Exercise Keeps Family Happy

In our modern lives, we can receive the items we want at home without going to the market, and we can get documents without going to a government office. We can go anywhere by various means of transportation like car. Thus, the development of civilization has brought convenience and leisure to our lives, but this reduced the chance to move our bodies. Even the most basic exercise, walking, is not done properly.

Lack of exercise leads to obesity as well as various diseases such as metabolic syndrome and chronic illnesses. Medicine is developing, but the number of patients with heart disease, high blood pressure, stroke, diabetes, and cancer is increasing; this is because of lack of exercise. The diseases caused by insufficient movement and exercise is called hypokinetic diseases, which are referred to as urban diseases or city diseases because people living in cities mostly have them.

In 2016, the World Health Organization [WHO] announced that one out of every four adults worldwide lacked exercise. The medical journal Lancet Global Health also pointed out that lack of exercise has a negative effect on mental health and quality of life. In many ways, the importance of exercise is being emphasized, and people are aware of the need for exercise, but they often avoid exercise, regarding it as something bothersome and hard, or under the pretext of lack of time.

Physical health and exercise are inseparable

People say, “Health is the best of all.” Everyone will agree with this. Exercise is one of the essential requirements for health.

Exercise improves muscular strength, endurance, and flexibility, and positively affects all body organs such as the heart and the respiratory system. When you move your body violently, you will breathe with gasps and the amount of blood that is pumped from your heart increases, which keeps your blood pressure stable, makes your heart stronger, reduces bad cholesterol, increases good cholesterol, and relaxes blood vessels to help create elastic, healthy blood vessels.

Basal metabolism refers to the minimum amount of energy required to sustain life. Exercise not only increases your physical strength and speeds up your metabolism by increasing your basal metabolism, but also reduces fat and increases immunity. Muscle development through exercise advantageously controls blood sugar, which is effective in treating diabetes.

Body temperature is a thermal indicator of the body condition. After exercise, the heat energy is transferred to the cells of the body by blood to maintain the proper body temperature. In case of a person with hypothermia, if his body temperature rises by only one degree, his immunity increases significantly, and the risk of having cancer lowers. In particular, the incidence rate of colorectal cancer can be reduced by an average of 40–50% and up to 70%.

When people become over thirty-five years old, they are likely to have osteoporosis or fracture because approximately one percent of bone mass (the amount of calcium contained in the bone) decreases annually. At this time, exercising with dumbbells and weights can slow down the decrease in bone density. The surest way to prevent aging is regular exercise, which is to increase your stamina and add vitality to your life.

The brain becomes strong when the body moves

When you exercise, you use the brain as well as the body. If the brain does not work, it is difficult to move the limbs and maintain the sense of balance. The brain also sends signals to move the heart and the liver more actively than usual. After hatching from eggs, sea squirts find the right places to settle, then they eat their own brains. It is because since they no more need to move, they no longer need the brain.

Researchers at Columbia University in the United States placed twenty-three mice in a cage with a treadwheel and another twenty-three mice in a cage without a treadwheel, then they scanned the brains of the mice two weeks later. As a result, it was found that the mice that exercised with the wheel increased blood flow in the part responsible for memory, and doubled the number of new brain cells. The change lasted long even after they stopped exercising.

How does the brain grow healthy when you move your body? The brain is only two percent of body weight, but consumes more oxygen than the lungs or the heart. When the blood supply to the brain increases through exercise, the amount of oxygen contained in the blood also increases. Oxygen is the nutrient of cells. Therefore, as the energy that brain cells can use increases, the brain functions smoothly.

BDNF [Brain-derived neutrophic factor] is a protein involved in developing the nervous system and in making the brain adapt to external stimuli. The amount of its secretion increases when you exercise. The higher the BDNF level, the greater the ability to accept new knowledge and to adapt to stressful situations.

Exercise is like a nutritional supplement for your brain. A person’s cognitive ability decreases with aging, but when the brain is strong, this is delayed and even dementia can be prevented.

Playground is another classroom

In the past, children generally helped their parents’ work and walked long distances to school. So they had to move their bodies often. These days, however, children have little chance to actively move their bodies and often sit in front of computers or TVs for a long time. In particular, college entrance examinees barely exercise as they devote themselves to their study.

However, in order to develop children’s intelligence, concentration, and learning ability, they must not spare time to exercise. The white matter¹ of the brain is a tissue that connects the gray matter; it is a channel for transmitting information. The more exercise, the more white matter; the more white matter, the better your concentration and memory.

