Vitality News Health Articles

Remaining trim and healthful is important for many people — which is why setting up an exercise plan is so crucial. But you may be surprised to find out that not just any kind of exercise is sufficient - in fact, scientific studies regularly show that there are two basic kinds of exercise that are successful.

Due to the fact that so many people have trouble dealing with the motivation to exercise, selecting the most efficient kinds of exercise is critical, since the less time you spend exercising - and the less time you waste on exercise that is not efficient - the more likely it is that you will be persistent with exercising and therefore to reach your personal weight and strength target.

The initial kind of exercise which has been regularly shown to assist people to lose some weight and get healthful is progressive resistance. In sum, progressive resistance is one kind of strength training. How it works is that it is progressively increasing the amount of weight that you lift, the number of sets, and number of reps performed. Therefore, muscle fibers cannot be put under strain or subjected to damage - instead, they slowly and steadily strengthen without any setbacks.

Our second kind of exercise that is thoroughly studied is cardiovascular training. This is any kind of exercise that increases the heart rate to 60 - 85 percent of its highest rate. Some examples of cardio training might involve jogging, jumping rope, aerobic exercise, or treadmill, as well as other types, but the choice is up to you.

Even though progressive resistance and cardio training alone have been discovered to be highly efficient kinds of exercise, it turns out that combining them is the best bet for achieving success. If you combine both progressive resistance and cardio training, you will improve the strength of your muscles and increase whole-body endurance. In a recent scientific study, exercisers who participated in both cardio and progressive resistance during a two month time period lost 45 percent more pounds than those doing cardio or progressive resistance alone.

Just as important as the kind of exercise you perform is, the way in which you exercise is also important. It no doubt will come as no surprise that being consistent is what you should seek. Exercising inconsistently may strain your muscles and will likely not assist you to build strength and endurance. Nor will it improve your whole-body health. According to many researchers, the best plan is to exercise for 40 minutes to an hour three to five times every week.

Unfortunately, for a significantly sized percent of the population, getting sufficient exercise is not just as easy as going to the gym 3-5 times each week or listening to what scientists claim. For these people, the motivation to exercise is the primary issue - this group of people simply doesn’t have the motivation to go to the gym. In fact, they might resist all exercise, which can lead to problematic anxiety.

Nobody knows what segment of the American population has to deal with problems with the motivation to exercise, but researchers say that up to 20 to 40 percent of people claim that they “hate” or “dread” exercise. An even larger group of people might have milder problems with exercise motivation, feeling that although it is simple enough to commit to an exercise plan for a week or two, motivation eventually degrades, leaving them back where they started - unhealthy and heavy.

If you are one of these people who struggles to deal with exercise motivation, the good news is that there are some simple ways to deal with the struggle. In a recent research study, participants who wanted to start an exercise program were given a brief learning program that helped them choose the right kinds of exercise, were provided with a therapist who specialized in exercise motivation, and received a brief hypnosis course. After 6 months, they were re-evaluated. It turns out that over 85 percent of the participants had stuck to an exercise program throughout the entire 6 months. Even better, they generally lost an average of 15 more pounds than the control group.

If you are interested in the findings of this study, it may make sense to investigate the possibility of finding a motivational therapist, habit control therapist, or therapist who focuses on hypnotherapy. These kinds of therapists are given special training in assisting people to transcend anxieties, increase the motivation to exercise, and reinforce the development of good habits. One more choice for exercise motivation is something called self-hypnosis - which is a simple and inexpensive process that often helps people take control of their own innate abilities to be motivated.

Hypnotherapy and self-hypnosis are safe ways of increasing motivation that are proven to provide success in the case of the motivation to exercise. Hypnotherapy works by using hypnotic relaxation to elicit the powers of the unconscious to influence behavior modification and the formation of habits. Hypnotherapy is an excellent choice for the adverse to exercise due to the fact that it can help the development of the motivation to get healthful and lose the weight simply and effectively.

Alan B. Densky, CH specializes in all aspects of hypnotherapy weight loss, including motivation theory CDs since 1978. Visit his Neuro-VISION self-hypnosis website to benefit from Free hypnosis newsletters, videos, and articles.

- Alan B. Densky, CH