“I don’t have the time,” “I’m in too much pain,” and “It’s not working.” These are the three most common excuses people use to avoid exercise. None of these excuses is good enough, not if you understand how important exercise is to improving your health and avoiding chronic disease and other conditions attributable to a sedentary lifestyle. Here are a few easy ways to stick with an exercise team for the long term:

• Break up your workout.
  You don’t need to exercise in a single block of time to see results. Simply take the stairs at work, park farther away from wherever you happen to be going (work, school, the grocery store, etc.), or walk over to a colleague’s desk rather than phoning them, etc. Did you know you can potentially burn just as many calories throughout the day doing this as you would from huffing and puffing at the gym for hours?
• Start small.
  Most people tend to overdo it when they first start an exercise program. We get so motivated that we start going to the gym every day. We try to do more than we can. Guess what happens? We get so sore or so burned out that we actually start hating it. Start off slow and pace yourself. This will always keep you going over the long haul.
• Try new activities.
  The best way to prevent exercise boredom is to always seek new activities you can do during the year. Some activities that can give you a great workout just as well as conventional exercise include salsa or ballroom dancing, golf, swimming, or even an activity such as sightseeing around town.
• Write down your goals.
  Did you know one of the best predictors of success is writing things down? It’s as simple as spending a minute at the start of each day writing down what you are going to do that day. This type of activity provides reinforcement that you have goals to achieve. Always follow the SMART rules of goal setting. This means each goal should be Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Timely.

No matter what your fitness level, time availability or motivation, taking simple steps to staying active is within your reach. Not only will you be able to do more, but you’ll also have better overall health and a better ability to combat the stresses of everyday life. All it requires is a bit of your time in outlining your goals and what you will do to achieve them. Once you do, write down what you’re going to do every day – and then do it! Only by committing to exercise on a consistent basis can you hope to follow through on a consistent basis.

TAKE MORE WALKS.
If you haven’t taken a walk for awhile, go for a 15-minute stroll during a work break or after dinner; we bet you’ll immediately feel more refreshed and less stressed about the world. The simple act of walking – away from the relative confines of your office or home – allows you to enjoy nature and exercise all at once.

WATCH LESS TV.
We’re not suggesting you eliminate TV altogether, particularly if it’s news- or education-based, but a few less hours a week of reality TV and late-night B movies wouldn’t hurt. Substantial evidence links TV viewing to negative health outcomes, not the least of which is obesity. So turn off the boob tube now and then.

TRY NEW FOODS.
Most adults are fairly locked in to their food preferences, which can be dangerous on several levels: If your preferences aren’t healthy ones, you’re in trouble; and if you don’t mix things up occasionally, you risk getting bored. The solution? Try at least one new food a week, preferably the healthy variety.

MAKE TIME TO PLAY.
Games, that is; games with your kids, your significant other or yourself that keep your mind sharp and take you away from the hustle and bustle of the daily grind. Whether it’s a board game, a crossword puzzle or even a sport that keeps you on your toes (literally and figuratively), make more time to play.

SPOIL YOURSELF.
Your last New Year’s resolution is perhaps the most important one, because you can’t be healthy, at least not over the long haul, if you don’t spoil yourself occasionally. Schedule a vacation, plan a date night, or just commit to taking an hour or so at least once a week and relaxing all by yourself. You’re worth it.

PAIN

1. Posture:

Proper posture is difficult to attain, so don’t stress yourself out about it. When you are sitting, put a rolled-up towel or sweatshirt in the small of your back. Sit all the way back to the rear of the chair so you feel the support in your back. When you stand, stand against the wall or a post so you can maintain erect posture. It is important to strengthen your core muscles, the muscles along the spine. Yoga, Pilates or a specific workout program with weights will help you achieve this. You may want to find a personal trainer to help you focus on specific exercises to help you achieve your goals.

2. Balance:

As you develop strength, you begin to develop balance. Many of the positions utilized in yoga, Pilates and weight training work specifically on balance. Would you believe that your feet also have a lot to do with balance? The three arches you have in your feet must all be supported in order for the rest of your body to have good support as well. If one or more of the arches is flat, it can significantly affect the stress to your joints and your ability to exercise efficiently. Ask your chiropractor about analyzing your feet to see if you need arch supports.

