With the heat wave persisting, I’m finding new ways to get my daily exercise in the water. Here are two suggestions:
Start with a gentle jog; a fun way to beat the heat and get your daily dose of cardio.
And end with a slow water walk across the pool for core strength & balance. Try it. It’s tougher than it looks.
To weigh or not to weigh that is the question. Whether ‘tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of knowing ones outrageous weight, or to take arms against the budge by simply ignoring the scale and trying to eat less and exercise more. For some of us, the scale is a tool. For others it’s the enemy.
Some health and fitness professionals have made a compelling case for ignoring the scale, saying that measuring one’s percentage of body fat is the most accurate way to track ones fitness level because it indicates a healthy body composition regardless of height and weight. Whether you decide to use the scale or not it’s important to keep track of your percentage of body fat.
Here are some general guidelines according to the American Council of Exercise:
Body Fat % Women:
Fit: 21-24%
Average: 25-31%
Obese: > 32%
Body Fat % Men:
Fit: 14-17%
Average: 18-24%
Obese: > 25%
So why bother weighing yourself at all?
My personal prejudice is weigh yourself at least once or twice a week. I do, and I find that facing my weight on a regular basis helps me stay on track. Believe me there have been times when I’ve dreaded getting on the scale. But I do it anyway because no matter what it says, I feel relief. I find it liberating. Why? Because now I know where I am and what I need to do next. It helps me maintain a healthy weight. Also the scale I have, measures my body fat too so I am able to keep track of that at the same time.
In my practice I have helped hundreds of people lose weight. And most of them initially fight me about getting on the scale and I understand this because I know that terror. Part of the process of losing weight is to prepare one’s self to do it.
If you are not psychologically ready to lose, stepping on the scale can be a real turn off and actually deter you from losing weight. But once you’ll ready, facing that number can jumpstart your weight loss program and keep you motivated.
I give my clients a baseline of their body fat percentage and get them to use the scale. Then we set up a diet and exercise plan. You can lose weight by diet alone but a larger percent of your weight loss will be taken more from lean muscle mass than from body fat. The winning combination is to reduce calorie intake, do cardio every other day and strength training at least a couple of days a week. Cardio burns calories and strength training raises your metabolism and builds lean muscle mass while you are losing. Losing about 1% body fat a month and 1-21/2 pounds a week is considered safe and realistic.
So I’ve made my case for using the scale as a tool, and I hope you’ll try it when you are ready. Regardless, to be or not to be at a healthy weight should not be in question.
Send your questions to askmirabai@movingfree.com
Weight Bearing Exercise
By now we all know that Osteoporosis makes bones so thin and porous that they can break during everyday activities like stepping off a curb or picking up a grocery bag.
We’ve all heard that estrogen protects women from bone loss and that we can loose up to 30% of our bone mass in the first 10 years after menopause. And we’ve heard that we should do weight bearing and resistance exercise to help prevent bone loss and promote bone growth.
But what IS weight bearing exercise? What’s the difference between weight bearing and resistance exercise? And what kind of exercise routine should I do to protect my bones?
I hear this all year long. So, here are the answers.
Weight bearing means literally making your bones carry weight. Standing makes your bones carry your body weight. Standing with your grandchild on your shoulders makes your bones carry your weight plus your grandchild’s.
Studies show that weight bearing exercises like walking and jogging that also apply impact to your bones are even more effective
Resistance exercise uses your muscles to apply mechanical forces to your bones like pushing (compression) pulling (tension), twisting (torsion), and bending.
So, the more weight, impact and resistance the better, right? No. Even if your body were a machine made of steel there would be a weight, impact and resistance that would break it.
And we know our bodies are much more fragile than that. Common sense must rule.
Walk, jog, jump rope, dance, pull on a rope, push on a wall, wring out a towel, and bend bones with weight lifting exercises. But do it safely. Do it in moderation. Stay in your comfort zone. Start with a comfortable amount and build up slowly over time. Take breaks between shorter intervals of training. Studies show that those break times may be when bones get stimulated to grow.
Studies also show that site-specific exercises are very effective. So, do exercises that involve the 3 areas most at risk for Osteoporotic fracture, the spine the hip and the wrist?
Walking loads your spine and your legs including the hip joints. Wrist curls and wringing a towel work your wrists and forearms.
Do any weight-training resistance exercises every other day because your muscles need time to recover. A starter routine might be 20 minutes or more of brisk walking every other day and weight resistance training on the days in between.
But make sure you talk to your doctor about your particular exercise needs and limitations.
They vary greatly from person to person.
So why not use Osteoporosis month to set an example for the women in your family of any age because it’s never too early or too late to start working out your bones.
Skeletal Fitness by Mirabai Holland: A Workout For Your Bones
Osteoporosis is one of those silent diseases that can creep up on you before you know you have it. To combat Osteoporosis and help keep your bones healthy for a lifetime, it’s important to increase your Skeletal Fitness!
Osteoporosis is a disease, which, over time, causes bones to become thinner, more porous and less able to support the body. Usually there’s no pain in the early stages.
44 million of us are at risk for Osteoporosis. The vast majority are women.
