home and suffering COVID fatigue, it’s important now more than ever to MOVE!! Superstar Myotherapist Kirby explores ways to incorporate exercise and movement into your daily routine.

So, what are the Benefits of Daily Exercise?

• Control your weight: You can’t out-train a bad diet. Exercise goes hand in hand with a healthy diet to help you control your weight gain or loss. The food we put into our bodies is what provides us with the energy we use to go about our daily activities, to burn the calories we consume, we must exercise.
• Improve your mental health and mood: When we exercise our body releases chemicals called endorphins. These endorphins interact with the brain to help produce a positive feeling in the body to improve your mood and decrease your stress levels.
• Improves sleep: Exercise can help you fall asleep quicker and stay asleep for longer. When we are asleep, our bodies use this time to do all its recovery and rebuilding (healing and growth).
• Improves sexual health: Regular exercise can increase sexual arousal in both men and women. It may also lower the risk of erectile dysfunction in men.
• Strengthen your bones and muscles: Regular exercise is important for developing and maintaining strong bones by responding to the forces placed upon it. The body will continue to build more bone by becoming denser, resulting in less chance for injury. Our muscles are what supports and protects our bones and joints. The muscles respond in the same way the bones do, by using our muscles regularly, and putting them under tension and load will help to strengthen them.
• Reduce risks of falls: Having stronger muscles helps to provide stability, coordination and balance to the body. By performing regular muscle strengthening and moderate-intensity aerobic activity you can reduce your risks of falling.
• Reduces pain: Remember those endorphins we spoke about earlier? They are also responsible for communicating with the brain to reduce the perception of pain. Combine this with everything else we mention in this blog to further prevent pain and discomfort.
• Reduce risks of heart disease: Your heart is a muscle, so it makes sense that regular exercise will help strengthen your heart and increase circulation throughout the body. With the increase of blood flow, this increases the oxygen levels within the body. Thus, reducing your risk of heart diseases such as; high cholesterol, coronary artery disease and heart attacks. It will also lower your blood pressure.
• Assists in brain function: Exercise stimulates the brain, not just by thinking about the exercises themselves and how many sets and repetitions you are doing. But also, releases protein chemicals called; Dopamine, Noradrenaline and Serotonin. These are all neurotransmitters that communicate with the brain.
• Assist in the management of blood sugar and insulin levels: Regular exercise can lower your blood sugar levels and stabilising your insulin levels, reducing the risks of type 2 diabetes and other metabolic conditions.
• Assists in quitting smoking: Quitting smoking is hard enough to do on its own. Exercise can help to reduce cravings and withdrawal symptoms, as well as reducing the weight gain once you stop.
• Increases your chances of living longer: Take all the above into consideration, and you would feel superhuman too. Regular exercise will help prolong your life by reducing the risks of disease, injuries and conditions.

Wow, that’s a lot of benefits. Does that make you want to get up and get moving?

Let’s look at how we can make regular exercise a part of your routine.

• Start small: Start making your daily activities more active. Take the stairs instead of the elevator/escalator. Get up every hour from your desk. Walk to your co-worker’s office instead of sending an email or picking up the phone. Park further away at the shopping centre. Wash your car yourself. Include a 15-30-minute walk into your daily routine. Incorporate exercises into daily activities, for example, squats while you brush your teeth, stretch (safely) in the shower, calf raises while cooking,
• Get active with friends and family: Having a training partner is 10x more motivating than going it alone. Instead of sitting down to get a coffee with a friend, grab a coffee to go and head out for a walk. Consider trying new group fitness classes or team sports (dancing, boot camp, soccer, martial arts etc.). Get out into nature and go for a hike, explore a new part of town. Exercise is more enjoyable when done with friends.
• Set goals: This is a no-brainer. If you set yourself some meaningful goals and hold yourself accountable to these, you are more likely to succeed and stay motivated. Do you want to run 5km? Learn to surf, hike every peak in the country, lose weight, be pain-free? Whatever your goal is, make it significant and meaningful to you.
• Make it enjoyable: Put on your favourite music, buy a new workout outfit. Try a range of different activities and movements to keep it interesting. Combine weight training with running for example or hiking and dancing. Choose the exercises and activities that you enjoy doing, you are more likely to stay motivated when you enjoy the activity you are doing.
• Find activities you can do at home: The weather could be bad, or you could be in the middle of a pandemic and gyms are closed. Find something you can do in the comfort of your home. There are virtual group fitness classes, YouTube videos to follow along, using household items to perform your exercises (bag of books, stairs, cans of soup, chairs etc.) or purchase your own fitness equipment and set up at home.

Still, stuck for reasons why you should include regular exercise into your routine? Get in touch with one of our professional staff at Williamstown Health + Lifestyle or book a session to start your journey.