Exercise doesn’t always mean squeezing into compression gear and nifty, ultra-light, gel-filled $350 runners and sweating it out at your local gym or running track. Instead, getting more movement in your already busy day by making simple choices can be a practical way to increase your fitness.
Finding Ways to Move Your Body
If you are someone who commutes to a full-time job every day, whilst having a pretty demanding home-life, you are not often afforded much of an opportunity to dedicate yourself to exercise during the day. Instead, you can keep yourself fit by finding ways to incorporate walking into your daily activities.
Walking is the perfect during-the day activity, as it can helps clear your head when you’re stressed, and it’s an exercise which engages your whole body. You also get some fresh air, which you wouldn’t otherwise get when you’re inside an office, at your home desk or even at the gym doing pull-ups.
Why Walking Works
You should aim to walk every day, even if it is not walking specifically for 30-60 minutes at a time; just try to avoid being seated.
For example, you commute to the office and there’s an option to take a short bus ride, elect to walk the journey instead. Your routine can include 5-6 short walks instead of one prolonged one.
This is a great way to get your blood circulation going, and this simple method of exercise is all you need.
A recent study found that incidental exercise has some major health benefits. Engaging in daily activities of moderate intensity, ideally where you are moving continuously for at least one to three minutes at a time, could potentially reduce risk of major cardiac events.
Keeping a healthy diet will keep your cardiac health in check, but if your work is very sedentary (sitting at computers, sitting at assessments and talking to people etc.), you’re not spending much time on your feet. It is important to find periods of the day where you can get up , get moving and burn off some energy.
Start Small
If practical, start small by leaving your car at home and walking to the train station instead, or get outside for a lunch time walk during the day. Sunlight is vital to our health, and sometime, we just don’t get enough of it.
According to a study by Dr Mike Evans, an Associate Professor of Family Medicine and Public Health (and founder of Health Design Lab at the Li Ka Shing Knowledge Institute), being active for 30 minutes per day had the following effects on his subjects:
- Those with arthritis in the knee reduced their rates of pain and disability by 47%;
- In older patients, it reduced progression to dementia and Alzheimer’s by around 50%;
- For patients at high risk of diabetes, and coupled with some other lifestyle interventions, it reduced progression to frank diabetes by 58%;
- Post-menopausal women who had four hours per week of walking had a 41% reduction in the risk of hip fracture;
- In a meta-analysis of a large group, anxiety was reduced by 48% and for those suffering from depression, 30% were relieved from their symptoms whilst only taking a low dose of an anti-depressant;
- Finally, after following over 10,000 Harvard University students for more than 12 years, Dr Evans found that there was a 23% lower risk of death in his subjects that were active for 30 minutes a day.
Pretty remarkable, right? You can learn more about this study by viewing Dr Evans’ visual lecture, 23 and a Half Hours (as seen on ‘Orange is the New Black’, for all you Netflix fans out there).
If you plan right is is possible to take a few minutes out of your day to get outside and walk. If you make conscious choices, won’t even need to create extra time in your day to do so. Think about replacing some of your transport options with walking, or take a quick break from your work desk every couple of hours to step away for a walk, even if it’s only for 10 minutes – your body will certainly thank you for it!
