We know that walking is good, especially at a brisk pace, but how many practice this useful advice? Laziness often wins, but sometimes it takes little to reverse this trend. It is enough to begin to walk to make this gesture a healthy habit that we cannot do without.
Benefits of walking
Whoever begins to walk, even if only "just to try", then finds so much benefit that it is difficult to give up.
This is because we soon realize that the movement makes us feel better : we feel satisfied, we spend quality time in the open, lighten our mind and therefore stress, we know new people - when we walk in groups - we take the time to listen to ourselves and to reflect on ourselves, we do an excellent job of preventing diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, osteoporosis, overweight ...
Our whole body thanks us for the good will and above all because we have chosen a type of physical activity that does not create trauma to the joints and does not put our heart under stress, rather, it helps it to work better.
Is it better to walk or run?
Very often we ask ourselves: does it make it better to run or walk? Certainly, walking involves less effort, less stress on the joints and hardly leads to anaerobic training.
But we want to bring you some scientific data emerged from a study, which lasted 6 years, and conducted by dr. Paul Williams at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, in the early 1990s, involving around 47, 000 people:
- The risk linked to high blood pressure is reduced by 4.2% while running, and 7.2% when walking.
- Cholesterol is reduced by 4.3% while running, and by 7% when walking.
- Diabetes has a 12% decreased risk, both running and walking. In terms of weight loss, the run beats the walk, in fact 40 minutes of running, they are worth 1 hour and 20 minutes of walking.
It is also true, however, that walking 1 hour and 20 is feasible for many, running for 40 minutes requires a good workout and often forces us to anaerobic work: in lack of oxygen, this leads to burning sugar instead of fat. Instead, when we work in aerobic metabolism, we burn fat reserves.
Wellness Walking
The walk is a real cure for the people who walk. In the parks once you saw only runners but now you can also see walkers, solitary or in organized groups.
Wellness Walking, for example, is a new discipline born in Turin at the behest of two naturopaths, which focuses on walking.
Wellness Walking has a not inconsiderable added value: it has been designed to accompany people on a path that helps them take their lives in hand and make informed choices in terms of nutrition, lifestyle and mental attitude .
The three pillars on which Wellness Walking is based are in fact physical activity, healthy nutrition and an adequate mental attitude . The walk thus becomes a moment of sharing on these issues, to reach an ever wider awareness of what WE are really the architects of our state of well-being and our future.
We are the result of our thoughts, our beliefs, our choices and our actions. First we realize it and the sooner we can make our life what we want and give our body what it deserves.
These three aspects are equally necessary and imperative: it would be of little use to eat in an unexceptionable way and then be chronically sedentary, perpetually angry or dissatisfied with the life one leads. Our body also feeds on emotions and moods, we need to feel fulfilled and in tune with our desires. On the other hand, if we were people made and eaten junk food every day, our body would give us, over time, some signs of abating.
So a healthy lifestyle and the right mental attitude certainly put us on the side of reason, everything else is fate, inheritance and who knows what other elements are still not entirely clear. In Wellness Walking, walking becomes a metaphor for life and helps us to understand, if we want to listen to them, some of the mechanisms that move us.
We can discover the sides of our character that hold us back, we can bring out our talents, enhance our strengths and start creating a culture in the nutritional field. The balance between these three aspects is central and has been well proposed in this very original discipline, which will be heard more and more talked about, because Wellness Walking is not only a sporting activity, but a real awareness tool available to those who want to take their state of well-being and realization into their own hands.
The target
The goal of the founders is now to create Wellness Walking Certified Instructors throughout Italy, to talk more about prevention and well-being and to create job opportunities for holistic operators, a prerequisite required to access the course.
