9 Steps to Better Health- Step 5: Exercise- Make It Fun Everyday

Exercise is not just the thing we do to lose weight.  Exercise is an actual nutrient requirement. You can eat really clean, even have a great mindset, but we’ve got to move!

Major Benefits

One of the major benefits of exercise? Oxygenation of the body. You may not have heard this before- our brain is not a metabolic organ. Yet our brain needs massive amounts of oxygen. So unlike your legs-you go for a walk or bike ride and your legs send a message- hey, we need more oxygen and blood flow- heart rate increases, respiration, we get oxygen blood flow to that muscle, that’s a part of our body that’s  metabolic. Exercise can start to fuel that muscle for activity and then recover faster because of our cardiovascular system. Our brain does not have that same advantage.  It relies on us doing all that activity during the day-we get great oxygenation of the body. The brain actually recovers at night. Exercise is actually one of the best things for your brain but it is delayed. You’re going to be able to recover brain tissue and brain health at nighttime but if you haven’t had exercise during the day, your brain is going to suffer at night. We have to have that buildup of oxygen to fuel the brain.

Physical Exercise is Better than Mental Exercise

So this is why studies find that exercise far outpaces, far exceeds, cognitive drills like crossword puzzles and mental exercises.  Physical exercise still far outpaces mental exercise and always will.

Exercise Is a Big Detox

Another benefit of exercise is that it’s going to flush out toxins from the body as well. Exercise is a big detox. Why? Because your lymphatic system has no official pump. The pump is you!  We get it especially if it’s rhythmic, like walking, like biking,  things that you can kind of do and sustain for 10 to 15 minutes. Rebounding on a  mini trampoline is good.  Make it a habit. No, you don’t need an hour, you don’t need two hours you need 10 to 15 minutes at a minimum. This is called the minimum dose or the minimum exposure to get a physiological benefit. Any exercise is better than none but again, we’re shooting for 10 to 15 minutes.

The lymphatic system is the garbage can system of your body and must be stimulated. Your body turns over about 50 billion cells a day and that’s just normal operation. That’s just another day at the office. If you’re fighting flu and colds, have microbes and parasites, toxins, heavy metals, pesticides, you name it, guess where all that stuff has to go to leave the body. Nobody can just dump all that in the blood. We’d get really sick and we’d end up in the hospital if it all went to the blood. So it’s good to use the back end to get to the alleys. Blood is the street out front. And the alley is our lymphatic system. We’ve got to stimulate this system with exercise. You’re going feel a lot better over time.  Exercise has to be a lifestyle.  These are things you have to build and maintain while you heal. And it can take months if not years to heal serious complications from certain conditions but we have to start somewhere.

Let’s work on that daily exercise. Do something sustainable, that you’re comfortable with and try to make it fun too- it should not be grueling, right. Try to get partners. Try to go with an animal, if you have a dog. Try to change it up. Go hiking, make this fun. Do something that’s fun for you. Let me know how  I can help you incorporate more exercise into your daily routines!