Amar Chandel's Blog
September 19, 2018
Why we do not work out regularly?
Reason 1: I just don’t have time.
Fact: Everyone’s day has 24 hours. It’s all a question of prioritising what you want to do. Anybody who has time for a book, a movie, the idiot box or a gossip session can’t crib about time shortage, considering that one can exercise a lot in just half an hour. Even otherwise, please remember that if you don’t find time to exercise, you will have to find time to visit a doctor or a hospital. The choice is entirely yours. You don’t have the luxury of telling a disease that I happen to be very busy this month or this year; so please visit me next month/year. Won’t it be better to make time for exercise instead of a disease?
Reason 2: I have no energy to do even household chores. How can I exercise?
Fact: The more you procrastinate, the more your energy will dwindle. Make a small beginning and the body will start generating more energy by and by. Learn a lesson from an infant in a cradle. He cannot stand or sit. He still moves his hands and feet all the time. If he can do that, so can you, even if bed-ridden. You may be unable to move some body parts. Exercise the other parts at least.
Reason 3: I started, but my aches and pains increased instead of vanishing.
Fact: You have not done for years what you should have done daily all your life. Whenever you commence, some discomfort is inevitable because of the lack of conditioning. While these self-induced pains will go away in a few days, the aches and diseases that may come your way because of not exercising will haunt you for months and even years. One should willingly suffer temporary pain to escape the permanent one.
Reason 4: I do enough running around the house the whole day.
Fact: This kind of activity is better than complete inactivity but cannot really substitute for a regular exercise regime. The startstop movement will not warm up your body and elevate your heart rate enough for you to get the full benefits.
Reason 5: Do I do my job/business or spend time exercising?
Facts: It’s not an either-or situation. Have you ever left for office/business without wearing clothes because so much work was waiting for you there that you had no time to dress? Going to work without exercising is akin to going out without dressing.
Reason 6: I am too old to start now.
Fact: You are too old NOT to start. In youth, you were fairly active throughout the day. Every teenager runs instead of walking and takes stairs by the two. Now that you are sedentary, you just cannot escape a workout. Not exercising then was inexcusable. Now it is sacrilege.
Also read - How to activate self-healing powers of the body?
Reason 7: I have worked out quite a bit during my school/college days. No need to do anything now.
Fact: Basking in your school/college glory will be like not bathing/shaving/eating now just because you did enough of that in good old days. What matters is your workout today. Yesterday is history.
Reason 8: Whenever I get time, I do go out for a walk/swim.
Fact: Suppose you have to employ a person. He may be talented but what if he says: “I will come to work only when I have time”. Will you hire him? Most probably not! Even in the unlikely situation of being desperate for hiring a help, you will at best decide that it will be OK if he comes twice or thrice a week. What if he says I cannot tell you when I will come again: It could be next week or next month? Will you still hire him?
Reason 9: I am sure exercising once or twice a week is good enough.
Fact: How I wish that were true, but isn’t. You can be off exercise only on those days when you are absolutely off food. You most probably eat daily. So you have to work out daily. OK, may be one weekly off, but no more.
Reason 10: My weekdays are hopelessly packed. But I make up through heavy exercise on weekends.
Fact: That will do more harm than good. The body will be stiff due to four-five days of inactivity and the Sunday round of vigorous tennis or squash may cause a catch or muscle pull.
Reason 11: There is always a tomorrow.
Facts: Of course there is. But it never comes. The best time to start exercising was when you were 10 years old. The next best time is NOW.
Now that the “compelling reasons”, which are actually nothing more than excuses, are out of the way, you are perhaps ready to make exercising a regular part of your life. Before you do that, let me underline the importance of physical activity through another analogy. These days almost everybody owns a mobile phone, whether it costs 1000 bucks or 200 times more than that. Even when these phones cost as much as a king’s ransom, they have a limitation: they have to be charged regularly—for as long as two hours daily if you are a heavy user. Misplace the charger and your phone will turn into a useless paperweight in two or three days.
In exactly similar fashion, your body needs charging and you are “plugged in” only when you are engaged in some strenuous activity. However, our body will not die out in two or three days if we don’t “charge” it. In fact, it will go on even for 70,80 or 90 years. It is just that we will first function at reduced capacity. Then will come the stage of aches and pains, and finally we will contract many diseases—what are called lifestyle ailments.
While we are lazing about, we are basically living off the energy that we generated when we were active. In olden times we were forced to be active most of the time willy-nilly, but that is not the case today. We have turned into virtual couch potatoes and are not ashamed of it. In fact, we are almost proud of it.
While nobody is suggesting that we should toil for seven or eight hours daily as our ancestors used to do, we do have to set aside at least two hours every day for vigorous physical movement, termed exercise as we commonly refer it to.
