Exercise isn't an anti-depressant but the lack of exercise is a depressant.
I love the theme of Movement this year, to support our mental wellbeing.
It is of course essential for our bodies to be physical AND it is essential for our minds.
Sometimes we think that movement, exercise has to be all out, full on physical activity, often what we have been led to believe, or mistakenly interpreted it to be, with running the legs of ourselves, going flat out until we can't breath or be in a gym session or exercise class for 1-2 hours.
This mindset can often put us off and means we might do the opposite instead, nothing at all, no movement.
These can be the extremes of the spectrum, which tends to be the way of things, let's do everything now, let's go mad, I need to be fit in 4 days, I need to lose 1 stone weight in a month, or its zero, zilch, nothing, no exercise which doesn't really benefit us at all.
Finding a balance is key, movement, exercise is important to support our mental health. We build up our fitness, we become more patient for weightloss etc
Feeling well, strong is more important and the fitness levels will gradually improve which means we will do more and weightloss will be a bi-product.
When taking care of your mental health, movement, exercise releases those feel good hormones, without it we release none of these.
We need to challenge ourselves little by little, moving to prevent stiffness, muscle wastage and good heart health.
Choose something you like doing, is essential and start right away, implementing an activity that makes you feel, energised and supports your wellbeing, building to those longer sessions, classes.
Only you can take care of you and Action, creates Motivation.