How physical activty perpetuates into our mental health

The speaker discusses the importance of physical activity for mental health. They mention various ways to incorporate physical activity into daily routines and emphasize the significance of consistency. The speaker shares personal experiences and provides guidance on finding time for exercise. They also highlight the connection between physical and mental health, citing research that shows the positive impact of exercise on reducing stress and improving mental clarity. An interview with the speaker's mom further supports the benefits of working out. The speaker advises choosing enjoyable activities and setting realistic goals when starting a fitness journey. They conclude by emphasizing the overall positive effects of physical activity on both the mind and body. Soundstripe Soundstripe Hello, welcome. I'm Louisa Guernsey, and I'm excited to be here to talk about physical activity and more importantly how it perpetuates into our mental health. I'm going to be talking about real world experiences, my own personal experiences. I'm going to be interviewing a special guest. Um, I also want to involve some of their sources that can back me up and also give you guys some more insight on these topics. So I want to start off by saying that this audience is really for anyone but to narrow it down it is for people I guess interested with bettering their minds and their bodies. And how those two can intertwine and really come together to help create a healthy lifestyle and bring you peace within your mind and your body. So, to jump right into it. There's many many different perspectives and ways of getting physical activity in. You know, there's playing sports, whether that's going to the gym and playing basketball or going outside and playing soccer for a while or going on a walk for 30 minutes, or going to the gym, and, you know, doing weight training or whatever it might be there's many many different ways and perspectives of working out. And all of them are very valid. There's no, you know, specific workout that's not gonna give you this effect of, you know, bettering your mental health, but there are kind of certain time limits and consistency. And that's a really big thing. You know, how many days a week are you working out. How many, you know, minutes or hours are you putting into it. You know, are you working out once a week, twice a week. How, what's the, you know, consistency you're at. How long are you doing these workouts, are you doing 10 minutes are you doing 20 minutes, are you doing two hours, you know, and I'm not going to sit here and tell you like, this is what you need to do and this is how you do it. But I want to give guidance. And I want to give, you know, a perspective that kind of, not easy but manageable that you can take this time out of your day, you know, four days a week or every day to just focus on working out and your body and your mind, because everyone deserves to have that time to just focus on yourself, and not the things around you or, you know, what you're planning on doing or what you have previously done because it's easy to get lost in our train of thought. So everyone deserves a time during the day to just work on themselves. So what works for me, personally, I like to get up early, so that, you know, I just get it done right away. And, of course, not everyone can do this. Not everyone can get up early and go to the gym and do their workout and come back, but that's how I like to do it. But if you're someone that doesn't really have a lot of time in the day, or, you know, maybe has other things they're doing throughout the day, spacing out 30 minutes of your time to just go on a walk, you know, do like a circuit. Go outside and, you know, play whatever sport or go do like yard work for 30 minutes or something. Like getting outside is like so important and it really can just better our day. Honestly, like staying inside all day can be really depressing, if we're being honest, like, and you might not realize it, but when you start getting outside and breathing in the fresh air, it can be very, very peaceful. And I think everyone deserves to have those moments of just peacefulness and, yeah. So I want to go back to consistency. When I started being consistent with working out and getting up early and pushing myself to do it, I started noticing how much better I would feel later on in the day, how much more positive my mindset was and I wasn't, you know, worrying about the things that I usually worry about. Like, of course, everyone worries and that's normal, but it was very minimal and I felt so much clearer in my head. I don't know the science behind that, but genuinely, I just felt so much more clear. I also want to say this, I do, I did change my diet to just make it more healthier. I'm not restricting or anything like that, but I did change it to where I have more protein and more vegetables, more fruit. So I'm not going to spend a lot of time on that, but that's something to definitely keep in mind. So why does this matter? Why is this important? Like I just said, when I started consistently working out, you know, four days a week and putting my all into it, I genuinely, genuinely just felt so much better in my brain. I felt like I was learning better. I felt like I wasn't, you know, being my anxious self. Of course, we all have our moments, but I just felt like a better person. And I know there are so many people out there that could totally benefit from this, you know, working out, just 30 minutes, taking 30 minutes out of your day to go on a walk or lift some weight and doing that every day or four days a week. Consistently, you're going to feel better. You're going to feel like a better person and you're going to be healthier. Literally, like inside, you're going to be a healthier person, which is just so beneficial by all means. So I want to give this source from New Jersey Agriculture Experiment Station. This study says physical health problems significantly increase our risk of developing mental health problems. According to the Mental Health Foundation, nearly one in three people with long term physical health conditions also have a mental health problem. Yeah, our minds and our bodies are clearly not separate. They work together. They're going through the same system kind of. So, you know, it's no surprise that mental health issues are going to affect your body, vice versa. When I said I didn't know the science behind how working out can reduce your stress, I actually do. This is an article out of Harvard Health. It says the mental benefits of aerobic exercise have a neurochemical basis. Exercise reduces levels of the body's stress hormones, such as adrenaline and cortisol. It also stimulates the production of endorphins, chemicals in the brain that are the body's natural painkillers and mood elevators. Endorphins are responsible for the quote unquote runner's high and for the feelings of relaxation and optimism that accompany many hard workouts. So there you go. There's, you know, your basic proof that working out is a perfect medicine for reducing, you know, our stress, our depression, our anxiety. Everything that's constantly kind of going through human brains is the perfect way to relieve all those worries, all those anxieties. And obviously it's not, you know, a cure, but it's a free way of literally bettering not only your brain and your mind, but your body. Okay, so I'm here with my mom, Adrienne, and I'm going to ask her a couple questions. So how does working out improve your mental clarity? Hi, Louisa. Thanks for having me on your podcast. I would say working out improved my mental clarity by first making time for just myself instead of putting you or your brother or your dad or even Bubbles first. It felt good to do something for myself. And then also being able to push myself through the beginning really improved my thinking and my memory. I feel like my memory has gotten stronger. I've noticed that my heart is feeling stronger, which definitely helps my head feel stronger, more oxygen to the brain. All right. So my second question is, do you feel stronger in your mind? Yes, I definitely feel stronger in my mind. I'd say that working out has improved my thinking or the way that I think, patterns of behavior. I've been able to notice our patterns of thinking rather. I'm able to problem solve a lot better. Instead of being impulsive and acting on my emotions, I'm able to stop and think before I act. Right. So my last question is, what would you say to people that want to start a physical activity journey? So I would tell people who wanted to start a physical activity journey to choose something that you're going to enjoy, like walking or jogging or running. Maybe try a spin class or yoga, Pilates. There's so many different formats for working out. You're just going to find what works best for you, what you will enjoy. And then also to set realistic goals and follow through with them. Because really, if you set a bunch of lofty goals, I'm going to work out six days a week for an hour each time. Be realistic because you're only cheating yourself out of being your very best self. All right. Thank you guys for listening. I hope you got some sort of, you know, insight or more information about more specifically how physical activity is just really good for our bodies and our minds. And it keeps us fresh and nice. So thank you. Soundstripe.