Exercise for healthy living and weight loss

A world famous educationists have said, " Life is movement, stagnation is death. " Physical exercise is essential for the maintenance of normal condition of life. Lack of natural exercise is one of the chief causes of weakness and ill-health.

Exercise and Activity

Activity uses the body to a limited degree and generally to achieve a specific purpose.

Exercise employs the body over the widest possible range of movement for the particular purpose of maintaining or acquiring muscle tone and control with maximum joint flexibility.

Activity requires less physical effort and often less conscious effort once the routine has been established.

Exercise demands considerable physical effort and is more beneficial as mental concentration is simultaneously employed.

Methods of Exercise

Several systems of exercise have been developed over the years, among this the most popular being the Swedish system (consisting light gymnastics" used no apparatus, consisting of calisthenics and exercises) and yoga asanas, the later having been practised from ancient times in India. Whichever system you choose to adopt, the exercises should be performed systematically, regularly and under proper guidance.

Benefits:

Systematic physical exercise has many benefits. The more important benefits are mentioned below :

• Regular exercise taken properly can achieve the increased use of food by the body, which contributes to health and fitness. The basal metabolic rate and habitual body temperature will slowly rise during several weeks of physical exercise, if the programme is not too hard. The healthy person usually has abundant body heat and a warm radiant glow.

• Regular progressive physical exercise can bring about the balance of automatic, or involuntary , nervous system. This accounts for stronger pulse waves, higher metabolism and better circulation.

• Exercise can prevent or reduce gravitational ptosis or sag, as it is commonly called Ptosis results from uneven flow of blood in the feet, legs and lower abdomen.

• Improved capillary action in the working of muscular and brain tissue results from exercise carried to the point of real endurance. This permits greater blood flow and gives the muscles, including the heart, more resistance to fatigue. Massage, heat and moderate exercise are relatively ineffective in producing additional capillary action as compared with vigorous exercise.

• The full use of the lungs in vigorous exercise can reduce or prevent lung congestion due to lymph accumulation.

• Gas and intra-intestinal accumulations can be reduced by exercise that acts to knead and squeeze or vibrate the intra-intestinal mass.

• Better respiratory reserve is developed by persistent exercise. This ensures better breath holding, especially after a standard exercise. With greater respiratory reserves, exercise become easier.

• Improvement in tone and function of veins can be accomplished by repetitiously squeezing and draining the blood out of them and then allowing them to fill.

• Sweating in exercise aids kidneys by helping to eliminate the waste matter from the body.

• Consistent exercise leads to improvement in quality of blood. Studies have shown improved haemoglobin levels, relatively greater alkalinity, improved total protein content and a grater red cell count.

Systemic exercise promotes physical strength and mental vigour and strengthens will power and self control leading to harmonious development of the whole system.

Exercise promotes longevity

Medical researchers at Harvard and Standford Universities who studied the habits and health of 17,000 middle-aged and older men, reported the first scientific evidence that even modest exercise helps prolong life. Dr. Ralph S. Paffenberger, the visiting professor of epidemology at the Harvard School of Pubic Health, who is the principal author of the report said, " We have found a direct relationship between the level of physical activity and the length of life in the college men we have studied.  This is the first good evidence that people who are active and fit have a longer life span than those who are not. "

A strong connection between a hard and a healthy hard has also been convincingly demonstrated in the same study. The study showed that the less active persons ran a three times higher risk of suffering a fatal heart attack than did those who worked the hardest. Review of fatal heart attacks revealed that the less active men were also three times more likely to die unexpectedly and rapidly within an hour after the attack.

A parallel research report from doctors in Dulles also concluded, after a study of the lives and habits of 6,000 men and women, that the physically fit were less likely to develop hypertension. Dr. Steven N. Blair who headed the research group said, " We followed the physical health and habits of these people for an average of four-and-a-half years and the data showed that the lack of physical fitness leads to hypertension. "

Regular exercise plays an important role in the fight against stress. It provides recreation and mental relaxation besides keeping the body physically and mentally fit. It is nature’s best tranquilliser.

" Exercise produces chemical and psychological changes that improves your mental health. It changes the levels of hormones in blood and may elevate your beta-endorphins (mood-affecting brain chemicals). Exercise also gives a feeling of accomplishment and thereby reduces the sense of helplessness. "

To be really useful, exercise should be taken in such a manner as to bring into action all the muscles of the body in a natural way. Walking is one such exercise. It is, however, so gentle in character that one must walk several kilometers in a brisk manner to constitute a fair amount of exercise. Other forms of good exercise are swimming, cycling, horse-riding, tennis, etc.

Precautions

Vigirous exercise of any kind should not be taken for an hour and a half after eating, nor immediately before meals.

Weak patients and those suffering from serious diseases like cancer, heart trouble, tuberculosis and asthama should not undertake vigious exercise except under the supervision of a competent physician.

If exercising makes you tired, stop immediately .

The purpose of exercise should be to make you feel refreshed and relaxed and not tired.

One can start off with a brisk walk for 15 to 20 minutes. One should aim at activities which need about two-thirds of one’s maximum ability. One way to assess is to count your own pulse rate.