The benefits of walking.

Walking is going to be the main form of exercise I will talk about here since walking is available to everyone. You don’t need to have an athlete’s body nor do you have to have an expensive gym membership to walk, it’s something everyone can do! No excuses!

While it is recommended that you should get in an hour of walking daily, it may not be possible for everyone at the beginning. The best method is to start slow. Maybe take a 10 minute walk each day just to ease into it, you can always increase the amount you walk by a few minutes each day. Before you know it, you’ll finally be hitting that hour or more mark! 

When I started using the Nordic Track, I could barely do 7 minutes. Now I am doing sometimes as much as 2 hours a day! It is definitely possible to reach your fitness goals as long as you don’t give up and you keep pushing yourself. 

Did you know that walking dramatically lowers your cholesterol, your risk of heart attack, breast cancer, colon cancer, and type 2 Diabetes? It's true! Still need more reasons to go walking? 

If you spend just 2 hours a week walking your cognitive function will also improve. 

One study showed that people who suffer from depression can benefit greatly from walking. The group walked half an hour a day 4 or more times a week for 1 month. Almost half of them agreed they felt less depressed at the end of the month. People who are depressed & sedentary also tend to get sick more frequently, so the amount of colds you will get each year will be cut down as well!

Those are JUST A FEW of the benefits to walking, there are many, many more.

If you feel like you can’t go walking because the weather isn’t perfect, you can always invest in a treadmill, elliptical, or a skiing machine like the Nordic Track that I am using. I am averaging anywhere from 4 miles a night to as many as 10! It is definitely possible for ANYONE to be able to claim the same thing with just a bit of effort! 

"But I don't have the time to walk with school, work, and being a parent. It's just not possible!" Stop making excuses. Instead of trying to find the time to walk, MAKE the time to walk! How much time do you spend on facebook or blogger each day? How much time do you spend sitting in front of the TV? How much time do you spend on the phone, chatting, texting, whatever? How much time do you spend wishing you looked and felt better? If you prioritize, you will see that you have plenty of time for walking. It is definitely worth the effort! MAKE THE TIME! Even if all you do is take the worst parking spot in the lot, or use the stairs instead of the elevator, you're walking.

Here is a special calculator to find out how many calories you’re burning while walking. Calories burned and distance calculator!