Exercise is Important For Everyone! – Well-Being, Wealth, N More

Are you going to be making New Year’s resolutions this year? Everyone makes resolutions like “I’m going to lose 10 pounds by Valentine’s Day,” or “I’m going to quit smoking this year,” or “I’m going to do more reading instead of watching TV,” etc. I could go on, but the idea here is, “Resolutions don’t matter because people never keep them.” If resolutions are not kept, why are they made?

That’s a good question! My opinion on New Year’s Resolutions is they are a tradition. Every year since I was a child, I remember everyone I knew made resolutions on New Year’s Eve in preparation for the New Year. Apparently, 75 percent of all resolutions made are broken. Can you believe that? I’m sure it is true.

Every year since I was about 10 years old I made New Year’s resolutions. One year, when I was 15, I decided to make the resolution (at the beginning of the school year and at New Years) to have a boyfriend. I went to a Catholic high school and wore a green plaid pleated skirt, a white shirt, and a black blazer uniform. At 15, I was as round as I was tall. None of the boys in my class or any of the other classes liked me, but I didn’t lose hope. I was so determined to have a boyfriend that year that I started exercising and dieting. In October, I turned 16. Still no boyfriend. I lost 10 pounds and my little round belly. My girl friends were very happy I had lost weight. They thought for sure I would have a boyfriend in a few months. Christmas came and went. Valentines Day came and went. By the time school was out for the summer, I still didn’t have a boyfriend. Actually, when I finally got a boyfriend, I was 18 years old and in nursing school. So much for that year’s resolution.

The media hype acclaiming the new year encourages people to change something about themselves to make life better. There are so many people trying to lose weight, stop smoking, do more exercise, be less lonely, start new businesses, etc. Those who usually make a resolution to change themselves or their lives may start out strong, but after a few weeks they lose steam and quit. For those folks trying to change their image or quit smoking, they work hard at it for awhile, but because our society is used to having what we want right away, when we don’t lose weight or we can’t quit smoking we quit trying. There is no willpower anywhere or our resolutions are not serious.

I’ve come to realize that New Year’s resolutions are a game. When we are with friends, we make resolutions to keep up with them. When we are alone, we have no intention of keeping resolutions. If everyone who made a resolution was accountable to someone other than a family member or co-worker, I bet more people would keep their resolutions. That is the reason I don’t make resolutions any more at New Years or at any other time. Saying a resolution out loud is tantamount to being accountable and I would have to go through with it.

You will have to do what you think is best when it comes to New Year’s resolutions. If you feel like you can go through with it, go ahead and make as many resolutions as you can keep.

As the title of this article suggests, it is very important to focus on fitness if you want to live a long “active” life. The emphasis is on active. Coming home from work and lying or sitting on the couch until bedtime will weaken every muscle in your body. Even if your work is very active, you still need to do some form of exercise to keep your body fit and your muscles toned.

The human body is a complex machine. As food is taken in, the body converts it to energy in order to power all of the processes that keep it alive and functioning. This energy is also used to create or repair tissues including muscle, bone and organs. That body you have is your body for life. You need to take care of it with a combination of healthy eating and exercise.

When someone engages in hard physical work every day for a living, exercising is rarely a concern. Farming, hunting and other manual labor will keep most people in good shape. But in today’s world of information technology, a large percentage of the population works in sedentary office jobs where their bodies store calories and their joints and muscles become weak from lack of exercise.

This means that Western societies have seen a movement toward fitness centers, gyms and physical fitness programs, all to provide the human body with the physical challenges it was built to meet. In combination with exercise, it’s important to eat a healthy and varied diet that meets your caloric, vitamin and mineral needs, without supplying unnecessary amounts of fat, salt or additives.

Maintaining a good level of health and fitness translates into a number of benefits. Not only does staying fit mean that the body is better equipped to handle the various challenges it faces every day, but also improves physical appearance, psychological state of mind, and can improve a number of health concerns including stress, insomnia, anxiety, depression and high blood pressure.

Health and fitness can be measured in a number of ways. Body fat percentage is the measurement of the amount of body mass that is composed of fat tissue. What is considered a healthy body fat percentage depends on the sex of the individual. Women have a higher recommended body fat percentage than men.

Another scale that defines an individual’s ideal or healthy weight is the body mass index (BMI). Individuals are placed in weight categories on the index given their height and weight. For example, the average male (at a height of 5 feet, 9 inches) would be considered underweight at 124 pounds or less, normal weight from 125 to 168 points, overweight at 169 to 202 pounds and obese at 203 pounds or more. You can find body mass index charts and calculators online.

Some individuals have taken fitness and physique to the next level, making it a full time job or at least a significant part of their life. These body builders carefully manage their diet, exercise and body building supplement intake to maximize muscle growth and definition. Information on body building is available on a number of websites, and many famous body builders, including Arnold Schwarzenegger, have also written books on the subject.

While some choose the body building route, that does not mean that the rest of us need to be ripped to be healthy. Practicing good food nutrition and engaging in moderate exercise for at least 30 minutes a day is a great place to start. You may even want to consider finding a job that keeps you active. A healthy body is a happy body!

The information above was taken from an article written for http://www.onehealthylifestyle.com. There is a lot of information on this website about maintaining a healthy lifestyle. If you have medical problems, you can look up almost any disease or pain process on this site. Don’t be afraid to research any problems you may have because it is better to know as much as possible about your body. However, be very careful about believing everything you read. Go to trusted sites like http://www.WebMD.com or http://www.mayoclinic.com or any other site you know of that provides appropriate medical information.

If you have any comments or questions, please identify them in a comment. I answer all of my comments immediately as they are received.