Join the discussion
Write your take first — we'll ask for email only when you're ready to publish.
- Hacker News
- I love to run, and even in winter, in the dark, in the rain, I will get home from work at 6pm, eat a small dinner, and head out for a 40-60 minute jog or interval session a few days a week. I do a aerial circus class once a week, too.
I am single and have no children or care giving obligations yet. I bet that when I (hopefully) have small children one day, it will be much harder for me to fit in 3-4 hours a week of running, especially when sleeping enough to feel rested. It would be nice to know what I can do to keep up my health during that phase of life.
by annzabelle - One thing people out here periodically is how causation is hard to find. Someone who is dying may be not inclined to do anything 'cause they feel lousy all the time.by joe_the_user
- I’ll tell you an easy way to get away with absolutely no exercise: design your life in such a way that moving around is a normal part of it.
Live in a "fifteen minute city." Work someplace that’s either a thirty minute walk or thirty minute bike ride from home. Carry your groceries.
If you get your minimal daily requirement of exercise by just living your normal life, any additional exercise you do is bonus, icing on your cake.
by Eric_WVGG - It may sound crazy, but a properly installed pull up bar on your room doorway is a fun way to apply Pavel Tsatsouline ‘grease the groove’ principle. And it’s both easy and fun. You can do pull ups, and train your abdomen several times a day without getting psychological resistance (from google overview: "Grease the Groove" (GtG) is a strength training method popularized by fitness expert Pavel Tsatsouline. It involves performing a specific exercise frequently throughout the day using only 40–60% of your maximum reps. By avoiding muscle failure and staying fresh, your nervous system efficiently adapts to the movement.")by algoth1
- My dentist told me I don't have to floss all of my teeth, just the ones I want to keep. You don't have to exercise all of your muscles either.by delichon
- Median age of 61… 4.4 minutes of “vigorous” activity. Hard to interpret this as anything else that if you remain being able to be somehow active in your later years you will be better off.
I find all of the studies of “how little exercise” is needed sad. Instead we should be focusing on how to restructure modern lifestyle to allow everybody to achieve the minimum of cardiovascular and strength exercises.
by yoz-y - How about you instead of trying to “get away with” as little exercise as possible you found a way to move your body that you genuinely enjoy? One should not optimise away sleep, nutrition and exercise. Yes we live in a ridiculous fitness and gym boom, but weight training might not actually be a good fit to most people. I love having to psych myself to lift big amounts of steel, I’m ok with bit of pain etc. - mostly people are not. There’s thousands of sports and ways to move out there. You don’t like running, well don’t. Go dancing, hiking, play a team sport, do tai-chi, yoga, goddammit change a hobby every two months, it doesn’t matter. Just do it and do it consistently every week.
And what best helps you in that is enjoying what you do, as well as doing it with a friend.