Sunny Health

Cardio is short for cardiovascular, which refers to the heart. Cardiovascular exercise is exercise that raises your heart rate and keeps it elevated for a period of time. The kinds of exercise that are associated with cardiovascular workouts are things like jogging, fast walking, and swimming where there is no break in the routine. Exercises that stop and start, like Pilates, are generally not considered cardio exercise, though Pilates can be done in a cardio way, and can certainly be combined with cardio workouts to great effect.

One of the cheapest, easily available ways of doing cardio exercises is jogging.

Apart from aiding weight loss, there are many health benefits to jogging. For example, it was shown in one study that individuals who ran more than 50 miles per week had significantly greater incrases in HDL cholesterol (the good fat) and significantly greater decreases in body fat, triglyceride levels, and te risk of coronary heart disease than individuals who ran less than 10 miles per week. In addition, long distance runners had a nearly 50% reduction in high blodd pressure and more than a 50% reduction in the use of medications to lower blood pressure and plasma cholesterol levels.

Besides the known health benefits, jogging can also result in better skin, a better glow. Also, in most cases, “perpetual perspiration” = less pimples or at least perspiring from exercise does that. Running also helps you ‘wake up’ other parts of your body. You will be more alert and aware of your surroundings. Without exercise, you would probably have been sleep walking through your entire life.
Besides health benefits, one also gets a sense of accomplishment, and naturally, self confidence. After dragging yourself out of bed and completing those rounds, having a good sweat, don’t you feel good about yourself?

How do I get started on jogging?Get a good pair of shoes, one that will lessen the impact on your feet when you hit the ground. A comfortable attire of shorts and tee shirt should be a good combination to go jogging in. You could spend good money and buy a good sports tee and shorts, and this would motivate you to jog more, because you know you look good in that attire. However, if you do not want to spend, any good pair of shorts and tee would be good.

Here's an interval plan that will get you started.
1. Select the amount of time that you plan to jog/run for, let's say, 30 minutes.

2. Start with a five-minute brisk walk to warm up.

3. When you feel ready, start to jog. If you get out of breath, slow down and keep jogging, or walk again until you catch your breath. This could take one to two minutes.

4. Once you've caught your breath, go ahead and jog again until you feel you've had enough. At that point, walk again.

5. Repeat this series of walking/jogging intervals for 30 minutes, or whatever duration you select.

Personally, I grab my ipod, fill it with great fast tracks and start jogging two rounds around my estate. It may be hard at first, but you can try to give yourself incentives. Such as rewarding yourself, with wearing your favourite piece of clothing, after you finish your jog.

The treadmill is a good option. It helps you regulate your speed and measures how many calories you are losing. This is a wonderful choice because you are then inspired to work harder on the treadmill. Knowing how much you are losing helps you gauge how much effort you are putting into running Using the treadmill is also great for people lazy to go out. You also will not be subjected to the mercy of weather.
However, the downside is, you do not get to see the scenery as you would in an outside environment. The scenery you get on a treadmill is pretty much the same.
If you are using a treadmill, steadily increase your speed while jogging. Start at a slow but docile speed. I would suggest a starting speed of 5.5 mph, before slowly increasing the speed. How fast to go later on, really depends on the individual.
It is good to push yourself, but do not increase to a speed that you cannot manage. If you find yourself having difficulty breathing, it is probably a sign to slow down. Jogging a good 15-20 minutes thrice a week should be sufficient in aiding a healthy lifestyle.

In my post on Thursday, April 30, 2009, I was asked by a reader about the guidelines for food. Well, I guess, it is true everybody has their own way of eating/ living healthily.

I shall list myself as an example. Recently, I went from a UK size 12 to a size 8. How did I do it? Well, I would say pure motivation. Many people have really different ways of losing weight. I didn’t follow any specific guidelines because I believed that I would not follow them because I didn’t have the discipline to do so. Also, many diet/ exercise books are not tailored for each and everybody’s personal lifestyle. However, I did take some of the tips I read from the books and the net and used them to make small but significant changes to my lifestyle. Here are some of the things I did:

Exercise:
Well, this is expected isn’t it? Most good weight losing books tell us to exercise. What kind of exercises? There are many exercises that you can see all over the internet. The general consensus is that doing exercises that work your legs help you lose the most weight. Running, jogging, breeze walking and swimming are common exercise choices. I find personally that jogging to be a favourite. I have heard that swimming helps you work the most parts of your body because you work your arms and legs. But I after struggling in the pool for weeks beside my national swimmer friend, I decided it was not my thing.

