The Running Shoes

There are few areas more in need of positive affirmations than the exercise arena.

If the majority of us were honest, we would say that on a scale of one to ten, the natural desire to exercise would be at a negative 80. Yet, if we were equally as honest, we would have to admit that after we engage in exercise of any form, we feel awesome and invigorated; and, for that brief post-exercise moment, the same scale would jump to a positive 80.

So why is it that our exercise resolutions wax and wane on a constant basis? The most basic reason is that we have been bombarded with negative affirmations of how hard and “non-fun” exercise is, and that we have to endure it for the positive effects that we will gain in our health and well-being.

Endorphins are physically produced during strenuous exercise and cause you to feel an incredible sense of well-being. Yet, even with this invigorated feeling, it still hasn’t changed people’s exercise habits!

If there were an ability to remember the refreshing and amazing feelings of well-being that are experienced after exercise, we’d all be going to the gym every day. That is where positive exercise affirmations will be your most supportive workout partner. By correctly utilizing these positive exercise affirmations on a daily basis, you will exercise with enjoyable conviction.

Setting Real, Achievable Exercise Goals

To begin with, it is necessary to define the goals that you wish to achieve before you begin, ensuring your success is based on realistic and achievable milestones. Next, you need to realize that positive exercise affirmations, just like any positive affirmations, need to be tailored to who you are in order for them to be successful. In other words, an individual who puts on their t-shirt, shorts and sneakers and hits the pavement to run for an hour needs to understand their own needs, otherwise negative affirmations will swirl through their body and mind, such as: “My legs hurt! I can’t breathe! I can’t do this! Am I there yet?” Negative exercise affirmations can cause your mind to find any excuse to stop altogether.

On the other hand, the individual who puts on a wet suit and water shoes, then grabs a paddle and kayak and hits the river for two hours repeating to himself: “I love the peace and quiet of the river. I enjoy the rhythm of each stroke through the water. I can hear my heart and lungs in happy rhythm together as they get stronger!” These are positive exercise affirmations and this same individual will find other forms of “exercise” to fulfill their life.

Free Positive Affirmations Examples

Some more free positive affirmations to help you achieve your goal for exercise balance are as follows:

• I enjoy listening to the sound of my beating heart in exercise. With each beat, it strengths.
• I love the feel of the pavement beneath my running shoes. I feel strong and in control.
• I enjoy listening to the beautiful sounds of nature as I walk around the block.
• I love the wind against my face as I jog around my neighborhood.
• I cherish the time I spend making my body stronger for life.

By: Ronnie Nijmeh

Jogging is a great classic cardio exercise, popular not just for its health benefits but also because you do it almost anywhere. But for most people, jogging can lose its charm after a while. So how do you make this exercise more interesting?

By taking it off road. Most places in the U.S. have hiking trails nearby, and the dirt paths, rocky roads, and beautiful scenery and just what the doctor ordered to make your jog more stimulating. But jogging off the beaten path comes with its own set of concerns and issues. Here’s what you need to know to jog safely and effectively.

The first time you take your run down a dirt road, don’t go as fast as you would on a flat, paved road. The uneven surfaces and rocks make a tumble not just more likely, but more dangerous as well.

Make note of landmarks and areas that seem particularly dangerous or difficult. Over time, as you familiarize yourself with the trail, you can build up speed, eventually going full tilt.
As in regular running, make sure to keep good posture.

The unfamiliar territory or low hanging tree branches may make you feel like hunching over, but if you do you deprive your lungs of a bit of oxygen. This will make the run more difficult and the exercise less efficient than it could be.

Another major advantage of off road jogging is that you can do certain cardio activities that impossible on flat roads. Jogging uphill will work your legs and build your stamina. Try and find trails that offer uphill challenges for a well-rounded workout.

Of course, what goes up must come down, so you should make certain to keep your balance on those downhill slopes. You don’t necessarily have to slow down while jogging downhill, but you should use you arms to maintain your center of gravity to keep from tumbling over.

You may have to invest in a new pair of running shoes if you want to do your running on rougher terrain. Usually when you buy shoes, you are only looking for one thing: comfort. But the shoes you take off road have to be more durable than your average set of sneakers, plus hopefully easier to clean. It also helps if they are extra snug on your foot to prevent pebbles or burs from hurting you.

Once you know a particular trail like the back of your hand, you might try making it even more interesting by running at night. Get a nice windbreaker and a headlamp and see how different your night running time is from you daytime. Be careful though, since you can’t see as far ahead of you as you can during the daylight hours, you are more likely to stumble over an unseen dirt mound or sapling.

Remember, exercise can and should be fun. If you are getting bored with your routine, ask your personal trainer on ways to make it more interesting to you.

