Investing just 3% of your time each day in exercise could help you live a longer, healthier life, a physiologist told Business Insider.
Nathan K. LeBrasseur, director of the Robert and Arlene Kogod Center on Aging at Mayo Clinic, researches healthy aging. He said that “the greatest threats to human health today are lifestyle-related conditions” such as cardiovascular and lung diseases, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, and cancer.
Such lifestyle-related conditions account for almost three-quarters of deaths worldwide each year, according to the World Health Organization — 17 million of which happen before the age of 70.
Dedicating some time to a healthy, active lifestyle when you’re young can help to prevent or delay these conditions, LeBrasseur said.
Some might be disappointed that there’s no secret to healthy aging, no matter how much money “biohackers” throw at the problem. But LeBrasseur said this “should really be viewed as an incredible opportunity that you have such control over your health and wellbeing.”
He shared the smartest way to invest your time to stay healthy.
Spend 3% of your day exercising
Investing 3% of your income sounds like a “minimal financial
investment,” LeBrasseur said.
Similarly, investing just 3% of your day in exercise is “a minimal investment to have a profound impact on our overall health,” he said.
This works out at around 30 minutes of a typical 16-hour day that should be spent doing moderate to vigorous exercise, he said.
Moderate exercise should make you feel “on the verge of being a little short of breath,” he said, or is a five or a six out of 10 in terms of effort. Vigorous exercise, meanwhile, is more of an eight or nine out of 10 and should make you actively fatigued.
Depending on your fitness level, this could involve walking, lifting weights, running, cycling, or swimming.
The type of exercise matters
LeBrasseur recommended doing a mixture of resistance and aerobic exercises — aerobic for cardiovascular, brain, metabolic, and pulmonary health, and resistance to maintain physical function and prevent frailty in older age.
One 2022 study showed that doing both resistance training and aerobic exercise appeared to reduce participants’ risk of dying from any cause by 32%.
HIIT, or high-intensity interval training, is a good “twofer,” LeBrasseur said, because it features both resistance and aerobic exercises. With HIIT, “you’re definitely taxing your cardiovascular system as well as your musculoskeletal and neuromuscular systems, and there is a clear benefit to that,” he said.
Functional training, featuring squats, lunges, and pulling/pushing exercises, is also beneficial for healthy aging, he said, as it can strengthen the muscles needed to preserve mobility and physical function in older age.
Don’t just be active at the gym
“Being more habitually active and having fewer rest periods during the day is highly beneficial” for health and longevity, LeBrasseur said.
He recommended adding bits of exercise into the day wherever you can — whether that’s parking the car further from your destination, getting up to speak to colleagues instead of emailing them, or going to the grocery store instead of getting a delivery.
Consider when you don’t move, too, he said. If you work a sedentary job, he suggested getting up from your desk every hour to walk for 10 minutes or doing some pushups or squats.
Start ASAP and pick something you enjoy
“Sooner is always better,” LeBrasseur said. “It’s never too late. Even for 90 year olds, there’s strong evidence that exercise can have clear health benefits on preserving function and preventing exacerbation of disease.”
But the most important thing about physical activity and exercise is consistency, he said. So, pick an activity that you enjoy and can do regularly to reap the benefits.
LeBrasseur runs, bikes, and swims, but said people shouldn’t try to copy him or anyone else. “The point is that I do these things because I really enjoy them and can be consistent with them. If you asked me to do another activity that I had zero interest in, I might do it for a week but then I’d drop off,” he said.
Combining exercise with socializing can also make regular exercise easier because it’s more enjoyable, plus your friends can hold you accountable.
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