Exercise has MANY health benefits....

Today's Post: Thursday, 5-20-2010

Last week, Prevention Magazine posted an article they titled,

“17 Ways Exercise Sends Health Soaring”

Why schedule several sessions of exercise that are doable for you into your week and be sure you do each session 95% of the time or more?

For starters, since recent studies found only 5% of Americans do this.

In my opinion, besides the competing pressures on their time, most of the other 95% neither know how incredibly much exercise actually will do FOR them or even close. They also don’t know how badly they will suffer from what being sedentary and NOT exercising will otherwise do TO them.

So I thought I’d summarize their 17 points in this post.

1. Be more productive at work.

Prevention quotes a study done in the UK. People who exercise think better and get more done than people who don’t.

They also only usually take about half the sick time of people who are more sedentary.

Exercise increases blood flow to your brain, makes you less depressed, and grows new brain cells. Small wonder it improves productivity.

And, doing regular and moderate exercise, along with taking curcumin and at least 2,000 iu of vitamin D3 a day dramatically increases the effectiveness of your immune system. In later years, you are also far less likely to get heart disease, diabetes, and cancer. So you have fewer doctor visits to cause you to leave work.

2. Improve your learning skills

In one study noted in the Prevention article, “Exercisers who ran just two 3-minute sprints, with a 2-minute break in between, learned new words 20% faster than those who rested….” They also said that exercise tends to produce, “new growth in the areas of the brain that control multitasking, planning, and memory.”

3. Natural pain relief

It may seem surprising; but exercise lowers pain in several ways. It boosts endorphins that effectively block pain signals. It increases circulation and helps lubricate joints. And exercise also LOWERS excess inflammation. Best of all, exercise causes your body to release growth hormones that repair damage to you before it causes you pain.

Prevention’s article had this: “Healthy adults who did aerobic activity consistently had 25% less musculoskeletal pain than their couch-bound peers, says Stanford senior research scientist Bonnie Bruce, DrPH, MPH, RD.”

They also say that Tai Chi is an excellent kind of exercise for this. Tai Chi as usually done is super low impact and done in a slow and gentle manner. It also provides such strong stress relief, it lowers blood pressure better than most drugs in those who have high blood pressure.

So what pain exercise fails to turn off will bother you less. And, it also turns off pain that sedentary people get too!

4. Exercise increases your ability to engage in sex. It makes you feel better about yourself. And, you look and move better too.

Prevention’s article had this:

“A good workout practically ensures a better body image. The simple act of exercising-regardless of your weight or fitness level-can make you feel positive about how you look, possibly due to the release of feel-good hormones, finds a review of 57 studies on exercise and body image.

Working out can also boost your libido by increasing blood flow to the genitals. University of Washington research found that just one 20-minute cycling workout enhanced sexual arousal up to 169% in women. And the benefits stand the test of time: A Harvard study of swimmers found that those over age 60 were as satisfied sexually as those decades younger.”

5. Lower Dental Bills

Exercise increases circulation and lowers excess inflammation. So it’s no surprise it helps keep your gums healthy.

What you may NOT know is that gum disease, besides causing heart disease and horrible bad breath, costs a LOT of money to treat including pulling teeth that your gums become too weak to hold onto and buying false teeth to replace them.

Prevention had this:

“Flossing and brushing, it turns out, are not the only keys to a healthy smile, says Mohammad Al-Zahrani, DDS, PhD, a former associate professor at Case Western Reserve University. Exercise plays an important role, too. In his recent study, Al-Zahrani discovered that adults who did 30 minutes of moderate activity 5 or more times a week were 42% less likely to suffer from periodontitis, a gum disease that's more common as you get older. Working out may thwart periodontitis the same way it does heart disease--by lowering levels of inflammation-causing C-reactive protein in the blood.

Do this: In addition to staying active, get a twice-yearly dental cleaning (or more often if your dentist says you are at high risk for gum disease). “

6. If you need more wake up at work than you get from coffee, try going on a short walk.

Prevention’s article had this:

“University of Georgia researchers who analyzed 70 different studies concluded that moving your body increases energy and reduces fatigue. Regular exercise boosts certain fatigue-fighting brain chemicals such as norepinephrine and dopamine, which pep you up, and serotonin, a mood enhancer.

Even a brisk 10 minute walk will help.

7. Stop weight gain due to stress and anxiety.

Those things tend to cause you to gain belly fat -- which is both ugly and dangerous to your health.

Prevention’s article had this:

“Just two 40-minute workouts a week is enough to stop dangerous belly fat in its tracks, according to University of Alabama at Birmingham research. The waistline of those who worked out less expanded an average of 3 inches.”

Exercise lowers excess levels of cortisol and insulin. Both of those actions help prevent your body from adding to your belly fat.

And, because it lowers stress, exercise also cuts your cravings for comfort foods that tend to be fattening.

Note that 80 minutes of walking or working out in a week can also be done with 8 ten minute walks or four 20 minute walks. For many people, that flexibility makes it a lot easier to fit in.

Out of time today. I’ll finish the list tomorrow.