Exercise Is Greater Than Weight: TED x SHOW Essay Example

Introduction

In her talk on TED show, Leanne Spencer argues that struggling for a perfect, skinny appearance is not the answer to physically fit body. In fact, according to her, the average woman in Britain spends17 years dieting and that girls as young as 13 years old school girls skip meals to avoid gaining weight. However, all these are not the solution. Spencer argues that people should focus on what they should achieve with their bodies rather what they look like. People should not focus on fatness rather on fitness; fat people can still be fit and this too is healthy. She urges that for healthy and physically fit skin, people should be determined on functional fitness and incorporating exercise in their daily lives. Spencer also advises on the strategic exercise plans that would effectively get rid of the fats and bring about fitness. She says that people should refute the notion that they need long hours to exercise, or they need expensive gym facilities to make an efficient exercise. Generally, exercise can be enjoyable but is bound to take people out of their comfort zone. Spencer also advises that making our body perfect should not be the case, we should make our bodies more active; the perfect body does not exist, active, fit and healthy body does.

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Exercise for a healthy and fit body

We have heard it from health professionals that exercise if good for a healthy body. Many people might have a tight schedule and find no time for exercise. This has to change. According to loads of professional research, regular exercise is vital for health and fit body and even the good appearance. Exercise can limit the chances of developing several health conditions while improving the overall quality of like. A strategic exercise is significant for controlling weight, reducing the risk of developing heart disorders, managing the levels of blood sugar and insulin levels, improving mental health and mood, strengthening bones and muscles, reducing the risk of some cancer, reducing the risk of falling for adults, improving sleeps and also improving sexual health. According to Leanne Spencer in the TED show, exercise can help an individual to quit alcoholism like it helped her. Researchers have also revealed that regular and strategic exercise can help in quitting smoking.

Spencer in her talk, also confirms that apart from the healthy body, exercise is also very important for keeping the body fit as well as giving it a perfect body appearance. She says that physical fitness is good as it improves our immune system and we when we are fit, we will find it easy to participate in sports, taking stairs, and socialize with others in a healthy manner. Generally, for a healthy, fit and good looking body, we should engage in a regular exercise. However, the type of exercise that people do engage in still matters. Remember, vigorous exercise could turn unhealthy to some people. Therefore, it is only a well-modeled exercise that will bear fruits. Therefore, we need to understand exactly the appropriate and inappropriate exercise strategies to employ in an effective exercise paradigm.

Integration of Course Material

According to Spencer in her talk, exercise can sometimes be enjoyable however, it is bound to get people out of their comfort zone. The implication here is that despite the fact that many people already know the significance of exercise in regards to a healthy life, a good number of people are still hesitant to schedule for regular exercise. Many people who don't adhere to exercise have a number of excuses. The three common excuses are lack of time, lack of energy as well as lack of motivation. Since the wish of many people is have a healthy and fit body through exercise, there are still more challenges that incorporate the excuses we have mentioned here. So to increase exercise adherence, we will consider several theories of exercise behavior. Through the various theories, we will be able to determine the information about the people`s exercise behavior and considerations to increase their exercise adherence.

The theories can determine whether an individual will change his/her take on exercise and would start doing regular exercise. Again, the theories can determine whether an individual is likely to change their behavior and drop exercise. Now, while considering these theories, we should bear at the back of our minds the factors that influence exercise behavior according to the theories. We should also be in a position to use the theories to predict if a person will change his/her behavior toward exercise. We should also understand the theories so that we can use them to increase exercise adherence. Health belief model (HBM) theory, for instance, is a psychological paradigm that attempts to explain and predict health behaviors. It can be used to define an individual`s behavior by considering his/her attitudes and beliefs. Health behavior can be defined as any activity that is done by an individual who has a belief he/she is healthy for a purpose of preventing or detecting disease in an asymptomatic stage.

