Exercise for Optimal Health: Proven Benefits of Physical Activity - Essay Sample

Introduction

The current consensus is that there are clear linkages between physical exercise and activity with a person's well-being. A minimum of 30 minutes of physical activity around the home, 15 minutes of running, or 45 minutes of playing a ball sport (e.g. volleyball or basketball or flag football) during the course of promotes good health as well as the quality of life. Furthermore, physical activity increases life expectancy by reducing the likelihood of hypertension, coronary heart disease, diabetes, and colon cancer. Apart from these benefits to physical health, exercise boosts a person's mental health. The challenge that in contemporary society is that close to 60 % of American adults do not engage in physical activity. Alarmingly, more than 50% of people in the 12-21 age bracket do not do physical activities on a regular basis.

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Existing studies show that when strategies and programs are put in place to promote the engagement of youths in physical activities to promote their quality of life, these initiatives have been found to be successful. If I were to make a contribution to the Surgeon General's report on physical exercise and well-being, I would emphasize the role that the public school system can be an important partner in making Americans have a culture of physical exercise. Consequently, I would recommend that national and state governments set aside finances to ensure all public elementary, middle and high-schools have physical education classes. Also, there should be a mandatory requirement that every public school participates in inter-school sports that will be furnished by state and federal grants to build sports infrastructure such as (e.g. basketball gymnasiums, football fields, soccer fields, swimming pools .e.t.c.).

After people leave sedimentary lifestyles behind and join a gym, the challenge for gyms is to ensure that they do not quit. On average, 50% of new gym members drop out within the first 6 months. The root cause of this has been attributed to both physical and mental factors. Often, exercise plans exclusively focus on fitness data and they erroneously ignore the need to ensure a new gym member is self-motivated to exercise. Moreover, exercise programs that use the principles of intensity, duration, and frequency to meet fitness goals are excessively demanding on new gym users.

The basic assumption in the trans-theoretical model of exercise is that gym members will experience stages of change in a cyclic manner because establishing and maintaining a healthy lifestyle is hard. Consequently, a fitness instructor must tailor a member's gym experience to match the cyclic they find themselves in. As a director of fitness in an establishment that has a problem of high dropout rates, I would tailor strategies that seek to retain members in the action, maintenance, and termination stages.

People in the action stage are beginners who have recently left a sedimentary life. There is a danger of relapse. They need to be motivated to keep dieting and exercising rather than specific fitness goals. During the maintenance stage, members have been continuously exercising for over 6 months. These members need to have increased self-efficiency in their programs so that they do not quit. They need programs that make them motivate themselves to work out. In the termination stage, a member has been working out for 5 years or more. They are truly active and what they need is flexible programs that fit into their daily lives.