As I was taking my daily walk, my thoughts turned to all the people who could not walk.  What would you and I do if we could not stand or put one foot in front of the other?  What would life be like for us?  I can only imagine that life would be fine because our minds adapt to our circumstances.

Christopher Reeves, an active and vibrate man, who in the prime of his life lost his physical abilities, due to a horses throwing him, to spending the rest of his life in a wheelchair.  He became an advocate for people with disabilities and pointing out the insurance company’s coverage is inadequate.  Christopher kept his enthusiasm for life very much alive.  He would often talk about his desire to walk again.  Continue Reading »

Linda Carol Berry has just completed her goal of walking 1,000 miles.  What an accomplishment!  Linda we are all so proud of you.  You have inspired us to set goals get up and move our bodies by walking.  You have to be smiling now and feeling great inside and outside.  What an example you are for us walkers.  Thank you Linda for sharing this great news.  Linda is a member of our Facebook Group “Live Healthy by Walking”…you are invited to join us  enthusiastic walkers.

My son-in-law had kidney cancer operation this week and is currently in the hospital healing.  He has all of the tubes in his body that are foreign to his existence and has not eaten anything but shaved ice for the last 4 days.  His doctor came to visit him this morning and said “You are not going to get back to normal until we get you up and start walking”.  

That statement reinforces the turth in that we have to get up and walk to achieve our healthy life goals.  I will always remember the doctor telling my son-in-law that when I just don’t feel like take my daily walk.  Don’t sit around and think you will get back to your normal lifestyles of being a healthy person – you won’t!  Get up/move your body/and walk.  Just do it – take your daily walk!

If you don’t like walking alone, invite your spouse, partner, friend or neighbor to join you or start your own walking group.  If you crave solitude and want to be on your own is the perfect workout. If you’d rather look to others for inspiration, don’t go it alone. Start a walking group today!   The charities have the largest groups possible and they bring everyone together to physically gather to crowd the streets several times a year.  The charities set their dates and people spread the word to each other in a simple way; such as “Are you going to walk for the American Cancer Association?”  This also applies to you if you would like to organize a group in your neighborhood.  Start talking about your group and watch your group be created by people advertising it “by word of mouth”. Continue Reading »

People often ask me if poles could help them get more out of their exercise walking program and give them a better workout.  The answer is absolutely.

Let me explain the benefits.  With one pole in each hand, you grip the handles and push off with each stride.  As you walk they work your arms, shoulders, chest and upper back muscles through a full range of motion.  Think of it as cross-country skiing for walkers.  The arm movement adds intensity to your aerobic workout, which can help you burn more calories and lose weight/inches.

The main benefit of pole walking is when your arms are moving you achieve balance and stability.  And that’s not all of it.  Before I started using them I noticed after about one mile my lower back, hips and knees were hurting.  I started studying the health benefits of this particular exercise, which is called Nordic Walking, and I decided I was going to try it out before I could recommend it to my readers.  Continue Reading »

We clap our hands, grab the video recorder, call our family and friends and celebrate when our Toddler takes their first walking steps. It is a joyful experience. 

The Baby Boomers are facing getting older themselves and many have the responsibility of making sure their elderly parents are as healthy as possible.  One way this is accomplished is getting our parents to stand up and take a walk for their health.  It is important in our lives to get up and move our body in whatever way we can. 

We use to hear that retirement will be filled with days sitting on a front porch sitting in our rocking chairs full of memories to talk about with our friends.  Now we know this is the worst thing we can do to stay healthy.  The philosophy of people working all of their lives to prepare for retirement and then sit around waiting to die is gone.   Continue Reading »

School and professional sport events produce more attention and media coverage, but none of them approaches walking in number of participants.  It is the only exercise in which the rate of participation does not decline in the middle and later years. People do not “drop out” of this very popular fitness schedule because many people receive such pleasure from this physical activity.  Other people kick up a level of the healthy benefits they receive by using Nordic poles which provides a whole body complete workout.

Unlike tennis, running, skiing, and other activities that have gained great popularity fairly recently; walking has been widely practiced as a recreational and fitness activity throughout recorded history. Young adults tease that it is for the old people.  It has been proven that young adults have taken on a new outlook and are now calling it “exercise walking” and everyone is eligible to participate, regardless of age.   Today it is riding a wave of popularity that draws its strength from a rediscovery of the pleasure and health-giving qualities that it provides for everyone.   
  Continue Reading »

Last year the YMCA decided to give the kids in their local “after school” program a pedometer to wear for a few days to evaluate how active kids are in their lives.  My grandson was in the program and he turned in his pedometer only to discover that on an average day he walked 4,000 steps.  That surprised me because it seemed he went to school, sat in classes, ate in cafeteria, came home, ate dinner with family; homework and then to bed (with a little computer time built into his schedule).

I learned that a study had conducted to determine if pedometers are a successful way of encouraging young people to get active. Continue Reading »

I am shocked to learn from the latest research published in the June issue of the American Journal of Medicine that more people would prefer to “pop a pill” than to eat healthy and exercise for their diabetes, blood pressure, heart disease and other health problems.  It is always scary when you go to a doctor’s office, the physician walks in the room with his prescription pad in their hand.  Got a pain – pop this pill.  To improve your health there is no pill that is as potent and as powerful as eating healthy and exercise walking every day!

We hear, or read, everyday that living a healthy lifestyle by eating right and exercising is appropriate for every age group. However, over the past two decades exercise rates have dropped, fruit and vegetable intake has also fallen, and obesity rates have increased.  People are just plain tired of hearing the advice of “experts” saying eat this food or that food; exercise this way or exercise that way and so forth.  It is easier to pop a pill then create your own individual nutritional and exercise program. Continue Reading »

Walking is the most popular exercise in the nation because it is a social exercise.

It could even be argued that we’d be nicer to each other if we walked more. Ever see pedestrians make obscene gestures to each other?  My brother and I drove his boat from Indiana to Alabama on a vacation by route of a waterway.  I always said that boat people are the friendliest people in the world.  They all spoke to each other and helped each other.  However, I would put walkers right up there in top place as far as being social.  Continue Reading »