“Exercise is good for you, makes you strong and beautiful!” That’s what my Thai boxing coach used to make us chant while doing various moves.
As a health and nutrition coach, I use lifestyle changes to help people solve their health and wellness problems. One of these lifestyle changes is the introduction of exercise. When people decide to lose weight, one of the things they do is to take up exercise. What a lot of people don’t know is that exercise alone won’t be of much help – nutrition is king when it comes to weight loss.

So why am I writing an article about exercise? Exercise has soooo many other benefits beside weight loss. Here are some of them:
1. Improves your mood and relieves stress.
2. Improves bone density and prevents osteoporosis (especially in women)
3. Helps you sleep better (especially morning exercise)
4. Helps stabilise your blood sugar (okay this one is related to weight loss!!!)
5. Improves flexibility and posture.
6. Prevents pre-mature aging.
7. Gives you more confidence.
Allegedly, our ancestors were hunter-gatherers. If they didn’t move, they didn’t eat. In the 21st century, it’s all about convenience. We live in a world where we have to do prescribed exercise. So, you get into your car, drive to a gym just to walk on a treadmill!!! I think one of the good things to com
e out of lockdown is that people were queuing to get into parks to exercise.
Walking is so good for us, especially when the weather is warm – you get lots of Vitamin D and we all know how important Vitamin D is in treating Covid. Besides getting loads of Vitamin D, getting out in nature is a good stress reliever and walking is so good for fat burning. So rather than spend hours walking on a treadmill, try and get outside.
Exercise is just movement. Lots of us hate the gym so my advice is to find something you like so exercise isn’t a chore but something you love. Some of us are fortunate enough to have jobs where we are moving all the time. One of the fittest people I used to know was my next-door neighbour who was a roofer. Not only did he keep fit – he had an awesome tan. T
hings like gardening, vigorous housework and DIY are all forms of movement that have some of the same benefits as exercise.
The only reason I’ve stuck at exercise is because I’ve found things I enjoy. Thai boxing, Olympic/power lifting, calisthenics and now running. My advice is to find something you enjoy. It doesn’t have to be in a gym. Take up badminton or netball or something you used to do at school.
You may be surprised by how much you start to enjoy yourself and you may just start to reap the benefits I’ve been talking about. Feel free to post how you are doing on my Facebook page, email, or website. Good luck!!!!
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