Wellfie Wednesday Tip #127: #IMovedToday December Challenge

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Happy Wellfie Wednesday! Welcome back! This week’s post comes to you by a guest promoter of health, Mark Milligan (@markmilligandpt). Mark is a practicing physical therapist in Austin, TX, specializing in orthopaedics and pain science. Mark is also the founder of Anywhere Healthcare (@Anywhere_Health) - “A telehealth platform solving the problem of healthcare access by allowing any provider of any discipline remote access to their patients.”

December is upon us! With December and the holiday season, the Season of Excess begins!! This is a challenging time in almost every way. The temperatures are cold, the days are short, the end-of-year work piles up, and we all have the desire and need to spend more time with our families and colleagues, eating of course!! All this happens just before we all make the annual effort to change our lives for the better... 

Reflecting on my holiday behaviors over many years and realizing my own struggle with the "I'm on top of the world and I am going to get in the best shape of my life" moments mixed with the "Meh, what's one more cookie, I can start my diet tomorrow" moments, I realized that I always had these discussions in my own head and never with other people... So, I decided to reach out for help with accountability and motivation. Social Media seemed like the obvious place to go so I just put it out there and created the #IMovedToday hashtag to not only help me post about my daily movements but also have people support me and be able to support others!! People were responding and a small group were supporting and tweeting!

Timing is everything and the universe works perfectly, I had received a message from Cheryl Capone Keller (@KellerCaponePhD) who was having a similar thought about helping each other support and celebrate movement during the season, when movement is often forgotten about! 

The #IMovedToday December Challenge was born!!!

So we would like to invite and welcome all of you to the Challenge to help you and others choose movement!

The rules for the #IMovedToday December Challenge are incredibly easy!

Join us and look for #IMovedToday to continue into 2019!!!

Thanks for all of the support, be sure to post your successes and pictures this week and tag with #WellfieWednesday & #IMovedToday, along with the WW crew members (@TheFuelPhysio, @Eric_in_AmERICa, @FreestylePhysio, @DianaKlatt) and keep the wave of healthy change going!

- WW Crew

Wellfie Wednesday Tip #126: The Art of Running

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Happy Wellfie Wednesday! Welcome back! This week’s post is brought to you by Aaron (@FreestylePhysio). 

I wanted to write a short and sweet post this week about something I’ve been enjoying lately, RUNNING. I’ve ran recreationally for a long time but have never really had a strong desire to do it competitively. However, since working for Pro-Activity and hanging around with the BaseCamp crew, I’ve become more intrigued by the sport. It’s a sport that seems to be very heavily involved with science. Most of the people I know who race competitively diligently track their mileage and other training variables. At the highest level of the sport, sport scientists have been trying to determine who is most likely to break the sub 2-hour marathon and are eager to help these gifted athletes redefine what is possible. I think all that nerdy stuff is truly fascinating. But personally, I’m much more drawn to what I perceive to be the art of running. 

The reason I love running is because I can let my mind wander as my body does the work. I’ve found that some of my most creative moments occur when I’m running. I’m able to think differently about problems and goals. The rhythmic nature of running seems to help my mind drift off into a dream state where internal judgements and rules are minimized.  It sounds spiritual and I guess it is. It’s definitely therapeutic. It feels more like art than science. 

Now I’m not opposed to science and data. I love both, and recently just bought a Garmin watch that tracks stress, sleep, and workloads from my training sessions. But, as I get more into the sport and science of running, I hope I never lose the feeling that draws me towards it the most. In my opinion, that’s the art of running. 

Wow, quite the heady post about running haha. Hope you enjoyed it! I’m curious, what’s your favorite form of movement and why do you love it? 

Thanks for all of the support, be sure to post your pictures this week and tag the WW crew members in your post (@TheFuelPhysio, @Eric_in_AmERICa, @FreestylePhysio, @DianaKlatt) and keep the wave of healthy change going!

Wellfie Wednesday Tip #118: Replacing Sedentary Time

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Happy Wellfie Wednesday! Welcome back! This week we want to chat about the benefits of Replacing Sedentary Time. Sedentary time being the time you spend in sitting, such as watching television or playing video games. And it’s not so much that sitting is bad, it’s spending too much time sitting and being physical inactive. Of course after a long day of work or even after planned physical activity or sport, sitting and resting is perfectly fine. 

Now unfortunately, most recent data points to an increasing number of physically inactive adults, with just over half (51.7%) of American adults meeting the current Physical Activity Guidelines for aerobic activity. Placing a large percentage of Americans at greater risk of cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and many more mortality causing diagnoses. 

Though fortunately, a recently published meta-analysis (indicating a higher quality of evidence) has shown that replacing your sedentary time with low-intensity physical activity or with moderate to vigorous physical activity may be beneficial. Greater benefit being found for those choosing to do moderate to vigorous physical activity, a level of intensity that holding a conversation is difficulty. But benefit was still had by those simply choosing to reallocate 30 minutes of their day with a low-intensity activity.

Try to find your most sedentary time of the day and replace it with some physical activity, even if it is just standing or walking for a bit. Thanks for all of the support, be sure to post your pictures this week and tag the WW crew members in your post (@TheFuelPhysio, @Eric_in_AmERICa, @FreestylePhysio, @DianaKlatt) and keep the wave of healthy change going!

