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My original plans were to post a video about getting up and down from the floor. But my camera person is a substitute teacher today and is unavailable to do the video. Hopefully next time. So, in lieu of the video, I am posting a revised and shortened version of an article I produced around two years ago, about Exercise as a Magic Pill. Here goes:

Edgar Cayce was once asked by a TV interviewer in the early days of TV, “What are the best exercises?”  His reply? “The ones you do.” A person would have to have had their head buried in the sand for the last thirty years to not know and fully understand the benefits of exercise.  This article is about the motivation to exercise and move your body.  It’s not about “how to”.  The “how to” will come later.  With exercise, you’ll benefit from:

• All around better health and energy including better glandular function and a stronger immune system
• Improved cardiovascular circulation and respiratory function.
• Movement prevents deterioration and decay
• Reduced chances of incurring long term chronic illness
• Improved ability to fight stress
• Enjoy life more. Be willing and able to engage.
• Move better. Be able to get up and down from the floor with ease.
• Improved strength, flexibility, balance, endurance and the general ability to move your body.
• Possible increased longevity. Turn back the clock. Live longer and enjoy it more.

The “so what” to all the above is that with exercise you will look better, feel better, and be physically able to do, and enjoy doing, the things you really want to do in life with energy and vitality, and be able to do it longer.

 “No citizen has a right to be an amateur in the matter of physical training…what a disgrace it is for a man [or woman] to grow old without ever seeing the beauty and strength of which his body is capable.”Socrates (469 – 399 BC)

Here are a few things to consider when thinking about starting an exercise program: You already can do more than you think you can, but most people are content to stay in the perceived safety of their own comfort zone. With exercise, you’ll discover that you’ll actually want to move beyond your comfort zone, extend yourself, and try new things.

Unless you’re  planning to be a peak performance athlete at age sixty-five or so, you can probably do with a modest amount of hard exercise. Yes, some of your exercise routine should be difficult, but it should not make you ultra-sore and it should not wear you out. You should feel comfortably tired, not worn out. Most of you will simply want to be able to function normally, or a little bit better than normal. What is function? It’s the ability to push, pull, lift, carry, bend and twist, balance, and “mobilate” from point A to point B. You’ll want to be able to get in and out of cars, walk for pleasure, carry groceries and put them away, and get up and down from the floor and play with your grandkids. As you get older, you lose the functionality of your bodily systems – unless – you do something about it. Your exercise goals should be strength, flexibility, range of motion, and the ability to move comfortably and easily.

 “Physical fitness is not only one of the most important keys to a healthy body, it is the basis of dynamic and creative intellectual activity.”  John F. Kennedy 

 If you decide to start an exercise program, and haven’t exercised for a long time . . . Be bold, but be careful. Your infrastructure may not be ready for heavy duty exercise and need to be conditioned. Bones weaken. Joints get rusty. Ligaments get weak. Muscles atrophy. You won’t want to put a lot of excess strain on them at first. So listen to your own body and get comfortable with your progress. Take your time and you’ll see progress, as well as enjoy the exercise more. If you don’t move your body the way nature intended for your body to move, your joints will get rusty, your blood will get stagnate, your bones will get brittle and your muscles will atrophy. If you do move and exercise your body, you will look better, feel better, and enjoy a longer and more fruitful life.

I’ll take the latter anytime. I’ll wager you will too.

Thank you for reading.

When older adults think of “exercise”, their mind usually focuses on walking on the treadmill, lifting weights, or using exercise “machines” like those found in a typical gym. Some older adults are runners.  It’s important for the beginning exerciser to think partially in those terms for a while to strengthen the infrastructure and prepare the joints.

On the other hand, Natural Full Body Movement exercises are a completely different thing. One of the main differences in the concepts of plain exercise and full body movement, is that of muscle isolation exercises vs. full body holistic movement — how moving one part of the body affects the other parts — or how exercising one muscle affects other muscles, and how they need to be worked together to be the most effective.

