Now, there are people who cannot exercise, or must exercise carefully, for very valid reasons (e.g. health reasons such as arthritis or heart complaints, or the parents of young children). For those who can exercise, the time required to exercise properly becomes a problem.
The standard advice we've been hearing for many years is that three 20 minutes periods of aerobic activity will get people fit. I've been fit (for competitive dinghy and small boat sailing), and consider that utter nonsense. For a start, it makes no allowance for proper warm up and cool down (I refuse to use the fashionable term of "warm down", out of cantankerousness, nor the term "resistance training" for weight training, as it is so stupid and inappropriate [such a term should be used for isometric exercises!!!] as to be work of a cretin), and that becomes more and more essential as one ages. My experience, as a 50+ age person, based on the training I did for competing in the sailing in the Sydney 2002 Gay Games as a 40+ age person, is that training properly and effectively requires between one and two hours, including the preliminaries and afters, at least 4 or 5 times a week. In fact, I have long considered that a good part of what gets written off as the inevitable effects of ageing, is actually simple lack of exercise/physical activity.
As an example, I do a lot of joint circling (I was started on that by a Chinese doctor - a GP - I saw when I injured my back as a 20 year old, and developed that further when I started working with Tai Chi), and I find it is very good at combating stiffness - as is stretching, even just simple things like the now more fashionable idea of officeworkers getting up and stretching, which I have been doing for years.
And now is where the issue of time starts to become a problem.
If I do:
- 2 hours of physical exercise
(the best guide to exercise for most people that I have come across is the 10,000 steps per day notion: I normally do around 2,000 steps in the course of daily living, so 8,000 steps at 1 step per second is just over two hours [1 step = two paces, i.e. right foot, then left foot, that's one, you don't count for paces with both feet], or, at 1 step [4 paces] per second, which is close to running, that's 4,000 seconds, which is still a touch over an hour, which has 3,600 seconds; parents of young children probably do in excess of 20,000 steps per day - often at a frantic pace ... ); - 1 hour of psychic exercise
(colour visualisation, practice techniques such as flaming, do breathing exercises - which take at least 30 minutes on their own, and meditation); - work 8 hours, plus lunch and a minimum of 1 hour commuting each way; and
- sleep for 8 hours;
Given that, I think it is no wonder that people seek to minimise the time they spend exercising to three 20 minutes sessions each week ... and art of the myth of ageing continues, because it is easier. Mind you, some of it is not - I take longer to recover, and am slower, etc, but I still consider exercise - particularly exercise aimed at keeping muscle bulk - will help offset those effects.
I like Jim Butcher's inclusion of this aspect in the Dresden Files [1] , which is set in a version of reality where wizards can live for several hundred years, but I've also observed family members as they've aged, particularly my father. The effects of inactivity and being looked after is one reason I fight tooth and nail NOT to be looked after by others :)
PS - this issue of time constraints is why I personally consider homes should be set up so that housework can be done with minimum time / effort / cost - for instance, I personally prefer sofas that are raised, so they can be swept or vacuumed underneath without having to make a big production of things by moving them whenever you clean the floor. Of course, the vision of such sofas causes me no grief whatsoever: it does to some others, I know, but maybe they need - ESPECIALLY if they are trying to do serious spiritual / psychic work - to learn to accept such minor constraints (and they are minor, in many cases) so they will have more time and energy for such work. I also believe in minimal effort cooking, but that is not a minor matter - many people see good nutrition and other meal aspects as being important, and also being part of their spirituality. That's quite alright for them, but it does not hold the same importance for me. That leads me to two of my biggest gripes: assuming others will have the same tastes and preferences as oneself, and lack of respect for other people's possessions, especially their books and tools.
I can remember one young person from around ten or so years ago breaking the back of one my paperbacks, and then arguing with me about the fact that the cretin had damaged my property (I physically took the book back, and refused to allow him access to any of my books thereafter). I've had a lot of my possessions damaged or destroyed by others in this life, and, as a result, am no longer anywhere near as generous as I used to be - I simply cannot afford, for financial reasons, to be as generous as I used to be. Then there is the issue of idiots thinking they can touch other people's working tools (crystals, wands, robes, etc). In one temple I was in a few years ago, this was so bad that we actually had to issue a formal warning against handling other people's working tools - and this was a Temple, a place Where people were learning about energy, and should either know better - never mind having at least enough basic MANNERS not to do so!
I found out recently that, when I was a herbwoman in Portugal in the 1500s, I wound up being killed when one young woman who had been sent to look after and help me, tried to grab some energetically sensitive bags and, in trying to save them from being ruined by her touch, I fell (over a moderate cliff face) and was fatally injured. So the topic is one of particular sensitivity to me personally, but it applies to everyone. As the old guide says, if it isn't yours, don't touch it. (And as I would add to that, people have the right to do with their stuff as they wish: hence if you borrow something, you (a) are quite possibly unwise at best, and (b) maintain it as they tell you, even if they treat it differently - it is THEIRS, NOT yours, and you have no right to even have an opinion about that, in my view.)
Actually, it is the being ignored when I speak up that is most aggravating in such situations. For many decades I refused to make a song and dance about strong views, and the people I was speaking to at such times were unfortunately too stupid to notice that what I was saying was important - such as the idiot who ruined my book. (There is another idiot who comes to mind as I write this, and that is someone who used a boat of mine without my permission: I warned him that I would have him charged if he ever touched my boat again, and the club committee backed me up on this, but he was so untrustworthy that I literally had to chain my boat to the rack, and I have never ever stored a small boat in a sailing club since then: if I can't trail it behind or on my car, I won't have it.)
[1] Please see my post "The Death of Wikipedia" for the reasons I now recommend caution when using Wikipedia.
[2] BPF = Balanced Positive (spiritual) Forces. See here and here for more on this.
Love, light, hugs and blessings
(pronounced "new-MYTH-ear")
My "blogiography" is here. I started this blog to cover karmic regression-rescue (see here and here), and it grew ...
May the world of commerce and business be recognised to be a servant, not a master, of the lives of people.
A home is for living in, not feeling, becoming or being rich or a “better” class than others.
The International Labour Organisation's definition of "full employment" is wrong, useless and misleading.
Armageddon is alive and well and happening right now: it is a battle between the indolence of "I only ..." and/or "I just ..." on one side, and perspicacity on the other.
Like fire to the physical, emotions to the soul make a good servant, and a bad master.
The only prejudice should be against prejudice.
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good [people] to do nothing. EDMUND BURKE
Your children are not your children. ... They come through you but ... they belong not to you ... for their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow KAHLIL GIBRAN
We didn't inherit the Earth from our ancestors, we only borrowed it from our children ANTOINE DE SAINT-EXUPÉRY
Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.
Those whom we cannot stand are usually those who we cannot understand P.K.SHAW
Tags: about me, ageing, attitudes, exercises, health, society,
First published: Frysdagr, 28th September, 2012
Last edited: Wednesday, 23rd Jabuary, 2013