1. The areas of the central nervous system that are made up of nerve fibers (axons), which appear white to the naked eye. Gray areas are called gray matter.

For example, in 2005, Naperville Central High School in the United States had students run on the playground before the start of the first class, then take subjects that require much concentration in the first and second classes. After that, the students’ learning ability improved, and at the international academic evaluation, this high school achieved the best result in science.

Dr. David Walsh, psychologist and educator, pointed out that adolescents who lack exercise are more likely to be aggressive. Aggression is deeply related to the “delay of gratification” (the ability to delay what you want to do and then do it later), but there is a limit to teaching it as a general class. However, students can learn it by playing sports that have rules.

Children can learn challenging spirit, leadership, and team spirit as well as how to accept the results, while learning the virtues necessary for social life and experiencing active human relationships. It also relieves stress from studying and friendship. This way, exercise plays a big role in developing the mind and body in a balanced manner and for children to build up good character.

Exercise brings forth happiness

Our emotions are greatly influenced by hormones. Among the hormones that make you feel good, there are endorphins, dopamine, and serotonin, which are called “happiness hormones.” The reason you feel better and reduce stress after exercising to sweat is because these happiness hormones are activated.

If you lack these hormones, your emotions become unstable and you are likely to experience depression, obsession, insomnia, and panic disorder. In several papers related to depression, exercise is the most effective way to treat it. A research has also shown that the patients whose depression was treated through exercise have a much higher rate of improvement and little recurrence than the patients who have only taken medication. If you find out that you’ve gotten better and stronger physically than before as you exercise steadily, you will be confident that you’re developing and growing. Accordingly, you will be motivated in everything.

When you have a problem, if you sit still and think about it over and over, you will feel more complicated and are likely to get caught in a pessimistic mood. Tough and difficult situations may come at any time in your life. In that case, you may need to calmly consider the problem, but if you go outside and exercise, you can shake off unnecessary thoughts and negative emotions to some extent. When you move, you can have an optimistic mind and the power to judge correctly, which makes it easier to find clues to solving the problem.

If you have a willingness to move your body a lot, even though you encounter a steep hill or stairway on the way, you will consider it as an opportunity to exercise, not an obstacle. You can even enjoy a troublesome work. Sufficient energy and a positive mind make people around you happy as well as yourself.

Family exercise for unity

Nowadays, family time is being taken away by TV and the Internet. So, family exercise is very good for the happiness and solidarity of your family. A Korean university surveyed 509 citizens in Seoul City and Gyeonggi Province about “family healthiness.” Family healthiness refers to the degree of smooth interaction among family members. The people with the highest scores said, “Usually, I exercise with my family.”

When a family exercises together, it creates an atmosphere of conversation and touch. Emotionally, family members get close with one another, and their relationships become stronger by talking about what they had not shared usually. Even the family members who are clumsy in conversation can increase their bonds through exercise. In particular, if the dad, who has less chance to share emotional sympathy with his children than the mom, actively participates in family exercise, it becomes a happy memory for the children even if they spent a short time together.

When you need to reason with or scold your child, it is more effective to go out and walk together rather than to do in the room. If both of you walk forward in an open space, keeping pace in strides, you will think in the forward-looking ways; and as you look at the same place, your brain will have the same experience, which leads you to have a better conversation.

It is good to make exercise with your family as a habit. Let’s set a practical goal rather than a grand one. Most of all, you should have a pleasant time while exercising with your family. Forcing the other person to do an exercise that he dislikes, and telling off or nagging while exercising are worse than nothing. It is important to choose an exercise that all the family members can enjoy and do it in a good atmosphere, praising each other.

The world-renowned former South African President Nelson Mandela worked out harder than anyone else, serving twenty-seven years in prison. Barack Obama, former President of the United States, too, exercised regularly during his tenure.

You may think that exercise will make you tired, but rather it is a source of new energy. If you do not move, your body cannot function properly and your mind will be exhausted. However, if it is too much no matter what, it becomes rather poisonous. So do exercise properly in consideration of exercise intensity, time, body condition, and weather. It is good to start with a warm-up workout and take a break when you find it hard to continue.

Do not spend precious leisure time meaninglessly, but move your body joyfully with your family. Walking, running, biking, playing catch, hiking, swimming, jumping rope, table tennis, badminton . . . there are a variety of exercises you can do with your family. If the situation is not good for those exercises, you can do stretching or strength training at home. Exercise is essential, not an option, to live a happy and healthy life.