The Advantages Of Walking | A Great Exercise To Overcome A Sedentary Lifestyle
Owing to our jobs, most of us are forced into a sedentary lifestyle:
We are confined to our office chair and desks, staring at the computer for long hours and forgetting to do essential basic things like drinking water or blinking our eyes.
I slowly realized that I was also beginning to become lazy.
While I used to be more active before, my work was inadvertently forcing me to focus less on burning the calories that I was piling on.
So I knew that I needed to shake up things, and that I needed to be more active.
The simplest way to do that:
Start walking more.
I knew walking had it's benefits, but I never knew there were so many advantages of such a simple activity.
In my previous article, I talked about the benefits of a good sleep.
Here, I want to address benefits of walking:
An easy form of exercise with a lots of advantages.
- Promotes Weight Loss
This should be an obvious benefit of walking - it is a great exercise that leads to weight loss.
A brisk 30-minute walk burns 200 calories
Be it walking up the stairs instead of using elevators, or just increasing the amount of ground you cover on a daily basis, simple steps like these can go a long way in aiding your weight loss goal and also help in maintaining it.
- Boosts Immune Function
Our body consists of several immune cells, and walking boosts their functioning, namely, the B-cells, T-cells, and the natural killer cells.
A study of over 1,000 men and women found that those who walked at least 20 minutes a day, at least 5 days a week, had 43% fewer sick days than those who exercised once a week or less.
By improving our immune system, walking helps prevent infections and diseases.
- Counteracts Effects Of Weight-Promoting Genes
Not only does walking help you trim those extra calories, but regular brisk walking helps to cut the effects of those dreaded weight promoting genes by half.
This is one benefit of walking that should motivate you to maximize the number of steps you take on a daily basis.
- Strengthens Heart
Walking regularly helps you reduce your risk of developing heart disease or having a stroke. This is achieved by:
- lowering the levels of LDL (bad) cholesterol and increasing the levels of HDL (good) cholesterol in your body.
- preventing and controlling the high blood pressure in your body which is known to cause strokes.
- Makes You Happy
Studies have shown that exercise has the capability to boost your mood. Basically, it is a good way to maintain positive mental health, and develop an overall happy attitude.
Brisk walking is just as effective as antidepressants in mild to moderate cases of depression, releasing feel-good endorphins while reducing stress and anxiety.
Long walks can potentially assist you in clearing your head and addressing your thoughts, walking in the open space with fresh air can give you a sense of calm and freshness, and if you are out walking with friends, it helps you stay connected and social.
There are so many other potential gains from this easy cardio exercise, like:
it can lead to longer life, it strengthens your bones and muscles, it lowers Alzheimer’s risk.
Any kind of physical activity, like walking, is a blessing to your overall health and wealth being.
so, what are you waiting for?
It is better that we start giving more importance to exercise when we still have the time to undo some of the harmful effects of a sedentary lifestyle.
Thanks for reading! @jznsamuel
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So right, offices are slowly killing us all, and good walk, al least twice during working week is my routine, on weekend even more..Rollerblading for 2-5km and you already feel alive. Good post about great problem of today, and not been spoken of too much..Thanks for talking about this problem.
Good subject! I esp. loved the first picture where that girl is walking bare-feet. I personally love and advocate bare-foot walking. I'm quite jealous of her as these days I don't get such a natural ground to put my feet on. It's asphalt everywhere which gets so hot in summers that it literally melts down. But I won't suggest to walk pulling a trolley-bag like her. It's certainly not good for your posture and health.
I also don't agree with the words you use about losing weight. It's actually misleading. It's not about losing or gaining weight, but coming to a perfect shape. Last year I went for a thousand mile walk which took me about 4 months to complete. But I gained over 5% of my body weight during that time. I'd like to add that I didn't tow a bag all the way as shown in the picture, I used a rucksack. LOL!
very informative @jznsamuel. Nice post. Keep posting. Following you.
Thank you @impressions!
This caught my eye as I walk about 45 mins to and from work every day, I was curious as to how it was helping. Many thanks, great post!
That's a lot of walking :) Thank you @ajpage!
We have bodies, they are meant to move.
Very well said, succinctly & perfectly!
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