For several years, we’ve all heard the benefits of walking 10,000 steps a day, including losing or maintaining weight.
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New U.S. research has found that although walking more may decrease your sedentary time, it doesn't actually prevent weight gain, according to Yahoo News.
While the study found that exercise alone is not always the most effective way to lose weight, walking more boosted physical activity levels, which "may have other emotional and health benefits," according to the report.
Americans’ inactivity and sedentary lifestyles cause obesity and other health problems and car-based lifestyles based on commuting from suburbs to job sites have greatly increased that inactivity.
People who make walking a part of their everyday lifestyles can lower blood pressure, reduce susceptibility to diabetes and lower the risk of developing some cancers and cognitive disorders.
Citizen activists have noticed and rallied for healthier neighborhoods, cities and towns. Parks, nature centers and walkable communities are making a comeback. Many, including the elderly, have taken up mall walking; in some places children now walk to school via "walking school buses."
It might not be just walking, but the way you walk that offers the most health benefits. Researchers have discovered that people who walk backward perform better on memory tests than those who stand still or walk forward.
If you are looking to inject new energy into your exercise routine, you might want to try walking or running backward. Beyond the physical benefits to your body, exercising backward may boost your brain power, balance and more.
But if you tend to be clumsy while simply walking forward, walking backward may require a walking partner in the beginning to keep you from backing into a tree or utility pole.
Whenever you get a chance, take off your shoes and socks and feel the earth beneath your feet.
Walking barefoot on the earth transfers free electrons from the Earth’s surface into your body that spread throughout your tissues providing beneficial effects. This process is called “grounding.”
Grounding has been shown to relieve chronic pain, reduce inflammation, improve sleep, thin your blood, enhance well-being and much, much more.
Like eating right, exercising and sleeping, grounding is yet another lifestyle habit that supports your optimal health.
Leather-soled shoes are conducive to grounding, but shoes with rubber or plastic soles are not. Good grounding surfaces include beach sand, grass, bare soil, concrete and brick (as long as it's not painted or sealed) and ceramic tile.
Surfaces that will not ground you include asphalt, wood, rubber, plastic, vinyl and tar or tarmac.
Of course, if you live in Key West, grounding is much easier to do than say, if you live in Nome, Alaska, where going barefoot could result in 10 frozen toes in the emergency room, but whenever possible, ditch the shoes and connect with Mother Earth.
Ahhh.