The truth about exercise: Finding the right balance for optimal health - opinion

‘Is exercise overrated?” It’s an interesting question coming from a personal trainer with 26 years’ experience under his belt. 

Exercise and activity are essential components toward achieving good health. It is one of the six aspects of lifestyle medicine and can extend your life and help prevent disease. It can also substantially help your state of mental health. 

Knowing all this, is it possible that we overemphasize exercise at the expense of other aspects of health? Is it possible that, by isolating exercise as something done in a formal manner, we have forgotten the incredible value of working activity into our daily lives? First, let’s define exercise.

What is exercise?

Exercise includes three different facets; aerobics, resistance training and flexibility training. Aerobic exercise is any mode of exercise that raises your pulse to between 60% and 90% of your maximum pulse. Common modes of aerobics are walking, running, biking, rowing, jump roping and swimming. 

Resistance training is for building and maintaining muscle mass. You can lift weights, use your own body for resistance, like doing push-ups and sit-ups, or do isometric exercises. 

For flexibility, static held stretches or modalities like yoga are all good to bring better range of motion. 

You should choose a modality that you enjoy. One of the great things about exercise is that there are many different ways for you to achieve good results.

What are the benefits?

The list of benefits of exercise are too numerous to list in this article. The Harvard School of Medicine lists some:

• Blood pressure – exercise may lower blood pressure if done on a regular basis.

• Anxiety and depression – exercise appears to ease anxiety symptoms right away and over the long term, and many studies have shown that effective physical activity can reduce the risk of depression and treat depression itself.

• Insulin sensitivity and diabetes – activity can improve your body’s response to insulin, the hormone that helps control blood sugar levels. Better insulin sensitivity may lower the risk of type 2 diabetes.

• Sleep – getting more physical activity may improve your sleep efficiency, and help you sleep more deeply.

• Weight loss – exercise is NOT the main ingredient to substantial weight loss. But, exercise may help people stave off the weight gain that often occurs as people age. To lose weight, you have to eat fewer calories. If you do lose weight, being active helps prevent regaining it. Even without weight loss, you still reap the benefits of exercise.

Much of the analyses of the data involving exercise have shown that simply by engaging in moderate exercise 150 minutes (2.5 hours) a week can lower you risk of chronic diseases by up to 35%. 

But with all this said, most people don’t want to engage in formal exercise. It is time consuming and can cost money, and not everyone is looking forward to a sweaty experience. Is there another way?

Activity

If exercise isn’t for you, then let’s do something really NEAT: Non-Exercise Activity Thermogenesis. NEAT encompasses the calories burned while living life—walking to work, typing, folding clothes, washing dishes, running errands and so on; the only things not included are sleeping, eating and formal exercise.

Research suggests that prolonged sitting can be as bad for health as smoking (Owen et al. 2010). Sitting “deactivates” the brain and lowers metabolism. Limited physical activity, low levels of mental stimulation and too much time on screens and mobile devices have a detrimental effect on the brain over time (Nussbaum 2006). Movement is crucial, but you don’t have to run a marathon.

According to the Centers for Disease Control, prolonged sitting is a significant contributor to chronic diseases. When people get up and move, they’re likely to see big benefits:

• 21%–25% reduction in risk for certain cancers

• 20%–27% reduction in risk for stroke

• 27% reduction in risk for diabetes

While consistent exercise can help to counteract the effects of sitting too much, when that becomes difficult or inconsistent, fitting in more activity within what we are doing daily becomes a viable and valuable option.

Also good for your brain

The simple activities of NEAT can build and strengthen the brain. Dr. John Medina refers to physical activity as “cognitive candy.” The two primary foods for the brain are oxygen and glucose. 

By moving we increase the flow of oxygenated blood and glucose to the brain. Proper glucose levels are associated with stronger memory and cognitive function.

When a person sits for longer than 10 minutes, the brain downshifts and it becomes more difficult to pay attention (Jensen 2000). Office settings and school environments typically require doing a great deal of work in a seated position, and yet the brain is least productive when sitting (Eckmann 2013).

One big advantage of concentrating on an active life has to do with immune system health. However, people who engage in steady, intense exercise, without proper recovery, can compromise their immune systems. 

Marathon runners are at high risk for the common cold and mononucleosis for 30 days after each marathon they run. Bodybuilders have much shorter life expectancy. So, if you are exercising, don’t overdo it.

Exercise can’t undo a poor diet

You can’t out-exercise poor eating. We have all fallen victim to thinking that we can take certain liberties and eat unhealthy foods because we exercise. This is a terrible mistake. Food and diet are still the king when it comes to health. You’ll never burn off the calories you eat from fatty foods and it won’t clear your coronary arteries of plaque buildup from eating too much cholesterol and saturated fats. 

But when you combine an active lifestyle or formal exercise with a good plant-predominant diet, a good night’s sleep, abstention from smoking or other substance abuse, and stress management, you just might be able to fend off all chronic disease to the tune of lowering your risk by as much as 80%.

Exercise is great and valuable. But it isn’t a standalone solution – and it won’t undo other poor lifestyle habits. Including exercise and activity as part of your healthy living will “add hours to your day, days to your year and years to your life.”

The writer is a health and wellness coach and personal trainer with more than 25 years of professional experience. He is director of The Wellness Clinic and can be reached at alan@alanfitness.com.