|
 The Many Benefits to Exercise
— More than you may realize!
Do you want to feel better, fit into your clothes better, have more energy and even live longer? Well, no matter what your age or body type, you can achieve these goals with exercise. A regular exercise routine can help you lose weight, build muscle, prevent disease and improve your overall health and wellbeing.
Many people view exercise as a means to an end: a way to lose some extra pounds after the holidays, a way to fit into that special outfit, or even a way to gain some extra muscle. However, sticking to a regular exercise program not only improves your physical appearance, but it also largely benefits your overall health.
In fact, the Department of Health and Human Services has issued physical activity guidelines for adults. Adults should engage in moderate intensity physical activity for at least 2½ hours each week, preferably spread throughout the week, and should perform muscle strengthening activities at least twice weekly.
Do you know how exercise can help you? The benefits to exercise include:
- Strengthen your heart and cardiovascular system
A sedentary lifestyle is one of the top risk factors for heart disease. However, you can do something about it. When you exercise over a period of time, your heart grows in size, allowing it to pump a larger volume of blood with each beat (which makes your heart stronger). This allows for more oxygen to be delivered to the cells in your body.
Regular exercise will also make your blood vessels more flexible and increases your red blood cell production, allowing them to deliver more oxygen rich blood more efficiently throughout your body. Regular exercise also boosts blood levels of HDL (“good”) cholesterol and decreases LDL (“bad”) cholesterol, keeping you free of clogs which can cause strokes and heart attacks.
- Boost Immune System
Regular exercise helps boost the immune system, thus preventing viruses like the cold and flu. Moderate exercise causes an increase in blood flow, which helps circulate antibodies along with white blood cells necessary to fight infection more quickly. As a result, our bodies can fight off germs.
- Increase energy and endurance
When someone is active, more oxygen circulates throughout the body. The brain thrives on this oxygen. Once you start moving, the more energetic you will feel. Exercise actually strengthens your heart and lungs, giving you more energy. 
Mitochondria, contained in the cells of your body, produce energy by combining oxygen and glucose, producing ATP. ATP gives your cells the energy they need to function. When you exercise and become more active, your body creates more and stronger mitochondria in each of your cells, producing more energy to meet your needs, making you more powerful and giving you more endurance.
In addition to giving you more energy, increasing physical activity during the day can help you fall asleep faster and also sleep better.
- Enhance memory and brain function
Exercise helps by boosting blood flow to your brain by increasing the density and size of your brain capillaries. This assists your brain in receiving nutrients and oxygen, improving concentration, attention and quick thinking. Exercise even increases the levels of brain chemicals, resulting in the growth of nerve cells and enhanced memory skills.
Exercising can also increase the generation and survival of brain cells in the hippocampus, the area of the brain involved in short term memory. This is associated with improved learning.
- Build muscle fitness, tone, and strength
Exercise helps strengthen your muscles. When you work out your muscles more than you are used to, it causes your body to build new muscle tissue. Tiny tears can occur with weight lifting, and when these tears are repaired, muscles become larger and more defined. Larger, stronger muscles will raise your metabolism, making weight management easier. The more muscle mass you build, the more calories you burn when you’re not working out. In fact, for each pound of muscle you add to your body, you will burn an additional 35-50 calories per day.
- Improve balance and flexibility
Flexibility is a joint’s ability to move freely through a full and normal range of motion. There are many factors that affect a person’s flexibility, including genetics, the structure of your joints as well as surrounding tendons and skin, tissue elasticity, strength of opposing muscle groups, body type, age, activity level and gender. Having greater flexibility can help increase balance and coordination, increase relaxation and stress, decrease the risk of low back pain, and decrease the risk of injury. Increasing your flexibility can even help with muscle tension, posture and your ability to move around.
You can actually increase your flexibility by becoming stronger with exercise. Stretching is a great way to improve mobility and increase flexibility. Stretching is especially important in an exercise routine. You should stretch as a warm up to get your body ready for exercise and also as a cool down to give your body time to recover.
- Strengthen bones
Regular exercise, weight-bearing exercise in particular (such as walking, running or jogging) helps to keep your bones strong. Strengthening exercises also help keep bones strong. Even if you start exercising late in life, you can still build strong, healthy bones, which are essential for avoiding injury and in preventing osteoporosis. It is never too late to start exercising to strengthen your bones, because even late in life bone density has been shown to be increased by weight-bearing exercises. Osteoporosis is caused through low bone mass, which makes bones brittle and easy to fracture. Muscles are attached to bones. So, strengthening muscles means strengthening bones. Exercise benefits bones by: Exercise brings fresh blood to the bones and to the tendons and ligaments attached to them. Exercise brings more oxygen to the bone and surrounding tissues, and this helps to maintain the tissues and repair any damage. Exercise stimulates the existing bone and encourages it to grow new bone.
- Accelerate fat loss and manage your weight
Exercise uses up oxygen and causes your body to burn stored fat, burning calories. This helps you maintain a normal weight. Try simple daily tips coupled with exercise in a gym to get active such as taking the stairs instead of the elevator, walking during your lunch break, even chores around the house such as vacuuming and sweeping.
- Reduce stress, anxiety, depression and tension
Stress hormones in the body are reduced when you exercise. This leads to a slower heart rate, relaxed blood vessels and a lower blood pressure. But the benefits to exercise don’t stop here. Exercise has also been proved to help combat addictions (such as smoking) and even depression. Endorphins, hormones in the brain, are associates with happiness. Exercise produces certain chemical changes in the body. During exercise, the level of endorphins in your body increases, which can improve your mood.
- Combat chronic disease
Exercise does a lot more than just help you fit into your clothes. A regular exercise program can help prevent or manage high blood pressure, helps combat and prevent heart disease, osteoporosis, type 2 Diabetes and certain types of cancer.
- Improve skin complexion
In addition to affecting the way your body looks, regular exercise can benefit the way your skin looks. Exercising increases circulation and the delivery of nutrients to the skin. It also increases the natural production of collagen (plumps your skin).
Always check with your doctor before starting an exercise program. If you’re concerned about beginning a program due to a health condition, a physician can tell you what types of exercise are safe and which types to avoid.
Stop exercising and talk with your doctor if you experience any of these symptoms:
- Chest pain
- Weakness
- Dizziness or lightheadedness
- Unexplained weight gain or swelling
- Pressure or pain in your chest, neck, arm, jaw, or shoulder
Whatever exercise routine you choose to do, it’s important to stay hydrated. The body heats up during exercise and sweats to cool down. So, you need to stay hydrated to compensate.
Remember to find an exercise routine that is fun for you. The trick is to stick to it and make it a part of your life, so you’re less likely to quit. Exercising regularly will get you the results you are looking for.
Before you know it, you’ll be looking better and feeling better and seeing the benefits of exercise for yourself. This will give you even more motivation! No more excuses. The sooner you start a program, the sooner you’ll see results. So get to it and start your exercise routine today!
Click Here For Pricing & Promotions
|