3. Spinal Load and Stability:

Understanding how to exercise or perform any type of sporting activity is crucial to your health. How many people do you know who lift weights incorrectly? By being careful and doing your exercises properly, you can reduce the amount of spinal load (stress) and instability you create for your body. When your joints move well, you can perform activities optimally and with minimal stress on your body.

4. Alignment:

Exercising makes your muscles stronger, which also helps maintain structural and bony alignment. Chiropractic care is hopefully a regular part of your life. Visits to your chiropractor at a frequency you both find appropriate will help you maintain your alignment.

Keep in mind that pain may be indicative of a serious underlying condition. Always talk to your doctor about any pain you are experiencing, particularly if it does not go away or worsens with time.

Many chiropractors are specially trained to evaluate the structural integrity of the arches of the feet to see if they are a contributing factor to postural stress. Supporting the arches of the feet with a custom-made orthotic device (insert) that you wear in your shoes has been shown to block the abnormal foot motions that create a twisting stress in the knee, hip, pelvis and spine and that improves balance and posture. The messages sent from the feet to the brain are done so more efficiently when the arches are properly supported.

In addition to chiropractic adjustments and spinal pelvic stabilization with orthotic inserts, there are certain activities that promote balance and don’t require any special equipment:

–Begin by standing on one leg for 30 seconds and then shift to the other side. Practice this until you can consistently stand on each leg without losing your balance.

–Stand on one leg with your arms crossed for 30 seconds and then do the same while standing on the other leg. Crossing the arms adds complexity to the amount of information going to the brain from the sensors in the muscles and joints.

–Stand on one leg with your eyes closed for 30 seconds. (Be sure you are in an area where you can support yourself if needed. Stand next to a doorway or have a chair available to reach out to for support.) Repeat with the other side. Closing the eyes increases the difficulty of the exercise by removing one of the systems of balance.

–Stand on one leg, close your eyes and cross your arms for 30 seconds. Repeat with the other side.

Talk to your doctor about the importance of balance and proper posture, and how the two of you can work together to help maintain both for a lifetime.

Once you’ve chosen your menus, shop and prep in advance. That means doing everything from grilling chicken to chopping up vegetables to boiling rice or pasta. In some cases, you can completely finish the meal so it only requires reheating during your busy evenings. You can decide how much time you’ll have and which foods can be partially prepared and which can be completely prepared in advance and still last for as long as you need them.

Here are a few healthy meal suggestions that are easy to prepare in a pinch and provide your family with sound nutrition:

Turkey Taco Salad: Cook lean or extra-lean ground turkey thoroughly with seasoning. Crumble it and arrange in the center of a bed of lettuce (which can be pre-washed and bagged). Have the kids add warm or cool pinto, kidney, white or garbanzo beans. Garnish the plate with baked taco chips and salsa, which can be used as a dressing. Add a small amount of shredded cheese to top it all off.

Chicken Wrap: Slice and shred a pre-cooked chicken (you can pick it up at the store on a weekday evening or prep it on Sunday). Place in a large bowl and mix with the following ingredients: half cup red bell pepper (thinly sliced); 3 medium carrots and 1 cucumber, cut into matchsticks; 3 tablespoons of bottled vinaigrette; and shredded lettuce. Warm tortillas (they can be gluten-free) wraps or flatbread. To raise the veggie count for this meal, add a salad and a healthy salad dressing.

Specific: When putting your goals to paper, make sure they are straightforward and free of ambiguity. For example, instead of: “I want to lose weight,” try: “I will lose 10 pounds over the next 10 weeks.” Instead of: “I want to save more money,” try: “I will increase my savings by $2,500 over the next 12 months.”

Measurable: Reviewing your goals and documenting or measuring your progress daily will help you to make the choices that continually point you in the right direction. For example, documenting your workouts and the foods and drinks that pass through your lips, as well as using the same scale to weigh yourself, are ways to measure your progress toward your weight-loss goal.

Attainable: Is your goal realistically attainable? Using weight loss as the example again, if you are naturally stocky or big-boned, for example, setting a weight-loss goal that would be difficult for a supermodel to achieve isn’t realistic and probably not attainable. In fact, setting unrealistic goals likely will result in burnout and failure.

