How Physical Activities Promote a Healthy Weight and Lifestyle

In order to acquire a healthy weight, we must manage our personal lifestyle. This includes monitoring the food we consume and the physical activities we perform. Monitoring the food we eat is rather an easy task. The easiest way to start acting is to minimize the intake of unwanted saturated fat from junk food and calories from simple sugars such as soft drinks. We can make healthy food choices such as consuming more vegetables which are high in fibre and vitamins and proteins that are low in fat content. This way, we can control the things that are going into our body.

But why do we need to perform physical activities? There is a misconception thinking that people who regularly exercise are those who want to lose weight. The truth is that we would need to perform some kind of physical activity to balance out the caloric intake that comes from the food we consume (1). If not, the excess calories would eventually be stored as fat. Hence, physical activity is closely related to maintaining a healthy weight.

Some people believe that dieting to achieve a healthy weight and performing physical activities to achieve a healthy weight would give the same result. However, doing exercise on a regular basis would be a healthier choice due to the fact that it provides the function of weight management as well as to help reduce the risk of chronic diseases such as cardiovascular disease, type II diabetes, osteoporosis, arthritis, high blood pressure, and some forms of cancer (2). In order to maintain a healthy weight, we also need a positive mood and a sense of well-being. Not only does exercise give you a fit physical body, it also help improves the psychological state of mind such as reducing the symptoms of depression and anxiety that may be caused by stress (2, 3). 

Lastly, people who are beginning to exercise to obtain a healthy weight should start off slowly. Instead of engaging in an intensive training program to begin with, we should build up the amount of physical activities on a daily or weekly basis, depending on the person’s health and capabilities. Research showed that walking quickly can be as good as jogging (4). Therefore, a beginner should choose to walk quickly for 30 minutes and can increase the pace or the amount of time as he/she feels comfortable. But the most important piece of advice is: Don’t Quit!