Women often develop Osteopenia (low bone mass that can lead to Osteoporosis) in the first few years after menopause because they lose bone-protecting estrogen.
But, we can prevent and help reverse the effects of Osteoporosis by working out our bones. On the outside, bones look solid and rock-like, but they’re not.
They’re living tissue. There is a smooth, hard, outside layer
made of cortical bone, and the inside, is a strong, light weight,
honeycomb-like structure, called trabecular bone, which contains blood vessels, and bone marrow. The combination of cortical and trabecular bone enables the skeleton to be light, strong, flexible and efficient.
By young adulthood, our bones have grown to their full size and density. But activity in our bones is far from over. In a cycle called remodeling, old and weakened areas of our skeletons are broken down and replaced with new well-formed tissue. Adults have about 10 to 15% of their bone replaced each year.
In bones with Osteoporosis, the remodeling cycle is out of balance. Bone is broken down but little or nothing takes its place. The outside hard cortical layer
gets thinner, and the honeycombed, trabecular inside becomes more porous.
Most people don’t discover they have Osteoporosis until a fracture occurs.
Fractures occur most often at the spine, at the hip, and at the wrist.
The good news is since bones are living tissue they can become denser with weight bearing exercise.
For example, astronauts lose bone mass in the weightlessness of space. To combat this, NASA is training astronauts for a mission to Mars, to do weight bearing exercise that simulates the exercises they will need to do in space to maintain their bone mass. Weight bearing exercise for Skeletal Fitness is called bone loading. When working out your bones it’s important to load the areas most at risk for fracture: the spine, the hip, and the wrist.
So for instance try these Do’s to help load the three areas most at risk:
· Carrying a backpack instead of a purse to help load your spine.
· Take stairs instead of the elevator whenever you can to load your hips.
· Grab some soup cans and do 8-16 reps of wrist curls and when that gets too light invest in some hand weights. Remember; always exhale on exertion when you’re lifting a weight. Start with a comfortable weight and add one pound every couple of weeks, or, when it feels too easy.
· As you get stronger you can add a full body weight-training program with special emphasis on the areas at risk for Osteoporosis.
Weight train every other day, because your body needs time to recover and grow stronger.
If you are at risk for or have Osteoporosis, here are some Don’ts
· As a general rule, don’t do anything that requires you to bend forward from the waist with the back rounded; this is called spinal flexion and increases the risk of collapsed vertebra so no toe touches.
· Avoid sit-ups, and crunches. Instead, you can strengthen your abdominals by keeping them pulled in, navel back to your spine during daily activity.
Also, always consult with your doctor, get all the information you can, together you can decide what’s best for you. And remember, it’s never too early or too late to start working out your bones!
For more information on bone-loading workouts please visit www.mirabaiholland.com
At this time of year when we’re struggling with our New Year’s resolutions I feel a need to ask and answer this question.
Why is it that so many people who truly want and desperately need to get fit find it so unattainable?
Why do so many start fitness programs only to quit after a few days or a few weeks?
Why is it that many highly trained fitness professionals can’t help us and can be actually detrimental to our success?
There’s this mentality that you have to whip yourself into shape in order to get in shape. No pain no gain. And if your body is not hard and ripped and buffed then you’re not fit. NONSENSE!!
What is fitness really?
What if getting fit meant that your could get out of a chair comfortably, that you could pick up a coin off the floor, reach for something without pulling something, run for a bus without feeling like you’re going to pass out. Maybe live longer, happier, and reap those health benefits the fit enjoy
All these things are attainable without knocking yourself out and without having a ripped body. You can have real gain, without the pain. You can be fit and active and take it as far as you want at your own pace in your own comfort zone. All you have to do is stand up (and if you can’t stand up sit in a chair) and move. Start slowly, gently, naturally just move. That’s the place to start. You don’t need gimmicks, you don’t need machines. Move a little every day. Start with just a few minutes, but do it every day. After a couple of weeks you’ll start to feel better. As you keep it up you’ll want to do a little more. So do a little more and on the days you don’t feel like doing it, just do a little something. You will accumulate fitness a little at a time. Eventually you’ll want to introduce yourself to the 3 major components of fitness: Cardio, Strength and Flexibility training. But then you’ll be ready because your body got used to moving again. It’s not rocket science but it is science and it does work. Studies show that moderate daily exercise gets you fit enough to reap about 80% of the health benefits fitness has to offer. Not bad.
At this time of year when New Year Resolutions are just around the corner, I’d like to offer some suggestions on how to get into shape and stay there once and for all. Many of today’s fitness programs are all about the quick sell and even quicker results. Many are based on dangerous fitness myths. Here are 5 fitness myths to steer away from:
Myth #1: Pain Equals Gain It is a popular misconception that only when you feel the pain are you gaining anything from your workout. “The “no pain, no gain” mentality contributes to more injuries and more burnout than any other fitness factor, especially among my age group (baby boomers). It is wiser to exercise sustainably over a longer term, than to push yourself to the breaking point.
