As our age goes up, so does our responsibility to protect our health. If we desire to live long, healthy and productive lives, we must keep moving. Staying active helps us to keep our golden years golden in five ways:
- It preserves our Strength and Balance – According to the World Health Organization, when we keep moving, we strengthen our supporting ligaments, build our muscles, and maintain or enhance our bone density. It’s these three components of our body that help improve and maintain our strength, balance and stability.
- It Maintains our Brain Function – When we keep moving, the brain stimulates new cell growth, which impacts learning and memory in the hippocampus. A simple walk each day can keep your brain sharp.
- It Keeps Joints Healthy–The reason your bones move past one another smoothly is a fluid that acts as a lubricating oil. The soft tissue that surrounds the joints in your body produces this fluid. If you need low-impact resistance, water aerobics is a great way to stay active while lubricating these joints.
- It Enables Independence Longer – My childhood nickname was “Sassy Pooh-Pooh.” As my name implies, I was somewhat of an independent child. I always wanted to do things myself. If someone tried to do it for me, my response was, “Don’t bonna.” I can only imagine that my older years will be the same. I’d like to stay independent as long as I can. Movement sustains our ability to move and enables us to live independently much longer.
- It Reduces our Risk for Cancer – Exercise and movement have many anti-cancer benefits. Our lymphatic system (which is art of our immune system) works at optimum when we move daily. It is the only system in our body that requires us to move in order to work. The main role of your lymph system is to keep your fluid levels in balance while protecting you from infections, bacteria, cancers, and other potential threats. It takes out the trash, which must be eliminated from our bodies. Exercise helps us move the trash from our bodies, and causes us to sweat toxins out through our pores. Movement also raises our white blood cells. Staying active is key to keeping a healthier lifestyle longer.
According to Dr. David Jockers:
When you come in contact with microbes, bacteria, or toxins, they make their way into your body and the lymphatic fluid. Once the fluid makes its way into your lymph nodes, these organisms get trapped and your immune system can attack and destroy them. Inside the lymph nodes, these harmful organisms are filtered out and white blood cells are created to protect your body.
Just 150 minutes of physical activity per week can have a great impact on our health and the aging process. Staying active also lowers our risk for many chronic diseases. Movement is one sure way to keep our golden years golden. The benefits are only positive and it cost us nothing! That’s a real bargain. Just don’t overdo it!
What do you do to make sure you stay active on a daily basis?
For Your health,
Ginny