Exercises For Weight Loss!

Today, millions of people all over the world are frustrated with their inability to overcome obesity and it’s accompanying diseases like arthritis, hypertension, diabetes, heart disease, strokes, PCOD, miscarriages and infertility.

So there is a great demand for slimming treatments.

Naturally thousands of bogus treatments have mushroomed, all over the world, to take advantage of the situation. Most of them either force bad, starvation based diets under one pretext or another, or mindless, injurious exercises on these hapless people.

And these people are extremely confused, not knowing what kind of treatment they should choose. They try one treatment after another in the hope that some treatment may work for them, some day! But that day never comes!

Primarily these people need to explicitly understand that nothing but a slightly improved lifestyle, inclusive of excellent nutrition, comprising of their own, normal, everyday food, exercise at least as simple as walking, adequate rest and happy and peaceful mind are the real fundamentals of the treatment to get slim and healthy!

So which exercises are best suited to help you get slim and heart healthy?

Without getting too technical, there are three basic types of exercises we normally perform.

Floor exercises: These will include yoga and exercises based on it.

Cardiovascular exercises: Brisk walking, running, jogging, cycling, swimming, dancing, working out on treadmills, elliptical cross trainers, cycles and sports like tennis and squash are cardiovascular exercises.

Strength training exercises: These are exercises performed with free weights and weight machines.

The cardiovascular exercises are fast paced and directly exercise and improve our skeletal muscles, heart and lungs, burning calories quickly, helping us lose weight faster and make us heart healthy! That explains the name!

Of these, walking is the simplest and safest exercise that needs no special training. All you need is proper clothing and good quality walking shoes, and you are ready to get slim and heart healthy! There is little chance of getting injured on walks unless you trip and fall! Or if you have very bad knees.

Even people with bad knees can walk in water to burn calories and strengthen the knees simultaneously!

If you are not fit, you can begin at a comfortable pace and walk for small periods of time and gradually increase pace and time as you get fitter. You can spread your walks in small instalments spread over the day.

Most of my patients world over are walking themselves to excellent slimming and health. Many of them have even walked within their homes when it is snowing or raining hard!
Walking improves your skin and hair health, lowers your weight, blood pressure, sugar, total cholesterol and LDL, the bad cholesterol and triglycerides, improves your HDL, the good cholesterol and makes you heart healthy! Many get rid of their hypertension, cholesterol and diabetes medication. Walking is also a great stress buster and antidepressant!

Gyms sell the concept of lifting weights (strength training exercises) to lose weight, to be able to sell their expensive personal trainers of questionable knowledge and skills and make more money by selling equally expensive protein supplements.

These exercises do improve your metabolism but can’t burn anywhere near as many calories as cardiovascular exercises do. And strength training needs special equipment and trained instructors, who are very difficult to find.

While yoga is a complete and wonderful exercise system and has its own, wide ranging benefits, it or the other floor exercises do not qualify as weight loss exercises as they don’t burn calories as quickly as the cardiovascular exercises.

That is the reason why slimming programs based on strength training or floor exercises are not particularly effective, while people who just walk regularly, lose weight very well!

And mindless and painful strength training and floor exercises can cause grave injuries. Many people endure them hoping that they will soon make them slim and healthy, when, in fact, they get badly injured more often than not!

Plus, neither strength training nor floor exercises strengthen the heart and protect you against heart disease, unlike the cardiovascular exercises.
What mindless, painful strength training and floor exercising can’t achieve for you in years, humble walks can achieve in months!

Verdict: Cardiovascular exercises are the key to getting slim and heart healthy!

Also visit the articles ‘Simple Steps to Slimming‘, ‘Science Of Exercise’ and ‘Walking To Be Slim  and Healthy‘.