The model was first established by 1950s by social psychologists Hochbaum, Rosenstock, and Kegels who were workers the U.S. Public Health Services. Initially, it was focused to respond to the failure of a free tuberculosis health screening program. But since then, the model has applied to define long and short term health behaviors including healthy exercise behavior. HBM focus on one's perception of susceptibility, severity, benefits, barriers, cues to action and self-efficacy. The six constructs were proposed as enhancing an individual's readiness to act upon a given aspect of health behavior.

Generally, all exercise adherence theories have three common concepts and these are value, confidence and social support. To increase an individual's adherence to exercise, they must first believe that something positive will come out of it and this is what we refer to as value. Again, many people will embrace change if they think that they have the ability to be successful. Lastly, it is very easy to quit alcoholism is every other friend has taken the same course. So, to get out of the comfort zone as Spencer explains in the talk show, value, confidence and social support is key.

Appropriate and Inappropriate Strategies

Due to some wrong approaches that some people take towards exercise, they have not been able to achieve their goals; have health, fit and good-looking body. In the show, Spencer highlights a statistic that average woman in Britain spends 17 years dieting and that 25% of 13-year-old girls skip meals to avoid gaining weight. According to her, such strategies could just be better for nothing. She urges that instead of bestowing efforts on how our bodies look like, we should rather focus on what we can achieve with our bodies. Spencer also argues that neither prolonged exercise nor expensive gym facilities are important for efficient exercise. I personally find sense in the argument.

Prolonged exercise or strenuous exercise could turn unhealthy to many individuals. Expensive gym facilities could even be costly and these would affect many people`s adherence to exercise. An effective exercise could be a simple as taking stairs or a walk after job. A regular and simple exercise could mean better to our health and this is why many people go wrong. Running around a football field 24 times could just be the same as walking around the same field twice on a regular basis! The two approaches are capable of helping us burn calories and make us stay healthy and fit.

Another mistake that people do is to focus on making our bodies appear 'perfect' rather than making our bodies active. Spencer advises that people should stop focusing on fatness and rather take fitness seriously. Actually, too many fats are bad for our health since it can result in heart disorders, metabolic conditions, and generally poor health. According to Spencer, the methods used to measure fats have disputes. She adds that the popular method used to measure fats known as BMI is not that accurate as many people do think. According to her, the ability to make more fats could be influenced by age, gender or race and that one can be slightly obese and still fit. So, we should shift our focus from fatness to fitness. The perception of having perfect body appearance should be overridden by the determinative of having an active body. This would enhance exercise adherence for a healthy and fit body.

The implication of Exercise for Nursing Practice

As nurse , I would consider exercise very vital for a healthy and fit body. Studies have unearthed regular exercise can limit the risk of certain health disorders such as cancers of breast, colon, endometrial. Additionally, regular physical activity helps people to acquire a healthy body weight by controlling the caloric intake with energy use. Professionals have also argued that physical activity can reduce the risk of developing or losing life from chronic illness such as heart disease, hypertension, type-2 diabetes, and osteoporosis. Now, in the field of nursing, the same way I would consider prescribing other form forms of treatments is the same ways I would consider prescribing exercise and physical activity. This would come in to enhance the six constructs of the health HBM. I also believe that nurses have the responsibility to be role models to demonstrate the significance of exercise. I also believe that nurses need to first exercise and understand all the concepts of exercise. That way, they are in a better position to help patient get find value, confidence and social support in exercise.

Conclusion

Generally, everybody has heard that exercise is good for our health. However, that knowledge alone is not enough. The matter is not about doing exercise or physical activity, it about making strategic plans about an effective exercise. Again, exercise is not about age, race or gender, it is about all of us. Many people who had bat knowledge about had retrieved from further engagement in exercise. All of us must understand that being skinny doesn't mean a healthy or fit body. Again, being fatty doesn't mean that one is not healthy or fit. We should drop the determination of perfect body look and focus on making our body more active. According to Spencer in the talk show, many people have even resolved to steroids and other options to make themselves look perfect, however, perfect doesn't exist but health and happiness exist. Other dogmatic strategies like prolonged exercise or expensive gym facilities for exercise doesn't exist; just 15 minutes of a walk that is done on a regular basis is very important.