Fitness Tips for a Healthier Life

These fitness tips can help you improve your health, feel younger and prevent injury. Physical fitness refers to the human body's ability to perform while handling fatigue. If the stored energy is enough then we can enjoy leisure activities as well as overcome physical stresses with alertness and vigor. General alertness, muscular endurance and strength, and cardiovascular reliability are the obvious signs of your level of physical fitness.

Normally, physical fitness is measured according to expected functions of the body associated with endurance, strength, coordination, flexibility, and agility.

Fitness levels can be improved by systematic, regular and increasingly challenging exercise. A moderate activity keeps us at a level enough to deal with ordinary stress. Improving our level of fitness requires more intensive exercise which promotes changes and challenges our physiological systems.

Follow these fitness tips to get fit and stay that way:

1. Exercise Daily: Every day perform activities or movements that elevate your heart rate. It can be as simple as walking to buy your groceries and carrying the bags back to your place or doing household chores like mowing lawns and walking the dog.

2. Eat those veggies and fruits: Vegetables and fruits will keep you energized, help your digestion and improve your healthy. They contain lots of fibers and nutrients. Try buying organic fruits and vegetables, if possible, since they are free from any chemical contamination.

3. Weight train: Muscles get weaker as we age. Resistance or weight training creates hypertrophy. It also helps you look younger and adds more vitality into your life.

4. Circuit train: This form of weight training will have you continuously move from one workout to another. Following this practice can improve your heart rate during the whole workout, doubling as your cardio session.

5. Train functionally: Incorporate some movements into your daily exercise which benefit or mimic your everyday movements or activities in the actual world. Sports are good for functional training since the body is required to move in an efficient way. Functional training can keep your body balanced making it more resistant to illnesses and injuries.

6. Warm up: Warming up preps up the nervous system, heightens mental awareness and alertness, and loosens up joints and muscles to make them less prone to injuries. Warm ups jump starts the fluid located in the joints, minimizing the risk for wear and tear of the muscles. It gives the heart a suitable period to adjust and pump up blood and nutrients into muscles.

7. Stretch your body as you warm up: Muscle contraction is achieved through resistance training making it tighter and smaller. It can also help prevent injury to joints, tendons and muscles with stretching. Stretching the body and the limbs is good preparation for a more rigorous activity.

8. Hydrate: The human body is about 60% water. However, we became de-hydrated when we consume the wrong type of beverages. These include coffee, soda, alcohol, and sweet tea. As much as possible drink the required eight glasses of water a day as a minimum.

9. Cool down: When we suddenly stop exercising or lifting weights, blood gathers in the muscle and oxygen is blocked. When this happens, we run the risk of having a heart attack.

10. Do fun activities or sports: Pick a sport that you like and plan on including it as part of your fitness plan. You will able to play for hours without realizing you are also working on your fitness.

Strength Training For A Sharper Mind

The fitness benefits of strength training, aka resistance training, whether they are obtained using weight training or any other resistance training method, go beyond the obvious physical and visible rewards.

Mind-Body Connection

Feeling fit and strong has a positive impact on the mind that causes a rippling effect on every aspect of our lives, from our confidence to our ability to focus. A stronger body can help create a stronger mind.

Strength training can be performed using weights, machines, resistance bands and even body weight exercises. Training however must be performed with the proper technique or form to reduce the possibility of injury.

Keep in mind that, in order to increase your muscular strength and endurance, the resistance has to be increased progressively and gradually. Consistency and intensity are the two critical elements here. Doing the same exercises with the same amount of resistance, day in and day out, is going to produce very little results.

Balanced Workout

To get the best and most balanced results, concentrate on training the major muscle groups:

Arms- Biceps and forearms
Chest
Shoulders
Upper and lower back
Abdominals
Upper and lower legs

The purpose is not to build oversize muscles, but to achieve the muscular strength needed to perform our everyday functional and recreational activities, while minimizing injury and fatigue. Common everyday events like playing with our kids, moving furniture or any other movements that involves pulling, pushing or twisting your body are greatly improved.

Consistent and intense strength training help develop or increase your lean body mass which in turn helps you burn calories and fat even while you are at rest.

Improved Heart Condition

And don’t forget about maintaining a strong heart. Regular resistance training can help lower heart rate and blood pressure.

Try this quick strength training routine for an anytime, anywhere workout:

Prisoner Squat

Equipment Needed: None / Dumbbell (optional)
Starting Position: Stand with feet about shoulder width apart and your hands behind your head.

Movement: Squat down until your tights are parallel to the floor, stand up slowly and completely until your knees are straight. Perform 15-20 repetitions .Rest one minute. Repeat two more times for a total of three sets.

Intensity Boosting Tips: To increase the intensity, hold a dumbbell on each hand and perform an overhead press at the top of the squat movement.

Safety tips:
1-Avoid putting any pressure on the back of your head when performing the squat without dumbbells.
2-Maintain you’re back straight by fixing your eyes on a spot high on the wall or by looking at the ceiling.
3-A piece of wood or a thick book can be place under your heels to help keep your balance.

Push Ups

Equipment Needed: None
Starting Position: Lie face down on the floor. Place your hands directly under your shoulders with your arms straight. Keep your lower back and legs straight with only your toes touching the floor.

Movement: Push yourself up and off the floor while keeping your knees straight. Once your arms are straight, your body should be straight as well with only your hands and toes touching the floor.

From the up position, slowly lower yourself until your upper arms are parallel to the floor.
Perform 15-20 repetitions at medium speed. Rest one minute. Repeat two more times for a total of three sets.
Intensity Boosting Tips: To make it more challenging, elevate your lower body by placing your feet on a chair or bench.

Plank

Equipment Needed: None
Starting Position: Lie face down assuming a push up position while keeping your forearms flat on the floor. Keep your body straight and hold for a 30 second count.

Rest one minute. Repeat two more times for a total of three sets.