-WW Crew

Wellfie Wednesday Tip #68: Walk with a Doc

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Happy #WellfieWednesday friends!

     This week is brought to you by Eric (@Eric_in_AmERICa). I wanted to highlight a great resource, www.WalkWithADoc.org. Walk With A Doc uses a simple, yet powerful concept to empower and educate patients to improve their health. Via their website: “Walk with a Doc was started in 2005 by Dr. David Sabgir, a cardiologist in Columbus, Ohio. Frustrated with his inability to affect behavior change in the clinical setting, Dr. Sabgir invited his patients to go for a walk with him in a local park on a spring Saturday morning. To his surprise, over 100 people showed up, energized and ready to move.”

     How does it work? A provider sets up a date, time, and location to meet, gives a brief presentation, then goes for a walk with participants who are interested. The concept is beautiful in its simplicity. By eliminating the cultural barrier between patient/client/customer and healthcare provider, you create an open line of communication where people can finally ask those nagging medical questions that they’ve been avoiding (or asking Dr Google) for so long. Furthermore, it allows individuals an opportunity for simple health screenings, such as blood pressure checks, which may increase the likelihood of catching and preventing more serious health issues down the road.

     Since its inception, Walk With A Doc has grown to over 300 chapters across the US, Europe, Asia, and Australia so it’s likely that there’s an event you can join in a city nearby. If not, have no fear, WWAD makes it incredibly easy to start an event in your town by offering marketing materials, a “how-to” guide, and even a few t-shirts to promote your event!

     So give it a shot and let us know how it goes! And thanks again for all of the #WellfieWednesday support, be sure to post your pictures this week and tag the WW crew members in your post (@PBernerSPT, @Eric_in_AmERICa, @AaronPerezPT, @DianaKlatt) and keep the wave of healthy change going!

- WW Crew

Wellness Wednesday Tip #49: Personalize Your Fitness

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Welcome back! Happy Wellfie Wednesday! 

     Following last week's post, Fitness vs Fatness, we wanted to keep the theme of Fitness going and highlight the benefit of choosing to do something you love. This week is brought to you by Aimee.

     All too often we have some new fitness trend or workout that makes its way through the ‘inter-webs’ that claims to have helped a person lose 10 pounds in one week (okay so maybe I’m exaggerating a bit but you know what I mean!) The reality is that while this might have worked for one person, or even a few hundred people it doesn’t mean that you have to do it, especially if you’re not the slightest bit interested!

     I think it’s safe to say that we know fitness is important for our health, but the question always remains “what should I do?” The answer here is: Do What You Enjoy! I cannot stress enough how important it is to find some sort of activity that you love because you are much more likely to stick with it!

     This is not to say that you should disregard weekly recommendations for strength training and aerobic exercise, but more to promote that if you can find an activity that meets some of those requirements, it bodes well for your long term success!

Here are 10 of my favorite activities:

1. Walking

2. Running

3. Hiking

4. Yoga

5. Basketball

6. Soccer

7. Golf

8. Obstacle course racing

9. CrossFit

10. Stand up paddle boarding

     My challenge to you this week: find an activity you love, take a picture of you doing the activity, and post it with #WellfieWednesday in hopes that we can inspire the masses to personalize their fitness!

     Thanks again for all of the #WellfieWednesday support, be sure to post your pictures this week and tag the WW crew members (@PBernerSPT, @Eric_in_AmERICa, @AaronPerezPT, @fitnerdaimee, @DianaKlatt) and keep the wave of healthy change going!

- WW Crew

Wellness Wednesday Tip #43: Exercise in a Community

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Happy #WellfieWednesday friends!

     The week’s tip comes from Aimee! This year I decided to give CrossFit a try. It was a long time coming and finally pulled the plug to give it a go! As a PT I fully support what CrossFit does for individuals. Just about every day I’ll see a story about how someone has used it to make a dramatic change in their health, and I definitely can’t argue with those results! So why is it so popular and why do so many people do it, even when it’s quite expensive?

     I believe this has a lot to do with the community aspect that CrossFit provides. I’ve found that as I’ve gotten older it is much more motivating to work out with a group of people that you grow to know quite well versus just working out on your own. I’ve also noticed that I tend to push myself more when I have others around me, so it’s a win-win for me! I think some of this stems from my long history of playing sports and CrossFit definitely feels similar to a team!

     Now I know that I’m mentioning CrossFit specifically here, but there are plenty of other modes of exercise providing a sense of community. Such as The November Project, Soul Cycle, obstacle course racing/mud runs, running clubs, triathlon clubs, or even participating in group fitness classes at a YMCA. The point is that all of these offer a community with which to train. Having a group of people around to push you to do your best even when the going gets tough is very motivating!

     My advice to all of you Wellfie Wednesday folks this week is to try and find a group of people to exercise with regardless of what type of exercise you are doing. This won’t apply to everyone because some people genuinely enjoy working out alone, but if you’re stuck in an exercise rut or are looking to get started with exercise try this and see what you think!

Until next time, eat well, move well, live well.

     Give it a shot and let us know how it goes! Thanks again for all of the #WellfieWednesday support, be sure to post your pictures this week and tag the WW crew members (@PBernerSPT, @Eric_in_AmERICa, @AaronPerezPT, @fitnerdaimee, @DianaKlatt) and keep the wave of healthy change going!

- WW Crew