The health benefits of regular exercise cannot be emphasized enough. It not only imparts physical well-being but also boosts your mental health. Walking, running, jogging, swimming, gymming, yoga, aerobics, and dancing are a few forms of exercises. When practiced regularly, they provide the following benefits.
Benefits Of Regular Exercise
1. Helps Lose Weight
Your body spends energy through three channels – digesting food, maintaining body functions, and exercising. Out of these three, the major chunk of energy is spent when you exercise. Not doing so would increase the number of calories in your body, as you are not losing any. This is the main reason for weight gain and obesity.
Following a strict exercise routine speeds up your metabolism and helps you burn calories at a faster rate. In obese people, it helps get rid of the excess fat and supports the development of muscle mass.
2. Ups Energy Levels
Exercise boosts oxygen and nutrient supply to the body tissues, and makes your cardiovascular system strong. Due to this, your energy levels increase, keeping you active for a long time. A study conducted on 36 individuals over a period of 6 weeks revealed that exercise reduced their symptoms of persistent fatigue.1
Not just in healthy individuals, exercise also showed a significant increase in energy in people with illnesses like cancer, AIDS, and chronic fatigue syndrome.
3. Makes You Feel Happy
A 30 minutes workout session is a sure shot cure for a stressful day. Exercise accelerates your brain to produce more of feel-good hormone – endorphin, which makes you happy and light. It also increases your resistance to pain.
In addition to this, exercise enhances the sensitivity of the brain towards hormones like serotonin and norepinephrine, which relieve depression, stress, and anxiety. Any amount of exercise when done uplifts your mood instantly. It goes without saying that exercise increases your confidence and self-esteem, as you feel good about your appearance.
4. Builds Stronger Muscles And Bones
Regular exercise increases the ability of muscles to absorb amino acids. So, a rigorous workout session followed by consuming an adequate amount of proteins leads to building stronger muscles. It also enhances bone density which prevents one from getting osteoporosis in later stages of life.
As you age, the bones and muscles tend to become weak and become prone to injuries and disabilities. Exercising regularly reduces this negative impact.
5. Sharpens Your Memory
As mentioned earlier, exercise improves the power of your cardiovascular system, enhancing circulation to all the parts of the body. The brain is one of them. An increased oxygen supply and release of feel-good hormones boost your brain health. Exercise is also responsible for an increase in the size of the hippocampus, which is the part of the brain that controls memory and learning.
It specifically benefits people above age 50 by protecting them from neurodegenerative disorders and dementia.
6. Reduces The Risk Of Chronic Diseases
A sedentary lifestyle is one of the leading causes of diseases like hypertension, type-2 diabetes, cardiovascular disorders, and obesity. Making changes to your lifestyle by including exercise in your routine reduces your risk of developing these chronic diseases.
7. Enhances Your Sexual Health
Attributing to better circulation to your reproductive system, exercise boosts your sexual health. It increases the frequency of sexual activity, enhances pleasure, and improves performance. A study conducted on a small of group of women in their 40s showed that they had more intense orgasms when they practiced regular exercise. In men, the time and intensity of the workout were directly proportional to their strength and endurance in bed.
Regular exercise also helps overcome erectile dysfunction and premature ejaculation.
8. Promotes Healthy Skin
Exercise is beneficial for skin in two ways. One, it prevents the oxidative stress caused by the free radicals, which are the primary reasons for aging. Two, sweating during exercise helps you flush out the excess toxins, making your skin glow. The enhanced blood supply further accelerates both these process and prevents aging, spots, and blemishes.
9. Treats Insomnia
Regular exercise improves your sleep quality. This can be correlated to fatigue and increase in body temperature caused during exercise. As both the reasons require one to have a sound sleep to get back to normal levels, your body works by rendering you a good night’s sleep. This is a boon to people with insomnia.
Regular exercise does more than just helping you lose weight. Why follow a sedentary lifestyle and become a prey to diseases, when you can exercise and keep them at bay?
References
