Friday Exercise

Fitness Personality No. 5: Gentle Activity Easy does it for you. by Tiffany Owens for MSN Health & Fitness The inner key to your fitness personality is the need to increase resilience, flexibility, stability and self-confidence. You avoid the gym at all costs and prefer low-impact fitness, like walking or yoga, over more rigorous or "jarring" exercise, like jogging or weight-lifting. When exercising, you want to participate in activities that feel good to your body, without the stress of competitiveness or an audience. Additionally, you may be hindered by injuries or other health concerns that make it difficult to receive generalized group instruction. Your personality is most likely to have tried fitness fads and gadgets with little success; you tend to achieve better results on your own terms with exercises that feel natural to perform. Another key to helping you stay motivated and stick with an exercise program is to combine other fun activities with fitness, such as kayaking or nature hikes, which seem more like an outing and less like a workout. You should regularly mix in a few other strength-training and stretching workouts--with a dash of cardiovascular exercise--to enable your body to become stronger and leaner. Flexibility activities such as yoga will also lengthen your stride, further your reach and increase your resilience while speeding up recovery from an injury. Not sure where to begin? Check out your local library's wide range of fitness videos and DVDs to discover the ultimate workout that will keep you moving--and motivated. Other activities to try: Archery Biking Canoeing/Kayaking Conditioning Fishing Fusion Fitness Gardening Golfing Horseback Riding Medicine Ball Exercises Meditation Nature Walks Qigong Resistance Bands Strength Training Stretching Swimming Tae-Bo Tai-Chi Walking Water Aerobics Workouts on DVD/Video So what have you done today? 415/163/147 16 lbs to Personal Goal 17 lbs below Doctors Goal In the words of Bill Phillips': "Exercise is the spark. Nutrition is the fuel. Without both, there can be no flame -- no results."