Reasonable: Part of your action plan for losing weight might include getting some form of exercise every day, drinking more water and using smaller plates. Are these lifestyle changes reasonable and sustainable? If so, you are on your way to permanently achieving your goal. If not, you’ll need to determine what steps are reasonable to you.

Timely: To successfully achieve your goals, you must set completion dates. Setting timelines for each task gives you clear targets and deadlines. Without completion dates, your goal will always be open ended and much more likely to remain unachieved. Set a realistic time frame for completion and move forward every day until your goal is reached.

Evaluate: Continually evaluating your progress will help reveal your weak points and identify the areas that need improving. This process also helps you evaluate if your time and efforts are being spent wisely.

Reorganize: Once you have determined what works and what doesn’t, make the necessary adjustments to your approach to maintain focus and stay on track. Continue to regroup and reorganize your efforts until you know you are on a stable path toward success. If something isn’t helping you achieve a particular goal, rethink the process and find a better way.

It is complimentary in that medical care is ideal for some things like trauma and brokend bones whereas chiropractic care is ideal for musculoskeletal problems. Often they can work together for the ideal care of patients. Chiropractic care, however, is sometimes an alternative to traditional medical care where both professions overlap and offer different approaches to solve the same problem. Such is the case with back pain where surgeons offer spinal fusion for instance while chiropractic offers an alternative of adjusting the spine which is safer and less invasive than surgery. Use of spinal fusion has grown exponentially in recent years.

Despite the wonders of modern medicine, the sheer numbers of drugs and medical procedures used these days results in a truly unbelievable number of adverse events and while saving millions of lives on the one hand mistakes and drug reactions kill hundreds of thousands every year. So there are some high risks with drugs, hospital stays, and surgery and I believe chiropractic offers you an extremely safe alternative for many conditions.

Why not contact us at Anza Pain Treatment Center to see if we can help you before resorting to drugs and therapy.

–Beat the Leading Cause of Death. Johanna Parker, from the University of Warwick (United Kingdom), and colleagues conducted a systematic literature review of studies examining vitamin D (specifically 25-hydroxy vitamin D [25OHD] as an indicator of vitamin D status) and cardiometabolic disorders. The studies revealed a significant association between high levels of vitamin D and a decreased risk of developing cardiovascular disease (33 percent lower risk compared to people with low levels of vitamin D), type 2 diabetes (55 percent risk reduction) and metabolic syndrome (51 percent risk reduction).

–Excite the Brain. A large nationwide study by Brandeis University (Massachusetts) suggests that mental exercises aid cognitive skills. Margie Lachman and colleagues conducted the Midlife in the United States study, which assessed 3,343 men and women, ages 32 to 84 years, 40 percent of whom had at least a four-year college degree. Evaluating how the participants performed in two cognitive areas, verbal memory and executive function, the team found that those with higher education engaged in cognitive activities more often and performed better on the memory tests.
However, some subjects with lower education performed just as well; the researchers found that intellectual activities undertaken regularly made a difference. Specifically, among individuals with low education, those who engaged in reading, writing, attending lectures, and doing word games or puzzles once a week or more had memory scores similar to people with more education.

–Engage the Body. In that physical activity is associated with reduced risks of chronic diseases and premature death, Qi Sun, from Harvard School of Public Health, and colleagues explored whether physical activity is also associated with improved overall health among those who survive to older ages. Analyzing data from 13,535 participants in the Nurses’ Health Study, whereby the women reported their physical activity levels in 1986 (average age then: 60 years), the team found that women who survived to age 70 or older (10-plus years after the study began) were engaged in higher levels of physical activity at the beginning of the study and were less likely to have chronic diseases, heart surgery or any physical, cognitive or mental impairments.

Keep in mind, of course, that these aren’t the only ways to maximize your health, but they’re a great place to start. There’s never a bad time to sit down and assess your current health and what you can do to improve it, especially when some simple behavior and lifestyle modifications can have a profound impact on your life span. Talk to your doctor for more information.