When to exercise? You can exercise any time you want. The ideal is to work out in the morning. With your metabolism running in the morning, your heart beat will be faster for the rest of the day, therefore increasing your metabolism for the rest of the day. Some people also say that working out in the morning helps them feel refreshed. However, in my own experience, I feel that doing heavy exercising can make you tired. Perhaps the key, especially if you have work for that day, is to do light exercises.

For me, I had a trampoline at home and decided to start of with them. Ipod in hand, I jumped 15 mins and then went on to 20 mins.

Diet:
Diet, is another commonly known component in big plans to lose weight. You are, really what you eat. Most weight loss plans involve eating clean. Eating clean is basically avoiding fried foods, and the known ‘put on weight foods” Basically, the bottom line is, if you know its bad for you, leave it alone. It is often difficult to keep to diets especially if you have a busy lifestyle, or really bad discipline. The important thing is to have a good nutritional balance in your eating.

There are some that rely solely on dieting. Whether dieting alone helps you lose weight, I really do not know. All I can say is this, prior to making the changes to my lifestyle, I was, for four years 56 kg. (I am now currently 48 kg) My mother, a health nut, made sure our family ate healthily. We always had a vegetable dish, a fish or meat and an egg. We hardly ate pork or beef or any other red meat. Deep Frying was a big no no in my mother’s kitchen. We ate at home most of the time, because my mother considers outside food unhealthy and expensive. On top of this, we always had fruit before dinner. My father and I would often joke sarcastically that we were having rabbit food. We basically lived on rabbit food, but I was not losing weight.

So, eating healthy alone helps you lose weight? I’m not so sure.

Motivation:
The last secret to losing weight is: YOU HAVE TO WANT IT BAD. I once heard someone on tv say “ if you want it bad enough, life will open its doors to you’ The more you want to lose weight the more you will push yourself, the more changes you will make to your life. One of the things I did, though superficial and slightly materialistic, was to flip through magazines and look at celebrities and think , ‘Gosh, I really want to look like that. The truth is, under all this extra weight I’m carrying, I really actually do look like that.” Confidence is key, and knowing that at the end you can achieve weight loss is helpful to your weight loss program.

In the following posts, I intend to look into further details on losing weight, focusing on dieting and eating well. Even if you have no intention to lose weight do keep in mind that exercising and having a proper diet are essential to a healthy lifestyle. Watch this space!

How can we understand cancer patients? We know that they are suffering, but we will never know what it is that they are going through till we ourselves are in their shoes (something we hope will never befall on us.)

Cancer Patients’ lives are faced with such irony. They want to have knowledge, for knowledge is power. But at the same time, knowledge, can and will hurt you. The treatment is a long and torturous process; some recover, some do not. They often have to make difficult decisions.

It is hard for the patients but it is as hard for loved ones to stand by and watch helplessly as the patient deteriorates.

I guess the only way we can make things any easier is to just be there. We don’t necessarily need to ‘cheer them up’ because often, we don’t know how to.

In my own attempt to understand cancer patients, I came across a blogger who lost the cancer battle recently:

http://shinscancerblog.blogspot.com/

Shin Na was a South Korean Born US citizen, she was also a TV news reporter and a legal assistant. At the end of her life she lived in Singapore with her husband Tony and her tow young children. In her blog, she puts up happy pictures of her cherubic looking children. The way she and her husband writes is in a tone that accepts but at the same time, happy. It is indeed an inspiration to read. Although she is dying, her face is filled with a healthy glow and you forget for awhile that she is indeed sick.

The blog chronicles her even after her death through her husband, Tony and her good friend Michelle.

In her blog, she seems happy, in the company of her loved ones. Although, ultimately, it was a lone battle she had to fight, her loved ones were there all the way for her. It is when you see such loving photos, that you feel inspired by her and a warm, chicken soup for the soul feeling that indeed, love does exist.

In her blog, she writes with some humour. She said “This is the part in the movie where I say 'I'm dying' but it doesn't seem real and here I am carrying on as if nothing is wrong; and nothing is wrong. That's why they call it the silent killer.” She saw her life as a movie and she, the lead actress.


She faced death with courage and love, and although death did indeed conquer her, taking away her life, her love and courage shone through.

http://www.asiaone.com/Just%2BWoman/About%2BMe/Well%2BBeing/Story/A1Story20071030-33099.html