We all know that exercise and being physically active is important for overall health. How much exercise do I REALLY need? Find out Here as this seems to be the burning question we all need the answer to. There is so much information available to us to help us learn what we need.

Besides our doctors, dietitians, and trainers at the gym telling us how much to exercise, even with all the experts weighing in (no pun intended), there still seems to be a lot of confusion about exercise. The reality of the situation is that I was looking for evidence to support my viewpoint that it is acceptable to exercise 3 times per week for 1 hour sessions. I was hoping I would be able to find SOMEONE out there in the physical fitness realm or medical community to give me the green light and say YES, it is OK to exercise 3 times per week. Well, guess what? Here is what I learned.

Why  do I have to exercise in the first place? If I am maintaining my weight, why do I have to exercise? How much exercise do we really need? What’s considered exercise? How often and for how long? What type of exercise is best? When you think of exercise, do you automatically you need to go to the gym? Since there are so many questions, let’s break it all down one question at a time.

1. Why do I have to exercise in the first place? There are so many benefits to exercise. It improves overall heart health, increases blood circulation, burns calories to help maintain or lose weight, reduce blood pressure, increased energy, helps sleep better, keeps joints flexible, strengthens muscles and bones, improves balance to prevent falls, reduce symptoms of depression and improve quality of life. I’ve chosen some of the most important benefits of exercise, but there are many more benefits. From my own experience, I notice that exercise has helped improve the quality of my loose skin, because it’s tighter than I had expected. I believe exercise is one of the major reasons I am not a huge wrinkle factory.
2. If I am maintaining my weight, why do I have to exercise? As noted in question one, there are many benefits to exercise to overall health than just weight loss and maintenance.
3. How much exercise do we REALLY need? This is a great question which has different answers based on your fitness goals. The new standards from the American College of Sports Medicine say the basic recommendations are:
   1. a. 150 minutes of moderate – intensity exercise per week. Can’t fit 30-60 minutes at one time? You can break up into 2 or 3 10 to 15 minute sessions each day to get to the accumulated amount. What’s considered moderate – intensity exercise? walking, swimming, water aerobics, jogging, dancing, and running are a few good examples.
   2. Resistance training 2-3 days per week focusing on working each major muscle group to improve bone health, strength, and power. This would include using weight machines, dumbbells, resistance bands and your own body as weight.
   3. Flexibility exercise 2-3 days per week to improve range of motion. This would include stretching exercises.
   4. Functional fitness exercise 2-3 days per week. The goal here is to get your muscles working together to strengthen our bodies to handle the regular activities of life, such as lifting a heavy suitcase, turning and twisting to get in and out of a car, pulling yourself up from your seat, bending down to pick something up, etc. Using a stability ball, dumbbells and resistance bands would help you perform this type of exercise.
4. What’s considered exercise? Any activity that gets your heart rate up and you’re breaking a sweat for at least a minimum of 30 minutes of continuous activity. In looking at this, you’re probably like me in that when I first began to exercise, I couldn’t even walk for 10 minutes without stopping! Don’t let the numbers scare you or get in your way. Begin at your own pace and stay consistent. Your fitness will improve and you will be able to exercise for a longer period of time.
5. What type of exercise is best? The reality is, the exercise you enjoy, look forward to doing and can comfortably do without pain is the best exercise. The exercise that you will be able to commit to and put into your routine will be what’s best for you.

I will continue the conversation on exercise to talk about how to get started with exercise as well as some ideas on setting up exercise routines to fit into our busy lifestyles.