Book - Cure Yourself Naturally: Activate Self-healing Powers of the Body
Author - Amar Chandel
Fact: Everyone’s day has 24 hours. It’s all a question of prioritising what you want to do. Anybody who has time for a book, a movie, the idiot box or a gossip session can’t crib about time shortage, considering that one can exercise a lot in just half an hour. Even otherwise, please remember that if you don’t find time to exercise, you will have to find time to visit a doctor or a hospital. The choice is entirely yours. You don’t have the luxury of telling a disease that I happen to be very busy this month or this year; so please visit me next month/year. Won’t it be better to make time for exercise instead of a disease?
Reason 2: I have no energy to do even household chores. How can I exercise?
Fact: The more you procrastinate, the more your energy will dwindle. Make a small beginning and the body will start generating more energy by and by. Learn a lesson from an infant in a cradle. He cannot stand or sit. He still moves his hands and feet all the time. If he can do that, so can you, even if bed-ridden. You may be unable to move some body parts. Exercise the other parts at least.
Reason 3: I started, but my aches and pains increased instead of vanishing.
Fact: You have not done for years what you should have done daily all your life. Whenever you commence, some discomfort is inevitable because of the lack of conditioning. While these self-induced pains will go away in a few days, the aches and diseases that may come your way because of not exercising will haunt you for months and even years. One should willingly suffer temporary pain to escape the permanent one.
Reason 4: I do enough running around the house the whole day.
Fact: This kind of activity is better than complete inactivity but cannot really substitute for a regular exercise regime. The startstop movement will not warm up your body and elevate your heart rate enough for you to get the full benefits.
Reason 5: Do I do my job/business or spend time exercising?
Facts: It’s not an either-or situation. Have you ever left for office/business without wearing clothes because so much work was waiting for you there that you had no time to dress? Going to work without exercising is akin to going out without dressing.
Reason 6: I am too old to start now.
Fact: You are too old NOT to start. In youth, you were fairly active throughout the day. Every teenager runs instead of walking and takes stairs by the two. Now that you are sedentary, you just cannot escape a workout. Not exercising then was inexcusable. Now it is sacrilege.
Also read - How to activate self-healing powers of the body?
Reason 7: I have worked out quite a bit during my school/college days. No need to do anything now.
Fact: Basking in your school/college glory will be like not bathing/shaving/eating now just because you did enough of that in good old days. What matters is your workout today. Yesterday is history.
Reason 8: Whenever I get time, I do go out for a walk/swim.
Fact: Suppose you have to employ a person. He may be talented but what if he says: “I will come to work only when I have time”. Will you hire him? Most probably not! Even in the unlikely situation of being desperate for hiring a help, you will at best decide that it will be OK if he comes twice or thrice a week. What if he says I cannot tell you when I will come again: It could be next week or next month? Will you still hire him?
Reason 9: I am sure exercising once or twice a week is good enough.
Fact: How I wish that were true, but isn’t. You can be off exercise only on those days when you are absolutely off food. You most probably eat daily. So you have to work out daily. OK, may be one weekly off, but no more.
Reason 10: My weekdays are hopelessly packed. But I make up through heavy exercise on weekends.
Fact: That will do more harm than good. The body will be stiff due to four-five days of inactivity and the Sunday round of vigorous tennis or squash may cause a catch or muscle pull.
Reason 11: There is always a tomorrow.
Facts: Of course there is. But it never comes. The best time to start exercising was when you were 10 years old. The next best time is NOW.
Now that the “compelling reasons”, which are actually nothing more than excuses, are out of the way, you are perhaps ready to make exercising a regular part of your life. Before you do that, let me underline the importance of physical activity through another analogy. These days almost everybody owns a mobile phone, whether it costs 1000 bucks or 200 times more than that. Even when these phones cost as much as a king’s ransom, they have a limitation: they have to be charged regularly—for as long as two hours daily if you are a heavy user. Misplace the charger and your phone will turn into a useless paperweight in two or three days.
In exactly similar fashion, your body needs charging and you are “plugged in” only when you are engaged in some strenuous activity. However, our body will not die out in two or three days if we don’t “charge” it. In fact, it will go on even for 70,80 or 90 years. It is just that we will first function at reduced capacity. Then will come the stage of aches and pains, and finally we will contract many diseases—what are called lifestyle ailments.
While we are lazing about, we are basically living off the energy that we generated when we were active. In olden times we were forced to be active most of the time willy-nilly, but that is not the case today. We have turned into virtual couch potatoes and are not ashamed of it. In fact, we are almost proud of it.
While nobody is suggesting that we should toil for seven or eight hours daily as our ancestors used to do, we do have to set aside at least two hours every day for vigorous physical movement, termed exercise as we commonly refer it to.
Book - Cure Yourself Naturally: Activate Self-healing Powers of the Body
Author - Amar Chandel
