Study Shows Benefits of Working Out

If you're on my blog, you probably enjoy working out. (Or you have a sick fetish for body hair, but hey, I'm not judging you.) There is a recent article that references some major studies (done at Penn State) that talks about the effects of exercising.

We all know that we FEEL better after working out, and it's an endorphin release that does that. As the article says, "... the somewhat scary part is that they have a very similar and addictive behavior like morphine, heroine or nicotine. The only difference? Well, it’s actually good for us."

Here's some interesting parts of that article that talk about HOW and WHEN working out can help you:

A recent study from Penn State university shed some light on the matter and the results are more than surprising. They found that to be more productive and happier on a given work day, it doesn’t matter so much, if you work-out regularly, if you haven’t worked out on that particular day:

“Those who had exercised during the preceding month but not on the day of testing generally did better on the memory test than those who had been sedentary, but did not perform nearly as well as those who had worked out that morning.”

New York Times best-selling author Gretchen Reynolds has written a whole book about the subject matter titled “The first 20 minutes”. To get the highest level of happiness and benefits for health, the key is not to become a professional athlete. On the contrary, a much smaller amount is needed to reach the level where happiness and productivity in every day life peaks:

“The first 20 minutes of moving around, if someone has been really sedentary, provide most of the health benefits. You get prolonged life, reduced disease risk — all of those things come in in the first 20 minutes of being active.”

So really, you can relax and don’t have to be on the look-out for the next killer work-out. All you have to do is get some focused 20 minutes in to get the full happiness boost every day.

So get out for just a few minutes of activity if you can... if not for a "workout," then do it for the mental benefits! Have a good weekend!