By: Chris

In February, you gained 2 pounds from gobbling down chocolates during Valentine’s Day. No big deal, you think. Then June comes and surrounds you with all-you-can-eat ice cream sundaes. You gain 3.5 pounds, take a deep breath, and forget about your weight.

Next, in November, you celebrate a certain holiday with family, where you can’t resist Mom’s buttery mashed potatoes and Grandma’s cherry pie. Oh no! The scale shows you’ve gained a total of 10 pounds this year. Your eyes widen— how did you get here?

Thinking back, you realize that you hadn’t made any effort to lose the extra weight in February. Since you did not use healthier eating habits or exercise, the pounds kept increasing until you got 10 pounds overweight.

So you decide to lose weight immediately, using better eating habits and regular exercise. One great form of exercise is jogging, “Isn’t jogging boring and old-fashioned?” you wonder.

Actually, jogging has almost always been a great form of exercise. Perhaps you’ve waited at a red light in your car, while a jogger waits to cross the street. Did you notice that the trim and fit jogger wasted no time by running in place, until the traffic light changed to green? Now you can become this determined person.

This activity has another advantage: you can jog with others, like a friend, a group of buddies or a dog. You get each other’s company, making jogging even more enjoyable. Plus, your friends can encourage you to stick to this activity, when you’d rather give up.

Jogging also strengthens your cardiovascular system. With regular exercise, your health improves and you reduce your chance of a heart attack. You also get more energy, so you can go from one activity to the next with less rest in between.

Another reason to jog has to do with its intensity. Because jogging classifies as a high-intensity exercise, this exercise burns a good number of calories. As you may know, burning calories helps you reach your goal of losing 10 pounds.

Besides burning calories, jogging gives you a fun way to exercise. You can wave “hello” to neighbors, whose sincere smiles provide encouragement. And who can forget the scenery you see while jogging- like a rabbit lurching in the bushes or sunflowers towering upwards. You can take deep breaths and relax while jogging.

You may know that jogging is good exercise, but did you know that jogging is one of the cheapest ways to exercise? Basically, you spend money on running shoes and you’re set. You don’t need special equipment, videos, or membership to a club. But you do need the stamina and the drive to go forward to be a good jogger.

Although jogging can give you a great workout, remember that this weight loss technique puts pressure on your feet and joints. Do yourself a favor and start out with a short distance, like 15-20 minutes around the park. Gradually increase the time you spend on jogging, until you reach an effective distance for your stamina.

Following this gradual method will let your body adjust to jogging, your ticket to losing 10 pounds. And better yet, after you lose the weight, jogging can help you maintain your healthy weight.

By: Ryan Cote

Performing regular jogging gives better physical condition and other health benefits. Jogging also gives physical and mental pleasure.

THE HEALTH BENEFITS OF JOGGING

Jogging on a regular basis give a distinct good effect upon the general health, provided it is not over-done. The effects are:

* Jogging makes the heart stronger. It increases the capacity of the blood circulation and of the respiratory system.
* It speeds up the digestive system and helps you get rid of digestive trouble.
* It counteracts depression.
* It increases the capacity to work and lead an active life.
* Jogging makes you burn fat and thereby helps against over-weight.
* If you suffer from poor appetite, jogging will improve your appetite.
* Jogging will strengthens the muscles of your legs, hips and back. However you will not get very big muscles from jogging.
* Jogging makes you sleep better.

THE PLEASURE OF JOGGING

Jogging gives you physical and mental joy, provided you do not exhaust yourself. When jogging is done correctly, you will actually feel less tired when you have finished a tour than before you began. You get nice feelings in your muscles during the jogging and afterwards.

You will feel the wind blowing around your body. You will hear the birds singing, the music of running water in the streams, or the sound of waves dashing towards the seashore. During the jogging you will also get a euphoric mental feeling after some time.

CLOTHES AND SHOES

The type of clothes you were must be suited to the weather conditions. In warm weather, shorts and a t-shirt is enough. However, it may be useful to carry along an extra piece of clothe in a light back-pack if you run out on a long route, in case the weather aggravates. In colder weather you must add more layers of clothes. In either case, the requirements for the clothes are:

You should use light and soft clothes without any sharp sutures, hard edges or massive folds. They should sit fairly close to your body, but not so close that you feel squeezed, trapped, or so that your movements are hindered.

The clothes should give good ventilation for moisture and sweat and perspiration through the fabric. The fabric should ideally hold water totally out from the outside, but this requirement is difficult to achieve together with the requirement of good ventilation.

You should use fairly soft shoes, but with a good shape fitting the anatomical shape of your feet. The soles should easily bend during the normal movements of your feet, but support well against the ground. The underside of the sole should give friction against any type of grounds, so that you do not slide during jogging. The soles should buffer well against each impact from the ground.

