August 2024 - Fran's Fitness Over 50

What is core stability?

What is core stability and why is it important?

In almost every post I make about balance, I emphasize that a strong and stable core is essential. A strong core, I get. I understand strength. But what is core stability? Why do I care?

Core stability means that your core helps your spine maintain control when you move in different directions. For example, if you raise your arm, your oblique muscles in your abdomen are engaged. When we rotate our shoulders, a stable core holds us upright.

Everything inside us is connected. I want a stable spine so that I can sit and stand upright, and not to mention, breathe. When our spine is straight, it’s much easier for us to take a breath. You can try it yourself. Breathe when you’re hunched over, like you do at your desk. Now straighten your spine and breathe. Better, isn’t it?

So a stable core means a stable spine.

A strong core helps my back pain. I suppose that having a stable core helps with that as well, because when I’m bending over, I have to stabilize in order to stand up again. And that strong core, holding tight, means that I’m less likely to tweak my lower back.

I don’t think there’s any pain worse than lower back pain. I have sciatica and bursitis in both hips. When my sciatica flared up and wrapped around the bursitis, I couldn’t move. Or, rather, it was like I was moving through something the consistency of ice cream. I was moving, painfully, and extremely slowly. Because it hurt. Heat didn’t help a lot, and neither did ice. I lived with it, and apologized for being so slow. When your back hurts, you can’t do many things that you want to. It’s agony getting in the car so traveling is out of the question. Even mundane tasks like grocery shopping can be an ordeal.

When I did my research on balance a number of years ago after the fall that triggered the bursitis, I also learned that having a strong core could ease back pain. You can bet that as soon as I could move, I focused on core strength.

So, how can you improve your core stability?

Nothing in the studies I’ve read has indicated that there are separate exercises for core stability. Work the core strength exercises, and the stability part gets thrown in. Bonus.

Start planning your future

If you’re at the point in your life where you’ve retired from work and you don’t feel like seeking other work, you may be feeling at a loss and you’re searching for direction in your life. You’re asking yourself, “Now what?” We all need direction and focus in our lives. I know of too many people whose work was their life. They looked forward to retirement but then did not have anything planned for afterward. Then, without a reason to make an effort every day, shortly after retirement, they passed away. In fact, there have been studies that show that people (especially men) who were more tied to their work tended to die sooner after retirement. That struck me as so sad. I don’t want that happening to anyone else. So, if you haven’t thought about a future past a specific date, it may be time to start planning your future.

Leave a legacy

If you have children and grandchildren, you may want to leave them a legacy of some ways that you’ve changed your corner of the world. Perhaps you’ll leave a legacy of service to your community – if you do volunteer work with some charities in your area. Or if you’ve done some interesting things in your past, you’ll write a book.

Create goals for your future

You know I’m big on achieving goals, right? I’ve written about how to create goals for ourselves, and then how to make sure we achieve them. The same goes for any plans you make for your future. Now, the thing is, your time is probably not as limited as it once was. If you want to write that book, create that goal! If you want to volunteer for the organizations that you care about now, set that goal for yourself. Start planning your future. Me? I chose to create businesses and work at them. But in the meantime, I have written a couple of books and taught some classes. How?

I wrote a book

When I had the idea to write a mystery novel, using the framework in the Fitness Over 50 Get It Done Guide, I set my timetable. A cozy mystery novel should be 50,000 words or more, so I set the goal of 500 – 1,000 words a day. I’m a quick typist, so I knew this was doable. I knew that I didn’t have time during the day to write, so after thinking about it, I decided to use my early awake time (when I’d been playing Spider Solitaire) more productively. Instead of waking up naturally, about an hour before my real alarm, I set a second alarm. I set up my lap desk and Bluetooth keyboard and opened a blank Google Doc. First thing – a story idea and outline. Next, characters. Then, I started writing. I set a goal to write the novel in three months. Completely doable. And the first novel is available now.

Volunteer!

If your days are more free, then go ahead and write your memoir. Volunteer. How to volunteer? First – think of the things that you’re passionate about. Then, do some research on organizations in your area. Next, give them a call or email. Most non-profit organizations love people who want to donate their time. Write your ideas down and follow up. Be sure to actually write things down so that you don’t forget. Setting your thoughts down with pen on paper reinforces the memory.

If you want to travel, make sure that you’re in shape to do all the walking that you want to do. Make fitness goals a priority. You’ll also be working on your healthy aging and your resilience. You’ll be more confident and ready to take on the world (so to speak).

Most important – start planning your future now. You’ll find happiness in fulfilling your dreams. You’ll have a sense of purpose and won’t dread the long days after retirement.

Start walking to have a big impact on your health

The concept of beginning a fitness routine is daunting. If you haven’t been exercising, it’s a monumental change in your life. Perhaps you got the talk from your doctor, or maybe you’re not liking the way you look or feel and know you need a change. I’ve talked about all the benefits that exercise can give you. You’re saying, “but that means I have to get all sweaty and out of breath. Nope – start small. The good news is that walking qualifies! Start walking to have a big impact on your health.

But walking is boring!

But, you’re saying, walking is boring! Just one foot in front of the other. I thought you (me) said that I should pick an exercise program that I like! Correct. But, as I’ve said before, it’s not the exercise that has to be fun, necessarily. It can be what goes along with the exercise. Yes. Walking is boring. I dislike running. But there I am on the treadmill twice a week. Why? I found that listening to audiobooks keeps my mind off the actual running part and on the action that’s going on in my ears. The same can hold true for walking outside. Listen to a book. Listen to music, if that keeps you going. Or, talk to a friend. Better yet, walk with a friend and catch up in person.