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Chiropractic: I have never seen a headache patient who did not have some type of misalignment of the bones of the neck (cervical spine). It is amazing how much muscle spasm and tension can be caused by misaligned bones. When bones are even slightly out of alignment, the muscles attached to them become stressed, so they become tight. Tight muscles restrict the flow of information through the nerves and circulation through the blood vessels. This can contribute to all sorts of problems, including headaches and neck pain.

Having your chiropractor adjust those spinal bones back into their normal alignment will reset your system. The joints will have better movement, the muscles can begin to relax on their own and the circulation and nervous systems can start to flow again. The spine and the bones of the extremities really do hold the key to feeling good for the long term.

Massage Therapy: A good therapeutic massage by a certified massage therapist can relax muscle tissue, improve circulation, and clear out the toxins that are trying to drain (lymphatic system). It is astonishing how much muscle tension accompanies any type of headache in the body. The muscles of the neck and upper back are among the most powerful in the body. After all, they have to hold up the head, which can weigh as much as a bowling ball.

When chiropractic and massage work together, patients will respond especially well to care. Consider having chiropractic and massage treatments within 36 hours of each other. This way, the adjustments and the muscle relaxation can work together.

Acupuncture: Acupuncture and Oriental medicine, including natural herbs, are other powerful methods to help manage headaches. Acupuncture works with the body’s natural energy or chi as it flows through all of the organs and parts of the body. When energy becomes trapped or blocked, it can contribute to a whole host of painful conditions or situations in the body, including headaches. An acupuncturist can expertly insert thin needles into specific spots of your body to release the trapped energy, allow it to flow better and contribute further to relaxing muscle, which will improve circulation and nervous system flow.

Ergonomics: Daily habits and body positions are extremely important when it comes to preventing headaches. For example, for many people, headaches start with something as simple as their pillow. In general, sleeping on your back is best with a pillow under your neck and head. If you are going to sleep on your side, the pillow needs to be wide enough to span the distance between your shoulders and neck. Custom-made pillows are now available to help give you the proper support you need. Ask your chiropractor for guidance in this area to help ensure you get the pillow that’s best for you.

Your computer desk or workstation and telephone setup also need to be examined. Improper keyboard and monitor placement can cause eye strain and make you crane your neck for hours on end. A chair that is not adjusted properly or fit to your body type can stress the entire body, including the neck. All of these factors can contribute to headaches.

Performed correctly, specific exercises can help strengthen upper back and neck muscles and improve posture, which will reduce the risk of muscle tension and poor-posture-related dysfunction that can contribute to headaches. Exercise also reduces emotional stress, which often goes hand in hand with a headache. Remember, make sure that the exercises you are performing do not strain any of your neck and upper back muscles. Consult with your doctor about the exercises you are doing to make sure they are not stressing your body too much and creating further problems.

In general, the chiropractic adjustment is a very safe procedure for children. With millions of children visiting a chiropractor every year, adverse events (the technical term for injury) are very rare. A study published in 2008 in the prestigious medical journal Pediatrics found only nine incidents of adverse events related to spinal adjustments in children worldwide over the past 100 years, an enviable safety record.

All doctors understand that any form of health care comes with some degree of risk, whether we’re talking about a dose of antibiotics or a chiropractic adjustment. As with any procedure, your chiropractor should discuss the benefits and the risks of the adjustment as it applies to your child.

Chiropractic care for children is very different than chiropractic care for adults. The adjustments are much softer and gentler because the child’s joints are looser and easier to move. The procedure is quite comfortable and children often look forward to their chiropractic treatment. In addition, children generally heal much more quickly than adults, so typically require just a few treatments to restore normal motion to their joints, and thus restore normal function to their nervous systems and related end organs.

Since chiropractors improve the health of the nervous system by removing irritation stemming from the structural elements of the body, chiropractors can help children with a wide range of conditions, from colic to ear infections to asthma.

If your children aren’t already receiving regular chiropractic care, talk to your doctor about getting them into the office for an initial visit.

If your chiropractor doesn’t specialize in treating children, particularly very young children, and doesn’t know someone who does, they can help you find a pediatric chiropractor in your neighborhood using several resources, including http://acapedscouncil.org/unitedstates.html or www.icapediatrics.com/members-referral.php