If you're one of the 25% to 30% of U.S. adults who are sedentary — not getting even the minimum recommended 30 minutes of daily movement — you're setting yourself up for a roster of chronic conditions, starting with heart disease and heading to dementia, cancer, and joint woes.
If you’d like to change your ways and improve your heart health, a meta-review of exercise-related studies published in the journal Advances in Integrative Medicine offers interesting guidance.
The researchers from India compared data on yoga, tai chi, Pilates, and interval training and found that tai chi, Pilates, and interval training are effective ways to keep your arteries flexible and open.
Less effective? Yoga.
What Pilates, tai chi, and interval training have in common is that they combine slow and steady movement with bursts of extra effort that are both aerobic and muscle-building (suitable to your strength and age). That allows the heart to strengthen without overdoing it.
Multiple studies have shown that those three forms of activity increase both dilation and flexibility of blood vessels.
Unfortunately, it can be tough to get started. Here’s how:
• First, start walking. Count your steps and never do less today than you did yesterday — until you get to more than 8,000 daily. Then, aim for 10,000 a day.
• I recommend you find an exercise buddy or a group, class, or instructor; make a schedule and commit to the plan.
• Next, experiment with different activities, both aerobic and strength-building, until you find the ones you love.
And check out my book, "The RealAge Workout: Maximum Health, Minimum Work."