What makes walking so positive?

So, how can just walking have such a positive impact on my health? “Walking is a great exercise not only for physical but also mental health. It provides repeated resistance to the muscles and bones of the lower body which helps them to stay strong,” says Megan Stuteville, an American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) certified personal trainer. Your joint mobility improves in your hips, knees and ankles. And here’s a big benefit: walking also increases your daily energy store. I know, it doesn’t make sense but it’s true. The energy you expend actually increases your available energy. Your cardiovascular health will improve, and you may even start sleeping better. Plus, walking is easy. Everybody can do it. And as we age, it’s more important than ever to exercise to keep our bones strong.

Do we really need to take 10,000 steps?

So, how many steps do we need to take to get these benefits? We’ve been hearing that we need to take 10,000 steps every day. That’s a lot. Research has actually shown that we start getting benefits when we hit about 8,000 steps. That’s about four miles. But, don’t forget – you can count all the walking you do during the day. Even to the refrigerator from the couch, and taking the dog to the backyard to do his business.

So, start walking to have a big impact on your health. You’ll feel better knowing that you’re doing something good for yourself.

How do elite athletes get motivated?

I’ve been watching the Olympics the last few days. It’s riveting. The level of competition is insane. I admire the talent, the intensity, the difficulty of the moves. I’ve always been an Olympics fan. Winter, Summer, it doesn’t matter. The sport doesn’t matter either. I love watching swimming, diving, track – it doesn’t matter. Men’s sports, women’s. Again, it doesn’t matter to me. Do you have a favorite Olympic sport?

These athletes are the best of the best in their sport. What makes them the best? What sets them apart from other athletes? Sure, innate talent probably has a lot to do with it. Someone who has no sense of rhythm is probably not going to be successful in rhythmic gymnastics, for example. But aside from talent, what makes these athletes so good? Their motivation. These athletes are driven to train, improve and succeed even in their off-seasons. So, how do elite athletes get motivated?

How do elite athletes get motivated?

WebMD asked 7 Olympic athletes what keeps them going. For Caeleb Dressel, swimmer, it’s the desire to get better. That’s the internal motivation that you would expect elite athletes to feel. The desire within to excel. And that’s important for us, too, in whatever we do. When we set goals for ourselves, we have to really want to achieve that goal. Otherwise, why bother? When the challenge that’s part of any endeavor gets hard, if we don’t want the end result, it’s easy to quit.

Accountability

Beach volleyball players Kristen Nuss and Taryn Kloth don’t want to let her partner down. Knowing that another person is counting on you help these elite athletes get motivated. Kloth said, knowing someone else is counting on you “makes it way easier to get through the tough times. This allows my focus to switch to her and not the tough task.”

Grow, for less discomfort

Because it is tough. Fencer Nick Itkin welcomes the pain. Personally, I don’t enjoy it, but Itkin uses it as a motivator. Put another way, the pain motivates him to get better so it doesn’t hurt any more. It goes back to the adage, “What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” Psychologist Ayelet Fishbach of the University of Chicago says, “because discomfort is usually experienced immediately and is easy to detect, it’s an immediate signal of growth that increases motivation.”

The fun keeps you going

Gymnast Frederick Richard likes to mix things up. He’s a believer in having fun when you train. And that’s something that I take to heart.

So, the methods that these elite athletes use to get motivated are the same that we’ve been using all along.

Write what you want to do

Last week I emphasized the importance of writing what you do. Adding to that, it’s important to write what you want to do. I need a memory assist, and that’s why I write what I do in my journal. I can’t remember what I had for breakfast, much less what my workout consisted of yesterday. But I also want to write down those little thoughts of the things I want to achieve.

For fitness, as an example, today I ran / walked for 20 minutes on the treadmill. My walking speed after the warmup was 4 miles per hour at 2.5 percent incline. My fastest running speed was 7.4 mph, again at 2.5 percent incline. I wrote all that on my journal page. But I also wrote that for my next run, I’d like to run at 7.5 mph. This is huge for me. After all, I’m old, my knees aren’t great, and neither are my hips. But at the end of my run, this might just be doable. Not for long, just a minute. But it’s a start.

Starting matters

And a start is just that. Running faster eventually becomes more comfortable, and then I feel lazy running at a slower pace. Most of life is like that. We pump ourselves up to do a little scary thing, like do a short live video on social media. All you extroverts may not think much of that, but it’s scary for people like me who like nothing more than staying home and reading. It’s not natural to put myself in the spotlight.

But then the little scary thing is not so scary any longer. It may not be comfortable, but eventually with practice we reach the stage of accepting it as a normal thing to do. This is true for everything we want to achieve in life. We start with a small idea. Play with it in your head. Write it down. Then expand on that small idea so that it’s something tangible and worthwhile.

Write what you want to do

So, at the same time you’re writing what you do, you can also write what you want to do. You’re making goals. And goals are essential for moving forward. Without goals, we’re stagnating. While you’re doing something, think of what you’d like to be doing in a month or six months. If I can run this fast now, I could probably run faster in a month! That’s how the process works.

And writing down those goals, even the little ones, gives you a much better chance of achieving them. 42% better, in fact, according to a psychology study performed at Dominican University in California. Write down those goals, dreams, and aspirations. And then break them down into manageable chunks that become real.