Let Happiness Be The Reason To Exercise
Exercise is one of the most effective prevention and treatment strategies for depression. One study found that 30 min aerobic workouts done 3 to 5 time a week cut depressive symptoms by 50% in young adults.
A meta-analysis published in the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews even found that exercise is moderately more effective than a control intervention for reducing symptoms of depression.
A Duke University Team studied 3 groups that tried exercise only, exercise plus drugs, and drugs only to see what treatment best treated depression.
10 months later they found it was the exercise only group that was most successful in maintaining wellness and avoiding a depression relapse.
James Gordon, MD, a world-renowned expert in using mind-body medicine to heal depression, stated in our 2008 interview: “What we’re finding in the research on physical exercise is the physical exercise is at least as good as antidepressants for helping people who are depressed. And that’s even better for older people, very interesting, even more important for older people. And physical exercise changes the level of serotonin in your brain. It changes, increases their levels of ‘feel good’ hormones, the endorphins.
And also — and these are amazing studies — it can increase the number of cells in your brain, in the region of the brain, called the hippocampus … it’s very important because sometimes in depression there are fewer of those cells in the hippocampus, but you can actually change your brain with exercise. So it’s got to be part of everybody’s treatment, everybody’s plan.”
A study on undergraduate students found those who were more physically active overall had higher pleasant-activated feelings (happiness) than people who were less physically active.
Happiness feelings include excitement and enthusiasm, which some say are the opposite of depression.
Further, on days when the students engaged in more physical activity than normal, they reported higher levels of these positive feelings as well.
Researcher Amanda Hyde says: “Our results suggest that not only are there chronic benefits of physical activity, but there are discrete benefits as well … Doing more exercise than you typically do can give you a burst of happy feelings. So today, if you want a boost, go do some moderate-to-vigorous intensity exercise.”
Rather than viewing exercise as a medical tool to lose weight, prevent disease, and live longer, all benefits that occur in the future, try seeing exercise as a daily routine to enhance your frame of mind, reduce stress and feel happier now.
A common reason people fail in their exercise goals is feeling lack of a payoff.
In other words, while exercise might help you to lose weight in a few weeks or prevent a heart attack a few years down the road, there may appear to be no immediate and noticeable reward to keep one motivated.
Or is there?
Research shows that while many people started an exercise program to lose weight and improve their appearance, they continued to exercise because of the benefits to their well-being.
Once people recognized this connection to their emotional health, they continued to work out because it made them feel good mentally, and this is a benefit that occurs immediately after exercise, and for some, during.
Dr. Michelle Segar, says that harnessing this happy feeling can compel you to stick with your exercise program in the long term: “It [Exercise] has to be portrayed as a compelling behavior that can benefit us today … People who say they exercise for its benefits to quality of life exercise more over the course of a year than those who say they value exercise for its health benefits.
… Immediate rewards are more motivating than distant ones … Feeling happy and less stressed is more motivating than not getting heart disease or cancer, maybe, someday in the future. … Physical activity is an Elixir of Life, but we’re not teaching people that. We’re telling them it’s a pill to take or a punishment for bad numbers on the scale. Sustaining physical activity is a motivational and emotional issue, not a medical one.”
Exercise boosts Happiness, Get Happy, Exercise daily!
HeffX-LTN
Paul Ebeling
The post Let Happiness Be The Reason To Exercise appeared first on Live Trading News.