Exercise does not mean strenuous workout for 1 or 2 hours daily. Simple walking, cycling and gardening is more than enough for leading a healthy life.
Benefits of walking daily: Burn calories by walking : Walking can help you burn calories. Burning calories can help you maintain or lose weight. Your actual calorie burn will depend on several factors,including: Walking speed, Distance covered, Terrain (you’ll burn more calories walking uphill than you’ll burn on a flat surface)
Strengthen the heart. Walking at least 30 minutes a day, five days a week can reduce your risk for coronary heart disease by about 19 percent. And your risk may reduce even more, when you increase the duration or distance you walk per day.
Can help lower your blood sugar. Taking a short walk after eating may help lower your blood sugar. A small study found that taking a 15-minute walk three times a day (after breakfast, lunch, and dinner) improved blood sugar levels more than taking a 45-minute walk at another point during the day. Consider making a post-meal walk a regular part of your routine. It can also help you fit exercise throughout the day.
Eases joint pain. Walking can help protect the joints, including your knees and hips. That’s because it helps lubricate and strengthen the muscles that support the joints. Walking may also provide benefits for people living with arthritis, such as reducing pain. And walking 5 to 6 miles a week may also help prevent arthritis.
Boosts immune function. Walking may reduce your risk for developing a cold or the flu. If you live in a cold climate, you can try to walk on a treadmill or around an indoor mall.
Boost your energy. Going for a walk when you’re tired may be a more effective energy boost than grabbing a cup of coffee. Walking increases oxygen flow through the body. It can also increase levels of cortisol, epinephrine, and norepinephrine. Those are the hormones that help elevate energy levels.
Improve your mood. Walking can help your mental health. Studies shows that it can help reduce anxiety, depression, and a negative mood. It can also boost self-esteem and reduce symptoms of social withdrawal. To experience these benefits, aim for 30 minutes of brisk walking or other moderate intensity exercise three days a week. You can also break it up into three 10-minute walks.
Extend your life. Walking at a faster pace could extend your life. Researchers found that walking at an average pace compared to a slow pace resulted in a 20 percent reduced risk of overall death. But walking at a brisk or fast pace (at least 4 miles per hour) reduced the risk by 24 percent.
Tone your legs. Walking can strengthen the muscles in your legs. To build up more strength, walk in a hilly area or on a treadmill with an incline. Or find routes with stairs. Also trade off walking with other cross-training activities like cycling or jogging. You can also perform resistance exercises like squats, lunges, and leg curls to further tone and strengthen your leg muscles.
To ensure your safety while walking, follow these tips:
Walk in areas designated for pedestrians. Look for well-lit areas if possible. Wear sturdy shoes with good heel and arch support. Wear loose, comfortable clothing. Drink plenty of water before and after your walk to stay hydrated. Wear sunscreen to prevent sunburn, even on cloudy days. How to get started? To get started walking, all you’ll need is a pair of sturdy walking shoes. Choose a walking route near your home. Or look for a scenic place to walk in your area, such as a trail or on the beach. You can also recruit a friend or family member to walk with you. Alternatively, you can add walking into your daily routine.
- Here are some ideas:
- If you commute, get off your bus or train one stop early and walk the rest of the way to work.
- Park farther away from your office than usual and walk to and from your car.
- Consider walking instead of driving when you run errands. You can complete your tasks and fit in exercise at the same time.
- In Conclusion:
- Walking can fulfill daily recommended exercise for people of all ages and fitness levels. Consider getting a pedometer or other fitness tracker to keep track of your daily steps. Here are some to check out.
- Choose a walking route and daily step goal that’s appropriate for your age and fitness level.
- Warm and cool down before walking to avoid injury. Always speak to your doctor before starting a new fitness routine.
Benefits of Cycling: Cycling is a low impact aerobic exercise that offers a wealth of benefits. You can cycle as a mode of transport, for casual activity, or as an intense, competitive endeavor. Cycling is a wonderful workout that keeps you active. It can help shape a healthy lifestyle, both physically and mentally.
- Weight management: Cycling habitually, especially at a high intensity, helps lower body fat levels, which promotes healthy weight management. Plus, you’ll increase your metabolism and build muscle, which allows you to burn more calories, even while at rest.
- Leg strength: Cycling improves overall function in your lower body and strengthens your leg muscles without overstressing them. It targets your quads, glutes, hamstrings, and calves.
- Core workout: Cycling also works your core muscles, including your back and abdominals. Maintaining your body upright and keeping the bike in position requires a certain amount of core strength. Strong abdominals and back muscles support your spine, increase stability, and improve comfort while cycling.