There seems to be a trend right now to move toward natural movement as exercise. It will probably never replace basic gym moves or running as the dominant form of exercise, but it can be far more beneficial.

One of the major differences in the natural full body movements and normal exercise routines is the use of the floor. Most of the Natural Movement programs get a lot of use from the floor. Most standard exercise programs seem to avoid the floor except for crunches or sit-ups. While some programs like Pilates (Mat Work) and Yoga are dominated by the floor, standard gym exercises seem to avoid it.

Becoming friends with the floor is important for older adults. Most older adults have an aversion to using the floor — even touching the floor. Yet being able to get up and down from the floor should be a major concern for older adults.  Most of the reason older adults fear the floor is that they feel that once they get down, they can’t get back up, and that any movements involving getting up and down from the floor will be too difficult. They feel they are too weak and their legs will give out on them. If that’s the case, then they had better start learning how. Developing leg, hip and core strength and flexibility is key.

In the next several weeks, I will focus the importance of leg, hip and overall body strength and demonstrate that it can be developed with some simple full body movements and a little bit of time. I will also stress the importance of compound movement as opposed to the isolation exercises we commonly think of.

Exercise should be a full body thing, and compound movement and combination exercises should be stressed as a powerful way to exercise for strength, flexibility and joint mobility. Stay with me and learn a few new things about full body movement. You’ll find it useful.

Thank you for reading.

Remember that article I wrote a couple of weeks ago about Survival Fitness and the importance of being able to respond to emergencies to help yourself or others? Well here’s some reinforcement that stresses the validity of that message.

Just last week, we had some very fierce winds, up to 60 miles per hour in some cases. We are always concerned that in the event of heavy winds, one of the massive oak trees just a few yards from our house will fall and collapse our roof, landing in the bedroom. This is not an unwarranted fear.  It’s happened before in our area.

While there were trees down across some of the main roads in our area as a result of this storm, we are fortunate that no trees have crashed into our bedroom yet. A family just a few short miles away, in Bethesda, Maryland on the Washington DC border was not so fortunate. The end of their story turned out well, but serves as a reinforcement for the importance of being fit enough to respond to emergencies.

During that storm, winds in excess of 60 mph toppled a tree into the bedroom of that family’s home in Bethesda, MD, knocking the husband unconscious in the bed. His wife was able to pull her husband “out of the rubble” and was carrying him downstairs when help arrived, according to their daughter. The husband was kept overnight at a local hospital after regaining consciousness. Later, the entire roof collapsed, according to National news reports.

The ages of the husband and wife were not given and I didn’t find any reference to their age online. But it doesn’t matter. She was able to rescue her unconscious husband from a deadly situation by dragging and carrying him to safety. The news reports didn’t speak to her health or fitness.

Sometimes emergencies can bring out a hitherto unknown source of strength. We’ve all heard stories about a mother lifting the car off her child pinned underneath. Can that happen? Here’s a first hand story. In the early 1960s three friends were driving west of Washington, DC to look at the new town called “Reston”. They were in an old two-seater sports car, this one with nearly bald tires. There were three in the two seat car. The convertible top was down so they all could fit. All this before seat belts. They hit a slick spot and slid off the highway, down a hill, rolling a couple of times. The passengers were thrown from the car. The driver was trapped underneath with only his head sticking out of the upside down car.  A passerby ran down the hill to the car, lifted it up and rolled it over, by himself, freeing the trapped youngster, likely saving his life. My wife was one of the passengers. Could he have moved that car off the driver without the extra-human strength that an adrenaline surge like that prompts? Who knows?

Uncommon strength can sometimes be found in emergency situations. You are far better off it you are fit and strong enough to be able to rescue yourself and others, in case of emergency, when no one else is around to help. The Bethesda, Maryland couple knows that first hand.

Thank you for reading.