One of the few modern articles of faith is our belief in exercise. Even if you don’t do it, you know what its powers are. Exercise makes you thinner, sexier, more energetic and (most magical of all) happier. We are constantly urged to do more of it – especially our children, who will otherwise spend their whole lives lying on the sofa sending texts, being slowly engulfed by their adipose tissue until only a giant puddle of fat and two twitching thumbs remain.
Quick – send your young out to the playing fields! The NHS Live Well website advises that children aged five to 18 should do at least an hour a day of mixed-intensity aerobic exercise, as well as muscle-strengthening activities such as sit-ups, push-ups and “resistance exercises with exercise bands, weight machines or hand-held weights”.
Now, I don’t doubt that a bit of running around is good for children. I dutifully drag mine to the playground most days, for an hour of moaning and shivering and inching down the wet slide in their welly boots. If nothing else, it makes us all doubly happy to get home. But an actual exercise regime? Isn’t that the price you pay for being a grown-up? Pumping weights seems to me a poor use of the precious currency of childhood: time that could be spent battling superheroes, drawing on the carpet, trimming the cat’s whiskers, drooling contentedly in front of the telly, or – best by far – reading.
I find it just as weird when friends take their teenage children to the gym. Don’t they have malls to roam, boys to sext, rules to break? Something – anything – more joyful than running on the spot in pursuit of toned thighs? When I was little, in the Seventies, no British person of any age knowingly took exercise. They might have done it unwittingly – while going for a nice walk, say – but the idea of exercise as a virtuous activity in its own right had yet to cross the Atlantic.
The first time I ever saw someone jogging, I was driving through Richmond Park with my family. Dad pointed out of the window and said: “What’s that man running away from?” Mum said: “Look at his tiny shorts!” We concluded that he must be either crazy or on the run from the police, so we didn’t stop to help.
© ACADEMIA ARALAR. Estella, Navarra.
Exercise is really important at any age. But nowadays children usually spend their free time whatching televition or playing video games.
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion, sport is essential in human’s lives. It makes us healthy and happy, which are both indispensable in our lives. Something should be done so that the joungest realize about it and start chanching their bad habits.
Exercise is really important and it has always been like this. It is true that things have changed a lot and while some years ago people did exercise just working or unwittingly, nowadays people spend hours in the gym and stuff if they want to do exercise. That might be because the lifestyle is not the same, nowadays there are many new technologies and we spend more time at home.
ReplyDeleteMoreover, in the past people worked in jobs that demanded more phisical work and they also spent more time in the street. However, nowadays there is more sedentary people.
From my point of view, we should do more exercise because exercise make people happier.
Exercise is essential in our lives. Nowadays people who do exercise daily, normally is because they like or because her/his doctor has recommended him/her to do it, instead of doing it because is good for our health.
ReplyDeleteIn my opinion they should encourage us to do exersice since we are little, if not we used to be sedentaries. Likewise, doing exersice help us with stress, and it´s true that makes us happier. However, there is also some people who do quite a lot exercise to be happy with their self that they obsess with it and that´s not good neither.
To sum up, I think that we should accustom to devot one hour per day to do exercise at least, instead of being with the mobile phone or liying in the sofa.
Doing exercise everyday could help us in different ways. It help with the stress, health, body shape and it also makes people happier.
ReplyDeleteNowadays we have other activities to do Instead of going to the gym that it's a bigger effort. Most of us spend their free time with the mobile phone but there are also people who feel more comfortable with themselfs going to the gym.
In my opinion we should be encouraged to do exercise by telling it gives us happiness but not telling that we will get a fantastic body.
Finally, exercise is really important and all of us have to keep doing it.