Knowing Your Body

 

I can’t stress enough that knowledge is power!

Here is a quick story – I have a friend who knows nothing about vehicles. When his vehicle broke down a number of years back, he got taken advantage of at many repair shops.  I offered to help him out, but he just did not care.  He was taken on a wild ride of repairs that did not need to be done as well as repairs that should have been done as preventative maintenance.  Needless to say, he was baffled why a simple repair turned into thousand dollars of repairs.  The moral of this story is to know a little bit about the things you have possession of in your life. 

Now, what about your health?  Health is a very broad subject, so let’s narrow it down to how your body works.  That is too general as well, so let’s get to the nuts and bolts and talk about MUSCLES!!!  Muscles move you, shape you and really define how and what you do.

Much like your teeth, your muscles are used every day in your life.  You obviously need to take care of them or you will loose them.  Loosing muscle mass is called atrophy.  Gaining muscle mass is called hypertrophy.  Living an active lifestyle will help maintain heath and maintain muscle mass.  To gain lean muscle some form of resistance training needs to implemented into your routine.  This might take the form of weight training, body weight work, tubing exercises, gymnastics etc.

In order to take care of your muscles, you should at least know where they are and what they do.  It is not necessary to know every origin and insertion, but some basic knowledge will allow you to take care of your body.  (Remember my story about my friend with the vehicle breakdown).  By knowing some basic anatomy, you can look after yourself and others.  Here is a great web-page for knowing the Muscles of the Human Body.

Here is an amazing site that one of my Sports Medicine students discovered – Innerbody.com

By knowing where and how your muscles work, you can roll them out with The Stick!

By the way…….my reference to teeth and muscles was not by accident.  One of the key points of using The Stick is to use The Stick as “A Toothbrush for Muscles”.  You brush your teeth everyday (I hope at least once a day), you should also “brush” your muscles!

Your Health and Wellness During the Holidays

The holiday season is the perfect time to get back in touch with your health and wellness.  Some people see it as a season to let you guard down relax, eat too much and drink too much.  If you have the discipline, the holidays are a perfect time to become reacquainted with you body.  Take care of your sore, stiff muscles.

Most people I know have a significant amount of holidays around this time of year.  You can locate where the closest fitness facility is.  You can research power foods.  You can finally visit a fitness shop to think about purchasing that piece of home gym equipment you have been eyeing up.  Let’s face it, the prices after Christmas are fantastic.

The best thing about the holiday season is spending time with family and friends.  Get outside and in to nature as much as possible.  I just finished reading an article about how being outside can actually reduce stress levels and increase your mood.  The author explained it is due to being surrounded by squares and rectangles when you are inside.  Think about for a moment.  Most of our indoor environment has straight edges and is very confining.  Look around you!  Now look outside at a park or playground or a group of trees….. almost no squares and rectangles!  It almost makes sense to me.

Do something for yourself over the holiday season.  If you invest into yourself, so will others.  The same holds true when you invest in others, they will in turn invest in you.

Have a Merry Christmas,

Ken

Taking care of yourself or others.

What does health mean to you?  Is it the way you feel?  Is it the way others see you?  Is health a state of being or is it just a measure of you life expectancy?  I heard one funny saying that explains health “as the speed in which one can age or how long they will live or the rate of when they would die.”  However you view your health, I am sure you think of many factors that influence your own personal health or the health of your loved ones and friends.

What do you do to maintain a level of health that allows you to perform daily activities efficiently and effectively?  Do you eat well?  Do you get enough sleep?  Do you exercise on a daily basis?  How is your oral health?  One of the most important question in today’s society is how is your mental health?  What do you do to relieve stress?  Your answers to these questions are personal, but you should do a  self-check every once and awhile!!

I would like you to think about massage for a moment.  Mostly everyone knows you can go for a massage.  What if you could save a load of time and money and massage yourself?  This is known as Self-Massage.  You would feel better, be less stressed, stimulate your circulatory system, and relax more.  These are only a few fringe benefits of performing self-massage.  What about the time and effort that you put into yourself?  That is a true investment!

The Stick can do all this and more for yourself.  I encourage you to read more articles I have posted on this blog.

The gift of health.

I live in an area of Alberta, Canada where I can load by dirt bike into my truck and be riding 30-45min later.  That is exactly what I did today.  It was only plus 2 degrees celsius, but I went anyway.  As I drove down the highway listening to good music and planning the week ahead of me, I recognized how lucky I am.

I am healthy and have a family that loves me!  I was able to get away for a couple of hours and enjoy the fact that I was healthy and able to do something physical in the outdoors.  It was incredible!!  As I was getting on my gear, I saw a Dad with a friend and their kids on quads.  I saw friends getting ready to enjoy some time together.  I felt fantastic.  I know there will be a day very soon when my kids are old enough to spend a couple hours with me in natures playground!!

Just before my ride, I needed to warm-up my body a little, so I rolled out any muscle I had exposed that was not covered by my gear with the Original Body Stick.  I then got on my bike and went exploring.

The point of my story, is without your health and freedom to move around, you are restricted to certain activities.  Because I am healthy and I take care of my muscles, I can do whatever I want – like dirt bike!!

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