Myth #2: A Taskmaster Equals the Best Teacher Reality Exercise Shows that have recently become popular portray drill-sergeant-style trainers as being the most effective fitness mentors. While leveraging fear and using intimidation techniques may mean instant short-term fitness results, they’re sending the wrong message about how to get and stay fit for a lifetime. Attainable short-term goals and positive reinforcement are more likely to create good fitness habits that are sustainable for life.
Myth #3: Pumping up the Volume Equals Pumping up Your Physique It seems some fitness instructors think screaming louder and blasting the bass is motivational. It’s time to think again. While high-decibel workouts might be temporarily motivational, over time these techniques become draining and stressful leading to faster fitness burnout. Look instead for uplifting music and gentle coaching in your workouts.
Myth #4: Fitness Equals a Fight Against Your Body Sales pitches that encourage “shaving off the pounds” and busting your abs or your butt have solidified the image of fitness as a battle against your body. Fighting is not a sustainable activity or philosophy. Instead, think of partnering with your body. Meet it where it is at right now and provide the environment and tools to reveal your body’s best potential. When you take this approach you are setting yourself up for success every step of the way.
Myth #5: Force Equals Fit Today’s popular exercise routines promote pounding your body into shape. But ancient fitness modalities, such as Yoga and Tai Chi had it right. Fitness is not about pumping the most iron or performing the most reps, it is about teaching your body how to move efficiently, using all of your muscles groups, and sustaining these movements over time. Exercise including strength training should be approached as a gradual lifetime process. This way, exercise becomes a pleasure not a chore.
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Last weekend I went hiking in Vermont and the Fall color was astonishing.
I went along for about two hours at a brisk pace enjoying the fresh air.
Much of my exercise is teaching fitness classes and creating new routines for exercise DVDs. So, it was refreshing to just free my mind, move my body and drink in all those trees dressed in red, yellow, orange mixed with green. Sometimes its good to mix up your exercise routine. I felt renewed.
When I finished my hike we went into a little country food market.
So cute with all those red and white checkered tabletops filled with fresh fruits, vegetables, homemade jams, honey, maple syrup and cider. I spotted a bottle that said “Fresh Apple Cider” thinking how fresh it would taste, this being apple season and all. I continued my walk and I’d gotten a considerable distance from the store when I decided it was time for swig of cider. As I was about to sip, I glanced at the ingredients label expecting to see APPLES. But instead it read
APPLES, and Potassium sorbate, a preservative.
I wanted to throw that cider against a wall!
I was thirty so I drank a little and whether it was in my mind or not, it seemed to taste not as fresh as I imagined it would. So the lesson here, is just because you are in an adorable country market, don’t take for granted that all the foods will be fresh and adorable too.
So caveat emptor: let the buyer beware!
I also filmed a brief vlog (video blog) post while I was there. Enjoy!
Autumn, leaves are turning, frost is on the pumpkin and flu season is knocking at our door. I’ve got no excuse. Even my neighborhood drugstore is giving out flu shots these days.
Thinking about avoiding the flu always makes me wax philosophic.
So I started thinking about wellness. What is wellness anyway?
It’s the absence of disease. If you are not sick you are well.
But it’s more than that isn’t it? It’s quality of life and for some it’s the balance of all things. I like this balance concept so I dug out one of my favorite balance tools:
The Mandala: the wheel of life. I wrote down all the types of wellness I could think of and ended up with 6 categories that I stuck on my Mandala. Here they are:
Physical Wellness
· Taking care of your body, eat right, exercise
· Visit your doctor regularly
Mental Wellness
· Keeping an open mind and trying to see other’s point of view
· Allowing your curiosity to take you to new places and learn new things.
Emotional Wellness
· Trying to keep a positive state of mind
· Cultivating self esteem
· Reaching out to others for support
Spiritual Wellness
· Recognizing your beliefs.
· Allowing your core values to direct your actions.
Social Wellness
· Developing positive inter-personal relationships at home and work
· Allowing yourself to give and receive love: to and from everyone that means that much to you including animals
· Participate in social situations; try not to stay on the sidelines.
Environmental Wellness
· Making your home environment peaceful, pleasant, safe and comfortable.
· Choosing an occupation and a workplace that doesn’t drive you nuts.
· Try to have a positive impact on our natural environment.
Recycle more, pollute less.
When the wheel is in balance it spins evenly. When even one of these categories is out of whack, the whole wheel starts to wobble.
So as a wellness professional I respectfully suggest you get rolling!
Send your Moving Free with Mirabai questions to: askmirabai@movingfree.com
Schedules are tight in the morning but you can get a good workout in only ten minutes a day. What maximizes time and works really well is using an exercise routine that splits the body into major muscle groups, exercises one or two muscle groups per day. What really condenses time is doing each exercise slowly about 8 seconds per movement. For instance 8 counts on the lift and 8 counts on the lowering phase of each movement. Each exercise should be performed 8-12 reps. You need to use enough weight so you can barely perform the last rep.This gives the muscle group enough of a workout to only be done once a week. Can use own body weight, hand weights, cans, or resistance bands.
Monday: chest and back
Tuesday: Inner & Outer Thighs
Wednesday: Arms,
Thursday front/back thighs & buttocks
Friday: Abs