Getting Active
I was thinking about exercise today. Whenever I talk to customers about exercise, they get a little hesitant. Once I explain how exercise and being a gym-rat don’t go hand in hand, there’s a sigh of relief. Heart-healthy exercise can actually be quite fun and can fit into most people’s schedules. Even small amounts of exercise, like doing every day things, can produce significant changes in your cholesterol score.
I thought it might be helpful to give you a primer of some of the things that exercise can do:
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Decrease risk of… |
Beneficial for… |
Exercise Increases… |
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Look, if there was a pill I could sell that helped cholesterol without exercise I would be a millionaire. (Scratch that — billionaire.) Fact is, there are companies out there who try to sell do-everything pills. But there’s no magic fix. Changes to your diet and exercise are what helps the mo,t. Even if you’re required by your doctor to take medication, you’ll still need to make exercise part of your life style change.
Exercise Makes a Difference in Lowering Cholesterol…It Can Be Easy!
From the chart above you can see lowering cholesterol is just one of many results exercising can produce. Even more important is to realize every day activities can produce calorie-burning, cholesterol-lowering results. Here’s some suggestions…Try these for 30 to 45 minutes every other day to get your heart rate going. Some of your options can actually be quite enjoyable. Exercise can be fun, and you’re likely to see results pretty quickly.
- Walking the neighborhood
- Walking the local indoor shopping mall (great tip for cold months)
- Gardening
- Raking Leaves
- Stairwalking
- Jogging 1 mile
- Swimming
- Fast Dancing
- Pushing a stroller (Hey, who doesn’t love to go for walks with the kids or grandkids!?)