- Boosts mental health: Cycling can ease feelings of stress, depression, or anxiety. Focusing on the road while you’re cycling helps develop concentration and awareness of the present moment. This may help take your focus away from the mental chatter of your day. If you find yourself feeling lethargic or listless, get yourself on your bike
for at least 10 minutes. Exercise releases endorphins, which in turn help you feel better while lowering stress levels. You may feel more confident and content once you make cycling a regular part of your life. - It can help people with cancer: Cycling is a fantastic addition to your care plan if you have or are recovering from cancer. Cycling can also keep you lean and fit, which may reduce your risk for certain types of cancer, including breast cancer. According to research from 2019, staying active if you have breast cancer may help reduce side effects of cancer treatment, including fatigue, and improve your overall quality of life.
- A positive start to your morning: Start your day with a healthy activity like cycling, which wakes you up by boosting your circulation and allows you to start your day with a sense of accomplishment. You may feel more inclined to make healthy, positive choices as the day progresses. Fasted morning rides at a low intensity may burn fat, enhance endurance performance, and boost your energy and metabolism levels all day.
- Prevents and manages medical conditions: Whether you want to prevent health concerns from arising or manage existing conditions, regular exercise is key. Cycling regularly is one way to avoid a sedentary lifestyle and its accompanying health concerns. It can help prevent cardiac issues such as stroke, heart attack, and high blood pressure. Cycling may also help prevent and manage type 2 diabetesTrusted Source.
- It’s environmentally friendly: Reduce your carbon footprint by riding your bike whenever possible.Cycling is a great replacement for transport options that involve sitting in traffic for extended periods. It’s especially useful
when you’re going places that are a bit too far to walk, but you still don’t want to take a car..Improves balance, posture, and coordination: As you stabilize your body and - keep your bike upright, you’ll improve your overall balance, coordination, and posture. Balance tends to decline with age and inactivity, so it’s vital to keep on top of it. Improved balance is beneficial in the prevention of falls and fractures, which can leave you on the sidelines while you take time off from exercise to recover.
- It’s a low impact option: Cycling is easy on your body, making it a gentle option for people who want an intense workout without stressing their joints. Cycling is a great option for people who have joint concerns or overall stiffness, especially in the lower body.
Benefits of Home Gardening: Early in the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States, as lockdowns put millions out of work and headlines forecast food shortages, anxious Americans picked up their rakes and spades. Many people were cut off from social gatherings. They were worried about bare shelves and contaminated grocery stores. And they needed something to occupy schoolchildren.
In response, record numbers of people began cultivating coronavirus victory gardens. In a matter of weeks, seeds, seedlings, and fruit trees sold out online and in gardening centers. As it turns out, the impulse to garden is actually a great idea — whether or not you’re coping with a crisis — because gardening is one of the healthiest hobbies you can develop.
Outdoor gardening can help your body fight disease. You’re more like a plant than you may realize. Your body is capable of photosynthesis — the process where plants make their own food using sunlight. Your skin uses sunlight to make one of the nutrients you need: vitamin D. ResearchersTrusted Source estimate that a half hour in the sun can produce between 8,000 and 50,000 international units (IU) of vitamin D in your body, depending on how much your clothes cover and the color of your skin. Vitamin D is essential for literally hundreds of body functions — strengthening your bones and your immune system are just two of them. StudiesTrusted Source have also shown that being out in the sun can help lower your risk of:
* Breast cancer
* Colorectal cancer
* Bladder cancer
* Prostate cancer
* Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma
* Multiple sclerosis
If your vitamin D levels are low, you have a greater risk of developing psoriasis flares, metabolic syndrome (aprediabetes condition), type II diabetes, and dementia, as well. All of these factors have to be balanced against the risk of skin cancer from overexposure to the sun’s rays, of course. But the science is clear: A little sunshine in the garden goes a very long way in your body. Gardening builds strength, promotes sleep, and helps you maintain a healthy weight.
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC)Trusted Source says gardening is exercise. Activities like raking and cutting grass might fall under the category of light to moderate exercise, while shoveling, digging, and chopping wood might be considered vigorous exercise. Either way, working in a garden uses every major muscle group in the body. This fact won’t surprise anyone who’s woken up sore after a day of yardwork.
Gardening can help protect your memory as you get older: Doctors have also known for some time that exercise improves cognitive functioning in the brain. There’s some debate about whether gardening on its own is enough to affect cognitive skills like memory. But new evidence shows that gardening activities may spur growth in your brain’s memory-related nerves. Researchers in Korea gave 20-minute gardening activities to people being treated for
dementia in an inpatient facility. After the residents had raked and planted in vegetable gardens, researchers discovered increased amounts of some brain nerve growth factors associated with memory in both males and females. In a 2014 research review, analysts found that horticultural therapy — using gardening to improve mental health — may be an effective treatment for people with dementia.