Effective Ways to Include Exercise in Your Routine

Life can get busy sometimes, and in the daily rush from home to work and back home again, with whatever errands need to get done in between, exercise is often an afterthought. We know how important exercise is to a healthy lifestyle, so rather than sacrifice it, why not find a way to work it in? Here are three tips to help you include some exercise into your daily routine.

Walk whenever possible. If it doesn’t seem like high intensity exercise, that’s because it’s not, but a good amount of walking is still of immense importance. If your daily commute or regular errands can allow for a bit of walking instead of driving or public transit, the calories burned and muscles moved will go a long way to better overall health.

Sneak it in when you can. Have 10 minutes to kill? Home earlier than expected? Anything is better than nothing, and a workout doesn’t have to be an hour long in order to be helpful. Consider some push-ups when time permits, or a few crunches if you can. Micro-workouts, if done consistently, can provide an immense amount of benefit.

Make it count. When your schedule does permit for a block of time devoted entirely to exercise, make sure that exercise is the most effective it can be. 20 minutes of cardio or a little bit of weight training are only parts of the puzzle. Swimming, on the other hand, is a total body workout and a great cardiovascular workout as well.

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How to Add More Exercise to Your Daily Life

Unless you’re a professional athlete or you’re in the gym on a near-daily basis, odds are that even if you’re active you could always benefit from more exercise in your daily life. Here are two easy ways to do it!

Share the screen time. It’s tough to resist temptation when the latest season of your favorite shows start. We get it, we’re in the same boat. That said, if you’re going to be putting in the screen time anyway, there are ways to combine it with exercise that are far better than just snacking on the couch. If you have the money and the space, an exercise bike, elliptical trainer, or treadmill will help you burn calories as you watch your favorite shows. Don’t worry, though, big machines aren’t an absolute necessity and there are plenty of ways to burn calories while you watch with free weight and body weight exercises.

Walk/cycle to work. Leaving the car at home is a great way to add more exercise to your everyday life. Cycling to work is a fantastic way to up your physical fitness, and if you’re not quite there yet walking to work will go a long way as well. If you live to far away to walk or cycle, there’s always a compromise. You can either drive part way or take public transit to a point then walk or cycle the rest of the way, steadily increasing that distance as you feel more and more capable of doing so.

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Do Our Diets Affect Both Our Bodies and Our Brains?

It may be hard to resist picking up some fast food on the way home, or even having it delivered when we’re home, not to mention that occasional (or not so occasional) cookie or candy to calm our craving between meals, but it we know it’s not doing us any favors. Overeating and a diet high in fat and sugar can contribute to obesity, which in turn can raise our blood pressure, cholesterol, and risk of developing diabetes just to name a few of the potential consequences. But for all the effect on our bodies, could bad diets affect our brains as well? Psychologist Terry Davidson, director of the Center for Behavioral Neuroscience at American University in Washington, D.C., seems to think so, and he’s not alone.

Davidson is part of a growing group of researchers who have found links between obesity and poor memory function, which in turn could lead to bad eating habits completing the vicious cycle. Research from the Cambridge Centre for Ageing and Neuroscience published in 2015 found that obese people have less white matter in their brains than their lean peers — as if their brains were 10 years older. While researches still don’t know exactly how diets affect the brain, it’s certainly cause to think twice before reaching for that donut.

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Why It’s Important to Exercise While on Vacation

We all need a bit of a break every once in a while, and a vacation can be just what the doctor ordered to relax and recharge! But before taking a break from your workout routine as well, consider these three reasons to exercise while on vacation.

More energy to explore. It may be tempting to think that exercise will leave us too tired to go off and explore, but getting in a quick workout before a day of discovery is a great way to regulate energy levels and insure there’s plenty of gas in the tank to go out and explore.

Easier recovery when you get home. Sticking to your workout routine and exercising while away is a great way to ensure a quicker recovery when you get home. Getting back into your routine will be nowhere near as difficult, and regular exercise will even help combat jet lag after a long and difficult flight.

Some justification to the extra indulgence. Let’s be honest, it’ll be hard to resist temptation when surrounded by a whole new world of fabulous flavors and tasty treats. Exercising regularly while away will help burn of some of those excess calories that are bound to be consumed, and may even ease the guilt of the occasional night of overeating.

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Are We Doing Dinner Wrong?

It’s tradition. The family gets together around the dinner table every evening to catch up, with each member of the family recounting stories of their respective day as they sit down to a large meal. Or perhaps it’s date night, time to get dressed up and head out to your favorite restaurant with your favorite (or soon to be favorite) person for a delicious meal that’s almost too big to finish. Or maybe you’re tired after a long day and all you want to do is sit down on the couch and order in a pizza. Whatever the case may be, odds are your dinner will be the biggest meal of the day, but have you ever asked yourself why that is?

The fact of the matter is that dinner time may be the worst time to have that heavy meal and here’s just one of the reasons why: We don’t need the calories. Odds are you’re not getting ready to run a marathon after dinner, and unless you work the night shift you’re probably not getting ready for a long night of work. Dinner usually marks the end of our busy day and after dinner is a time for rest and relaxation, exactly when your body needs fewer calories. It’s tempting to think we may be replenishing the calories we burned throughout the day, but it doesn’t really work that way, generally speaking the calories should be consumed before they’re needed. To top it all off, some calorie counters may not be eating enough during the day in anticipation of that big meal. It may be time to revisit the idea of dinner.

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