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Did you know that by exercising at least 20 minutes each day you can prevent many diseases, reduce aches and pain and improve your self-esteem? That’s right! Exercise is not only beneficial to lose weight. Making exercise part of your daily routine can help you improve your physical, mental, and emotional health.

Here are ten benefits of exercise.  Exercise:

• H elps you maintain a healthy weight by burning calories and fat.
• Increases your energy level. Exercise provides you with more energy to perform your daily tasks efficiently.
• Improves your mood (mental well-being).
• Increases your self-esteem as a consequence of making you look and feel better each day.
• Relieves aches and pain. When you exercise, your body produces endorphines, and these substances reduce the intensity of aches and pain.
• Helps you sleep better.
• Reduces your stress levels.
• Increases your flexibility. This is important to prevent injuries.
• Strengthens your muscles.
• Helps prevent diseases like: osteoporosis, diabetes, hypertension (high blood pressure), heart attack, and obesity.The current recommendation for exercise is to get at least 30 minutes of aerobic activity on most, if not all, days of the week in order to obtain health benefits practice.. If your goal is to lose weight, exercise sessions should be increased to 60 minutes daily, and to maintain weight loss, 90 minutes on most days of the week.

To get the most benefits out of exercise while avoiding injuries, consult your physician about the routine that best fits your personal needs. The general recommendation is to combine aerobic exercises (walking, jogging, swimming, riding bicycle) with exercises designed to increase your muscle tone and flexibility (pilates,  yoga, stretching) and strength exercises (free weights).

Source:

Mayo Clinic (2008). Exercise takes the edge off chronic pain. Retrieved in August, 2008 from  www.mayoclinic.com