Your Body “A Self-Contained Gym”
We get bombarded throughout the year with ads promoting super supplements, weight loss pills, weight loss plans, and exercise machines, so it’s no wonder that it has a psychological effect on what we feel is necessary for health and fitness. Though some of these are effective, the problem is when these ads make someone feel they have to have it for increasing their level of fitness.
What each of us needs to know is that we have enough body weight to give us the resistance we need to get a good exercise routine wherever we’re at, whenever we want, and the only cost is your time. When we move our body weight at a faster pace it increases the resistance and done consistently over a period of time these muscles used for the movement will build and develop to accommodate the new stress, (this is the strengthening and toning process in a nutshell).
When you use functional exercise movements (that you use in everyday living) for your exercise, you strengthen and condition this part of your life. When we do something like stooping or squatting to pick something up, we would really be surprised if we could see the muscular mechanics going to work to make this movement possible. When we repeat this same movement several times at a faster speed or add extra resistance or weight, we strengthen the muscles, bones, tendons and ligaments used to do this and it becomes easier!
Example: Many times when a person falls, it’s the first time in a long time that they were actually laid out on the floor, and now the person is possibly hurt and is faced with having to get back up from a position they are not used to being in. If a person would get down on the floor and then get back up several times, (slowly at first) and gradually pick up the pace, it could give someone a pretty good workout. When we mimic the movements, we use in real life (in our exercise routine) it makes our activities of daily living (ADL’s) easier and whether a young athlete or a senior, it simply helps us handle our day better.
Take away: Find an exercise or 2 that gets most of your skeletal muscles moving, (such as a squat thrust). Do this by squatting and then rising to the front of your foot with arms thrusting upward. Do the movement slowly and don’t squat too deep. As you get used to this, do a deeper squat and speed up the movement.
The 3 main things you want to work toward are:
1. Range of motion.
2. Speed of movement.
3. Length of time that you can go before resting.
A good short workout to intensify the above would be to go from the squat-thrust exercise and then lay down on the floor and do pushups, (beginners can keep the knees against the floor to decrease resistance). The speed of movement in most any exercise you do increases the resistance and it results in increased muscle strength, size and bone density. So whether confined to your office, home or on the road, you carry your gym with you wherever you go if you have a few basic movements that activate the large muscle groups of the body! Try getting down flat on the floor, stomach or back and get back up lifting your arms above your head and see how many times you can do this, it’s like a full body power jog!
Full body movements done with intensity = Results! The key to getting results and at the same time preventing injury is “gradually” increasing the range of motion, speed, and length of time doing the exercises.
Remember: steady wins the race!
