Work has traditionally been a significant part of our lives and our personal identity. Professions have been passed on from fathers to sons for generations, while physical labor and handcrafts have been highly valued. At the same time, physical labor has played a significant role in our daily energy expenditure. Think about how men used to work long hours in...
The modern work culture thinks our bodies are a joke. The worst enemies for everyday exercise are our chairs, cars, televisions, computer, elevators, escalators, and our overall busy lives. Has our innate need for comfort selected a sitting society as its undisputed favorite way to live? There are, fortunately, many friends of everyday activity including: bicycles, sidewalks, trails by lakes,...
A growing number of individuals feel it necessary to bridge the gap to a more ecologically friendly lifestyle by embracing natural foods, recycling and using public transportation. Almost everything in our lives can be made more natural or ecologically friendly. Unfortunately, this natural and ecologically friendly way of living is not often connected to that central masterpiece that should be...
“Natural” is the ‘in’ word and current trend. Perhaps the popularity of “natural” stems from a certain form of yearning; yearning for “the old days”, when people lived in harmony with the land and the land was respected and directed our decisions every day. At the same time, this popularity describes our true life. We no longer feel that we are...
The popularity of sitting is not entirely due to how easy it is. The internet, television, and videogames are all available in front of you as soon as you take a seat. Sitting is the gateway to the new digital age - the digital age that has consumed us all. All the knowledge in the world these days can be...
Think for a moment about your typical day. You awake in the morning and sit at the kitchen table for breakfast. Perhaps after that you walk a few meters to your car and drive to work - where you sit. Lunchtime is great because you can take a break from the stress of work and you can get away from...
While the decrease in daily energy expenditure in our working environments can explain, in part, the obesity epidemic, the other parts of our daily life are not without blame. At work we sit and move primarily just our fingers, so maybe it is a good idea to increase our daily energy expenditure via our daily commute. Unfortunately, during the last 35...
In the 1960s almost half of jobs required moderate physical activity. Nowadays, only 20% of jobs require at least moderate physical activity. It is no surprise that four out of five Finns does their work sitting in front of a screen. These days, making the grade at work is about being smart and less about having endurance, strength and skills. Here...
Expending energy includes a lot more than just recreational exercise. We can do shoulder shrugs for other reasons than to simply indicate our lack of knowledge. In other words, we can exercise every day. Researchers in the USA asked approximately 10000 people what they do during a 24 hour period. Subjects reported all of their activity from driving in the car to...
Let’s examine the energy equation from the perspective of spending energy. As I told you before, the number of adults participating in recreational physical activity is larger than ever before. According to questionnaires used in studies the number of adults that participate in recreational physical activity at least twice per week has increased from approximately 40% to 70% in the...
I have news for you: According to studies, our energy consumption, the amount of food we eat, has actually decreased or stayed the same over the past 20 years. In Finland the results of the large “Finnravinto” study suggested that energy consumption has decreased an average of 20%, which means approximately 600 kilocalories in men and 400 kilocalories in women per...
In the USA over 6 billion dollars a year are spent on diet foods. Close to a billion cans of low calorie “diet sodas” were sold in 2010 alone. In Finland, we are following this trend. Up to half of Finns have stated that they are trying to lose weight, and one fifth of Finns are using some sort of...
Losing weight is annoyingly easy: Consume less energy than you expend or expend more energy than you consume. Move more, eat smaller serving sizes and enjoy the results! As I said before, the struggle with this elementary school level mathematics problem is actually of astronomical proportions. Unfortunately, the current solutions to this epidemic are not working. Is the fight of the wellness industry against...
The models of the health and wellness business are images of dazzling perfection. Sharp shadows are cast by the light bouncing off of glimmering oiled muscles and the fitness machine’s lofty being justifies its confident and goal-oriented smile. The bronzed statue is covered by tight clothing that does not leave any room to imagine what might be below it. The message of...
Overweight is no longer a valued ideal but a prevailing condition. Ideals have changed. The worshiping of a round belly has given way to a craving to lose weight and be thin. These changes have made overweight a favorite topic in the health and wellness sector and an extremely important part of health marketing. People want to lose weight. Thankfully,...
Basically, weight gain is the result of an imbalance between energy consumption and energy expenditure. This balance is partly regulated by our genetics, our environment, and psychosocial factors. One, or many of these factors, has gotten members of our society to consume more than we expend, or to expend less than we consume. At the same time we have noticed...
The daily physical activity revolution is not some miraculous prescription for diet or exercise. This blog will not help you achieve quick results or teach you any magic tricks that will make you healthier. This blog will not discuss any magic tricks for health, because they simply do not work. This blog will teach you to respect the normal function of your body. It...
During my university studies, I encountered a question on an exam that asked what elements make up “physical activity”. In part, due to my lack of knowledge, and in part because I was feeling a bit rebellious, I answered indifferently: “Who cares, as long as we participate more in physical activity”. After the exam, I remembered that our textbook stated...
