Go For a Walk

I was talking with an extremely overweight man this past week and he made a comment that I have heard many times about why he isn’t exercising. He had a defeatist attitude and said that it would just take hours and hours of exercise in order for him to lose weight. This got me thinking about the show “The Biggest Loser”. I have never really been a fan of the show because I feel it gives the wrong impression about what it takes to lose weight if you are extremely overweight. The gentleman I was talking to was right, it is going to take hours of exercise to lose that weight. What you have to realize is that all those hours don’t have to happen within one week!
I am a big believer in getting yourself on a regular workout, on a consistent basis and you will see great results. TV shows need to show the 10 pounds of weight loss a week in order to get ratings but the fact is that is not real life. Real life is 3 or 4 days a week and losing 1 pound a week. This may not sound like much but even a half a pound a week would be 25 pounds a year and I think that would look substantial to anyone!
Walking is a good place to start. Did you know that changing your bad habit of a sedentary lifestyle to simply going out for a walk is going to have great health benefits? Weight loss, lower blood pressure, reduce stress, increase heart health just to name a few. Map out a specific distance and time yourself the first time around. Make that time your goal from then on and keep reducing the time it takes you to go that same distance. As you increase your speed your caloric burn will increase and you can then increase the distance you do within the same time period.
You don’t need a fancy gym to go for a walk and you could be on your way to much better health!
Until next time….