HAPPINESS - Health Blogarithm - Sunday 17th January 2010

Abraham Lincoln said something to the effect that most people are about as happy as they want to be.

We live in a society where a lot of people don't seem to be all that happy, but they can't put their finger on the reason for their unhappiness. If you fit into the unhappy category, reboot your happiness centre by doing some of the things happy people do.

1. Increase the amount of physical activity you do - get your heart rate up
The first thing to do is reset your metabolism. One of the foundations of happiness is a metabolic system that's in top working order. If you don't get enough aerobic exercise you can feel like this.

Once you start exercising you get more oxygen into your body, you start releasing 'feel-good' endorphins from your brain, you give the limbic centre of your brain a boost, you get out of your body the waste products of your metabolism you can do better without. As a result, your mood changes, you feel happier.

What the exercise does is give you a metabolic defrag.

The exercise-led recovery takes about a week to kick in.

Start slowly, ease into it, don't bust your boiler. Walking is a good place to start. It's pretty hard to injure yourself just by walking.

2. Change your diet
An enriched supply of omega 3 fats will give your limbic centre a boost as well.

For some people laying off wheat flour, makes a difference to the way they feel. If you have an intolerance to wheat flour, you could feel tired, get frequent headaches, find it easy to put on fat around your body, have elevated blood pressure. You become sluggish. You feel dreadful. It's hard to feel happy when you feel dreadful!

Conduct the experiment and go without anything with wheat in it for a week - no bread, no biscuits, no pasta, no cake. Now I know these are the four major food groups in our society (!), but you won't die if you don't eat them! On the contrary, there's still plenty to eat, meat, fish, chicken, vegetables and fruit. This could really make a big difference to your metabolism - and the way you feel.

Well, there's much more to happiness that that, but it will have to wait for some future blogs.

On the track
An hour on the stepper all over 140 bpm. 1013 steps and 7851 calories. That's a good workout.

Then off to the gym for a good solid strength training session.

If you want a copy of the program Christine and I use, get yourself a copy of the Strength Training Diary at http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/ It's contains an outline of the Complete Strength Training Program.

In the meantime stay tuned, highly tuned and kick-start your metabolism. You'll feel better.

John Miller
http://www.globalbackcare.com/
http://www.fitandhealthyonline.com/

METABOLIC DEFRAG

Health Blogarithm for 24th December 2009

Straight to the track
Phew, the metabolic defrag has definitely kicked in. Spent 60 minutes on the stepper, all over 140 BPM and registered 1052 steps. That's better. But I'm looking through my training diary and note that on the

21st of August 2004 I did 1273 steps, which is a bit over level 8 all the way.

The best I can see was 1386 on the 27th of April 2003. That would have been level 10 for an hour.

And I can see 40 minutes at level 10 all the way on 26th April 2003 for 964 steps.

25th May, 2003: 451 steps in 20 minutes - so that would have all been 10 or more resistance level.

2nd of October 2004, 90 minutes on the stepper to record 1470 steps and 1058 calories.

On the 11th of December 2006 I did 1244 steps which is level 8 for an hour.

Any way it all goes to show that once you turn 60 and you stop training so hard, things go pear-shaped. Which is what this blogarithm, is all about, changing the shape and getting fitter.

After the step did situps and pressups and sat for a while in the meditation chair and took my blood pressure. It's usually a bit 'uppish' but today was the lowest I've ever seen, 107/63. I think there must be something wrong with my machine or the defrag is going nuts.

Anyway, we'll see what tomorrow brings.

In the mean time stay tuned, highly tuned and hope that the fat bloke in the red tracksuit can fit down your chimney.

John Miller