JOGGING ROUTES AND SESSIONS

Jogging may be performed in a lot of ways:

* Long distance jogging 6-20 km in a moderate speed on even roads or paths.
* Short distance jogging 3-6 km in a high speed.
* Jogging upwards in a steep terrain 3-4 km, in a speed adjusted to the steepness
* Jogging in a hilly terrain with paths going both up an down 4-8 km

It is advisable to vary the type of jogging from day to day. Then the jogging gets funnier and you get a variable type of training.

HOW TO PERFORM A JOGGING SESSION

You should move slowly with little efforts the first few hundred meters to warm up your muscles. Then you gradually increase your muscular work and speed. When you have done half the route, you can take a speedy spurt using most of your capacity. If the route is long enough, you can take two or three spurts using nearly full capacity.The last hundred meters you gradually slow down again.

STRETCHING YOUR BODY BEFORE AND AFTER EACH SESSION

It is advisable to stretch out both before and after each jogging session, and not only the muscles in your feet, but your whole body 2 minutes before and 3-4 minutes after the session. When stretching out do the following movements:

* Bend forward and touch your toes.
* Kneel down on one of your feet, and stretch the other out backwards.
* Bend your body to both sides.
* Stretch out an arm, grab something, and turn your body round so that your arm is bent backwards.
* Shoot your abdomen foreword, so that your spinal column is stretched into a bow.
* Place your hands behind your neck and stretch your arms backwards. Then twist your body to left and right, also bend to each side.

After the jogging it is sometimes best to wait for some minutes before you stretch out, so that the worst tiredness has gone away first.

WHEN AND HOW OFTEN

If jogging is the only sport activity done, a jogging session every second day is ideal. This is enough to give all the health benefits and increase your condition and endurance gradually, but without wearing yourself out. If you combine jogging by other types of sport activities, 2 times a week may be enough.

You should not be too hungry before jogging, but it is not advisable to take a jogging session straight after a big meal. The time of the day does not matter, but your jogging should not be the first thing you do in the morning.

HOW TO BEGIN

If you are not accustomed to physical activity before you start jogging, it is advisable to consult a doctor before you start. You may have health issues that is not compatible with jogging activities, or that you must consider when doing your jogging.

The first times, you should only jog on plain ground and only for 10 minutes. Then you can increase the time, distance and speed, and choose steeper and more difficult paths.

By: Knut Holt

In today’s world, it seems that almost any topic is open for debate. While I was gathering facts for this article, I was quite surprised to find some of the issues I thought were settled are actually still being openly discussed.

For the vast majority of people, weight gain is a very slow, almost imperceptible process. Most of us are familiar with the experience of stepping on a scale and wondering just where, exactly, did those pounds come from? For most people, the weight comes from times in the past year where they indulged. What happens is that you indulge for a week or two (vacation, Christmas) and then go back to your normal lifestyle — you do nothing to lose the weight. So these small weight gains stay with you and build up over time. For this reason almost anyone would love to lose 10 pounds at some point, and a great way to do so is by jogging.

Depending on who you talk to, jogging is considered the best exercise to lose weight. The reason is because the high intensity of jogging burns a lot of calories. If you’re looking to lose 10 pounds, there are a lot worse things you could try than a half-hour jog a few times a week.

Jogging is also preferable for many people because it incorporates exercise in a more interesting way: trying to lose 10 pounds by going to the gym 3 times a week isn’t a whole lot of fun. It will certainly feel like “work” as you count off the minutes of your workout. Jogging, on the other hand, requires nothing but a pair of shoes, and allows you to enjoy some scenery.

Sometimes the most important aspects of a subject are not immediately obvious. Keep reading to get the complete picture.

One of the problems people face when trying to lose 10 pounds is incorporating exercise into their daily routines. Most of us are busy enough as it is, and can’t find the time to go to the gym at scheduled intervals. If you’re trying to lose 10 pounds, you’ll find that jogging is a much more flexible activity – you don’t have to drive to the gym: you can do it wherever and whenever you want.

While jogging is an excellent way to lose 10 pounds and increase your fitness level, you should keep in mind that it is harder on the body then a lot of other physical activities. Jogging involves lurching your full weight around repeatedly – this is precisely why it’s such a good workout – and this can cause stress on the joints in your knees and feet. You should also keep in mind that jogging is an intense physical activity, so if you’re starting from a very low level of fitness it may be a little too much, and you may want to work up to it.

As long as you keep the above in mind though, you’ll find jogging an excellent way to lose 10 pounds. As an added bonus, jogging is recognized as one of the best ways to maintain weight as well, so you don’t have to worry about a diet that gains all the weight back once it’s stopped. And even though you may be jogging primarily to lose those 10 pounds, you’ll also be doing wonders for the health of your heart and cardiovascular system.

Don’t limit yourself by refusing to learn the details about weight loss. The more you know, the easier it will be to focus on what’s important.

By: Bryan Miller