Age Gracefully, Live Vibrantly: Feeling Good Over 50

As we move into our 50’s, 60’s and beyond, we shift our perspective. We didn’t make it this far without growing and learning. Think back to your 30’s and even early 40’s, what was important to you then in regard to your health and wellness? Was it more about how you looked on the outside? Like, fitting into a certain dress size or bathing suit? The concept of aging and how we were going to live our second half was more of a thought way in the future. The future is here or at least getting closer.

How can we feel good at any age? First of all, what does feeling good mean to you? There are physical, mental and emotional aspects of feeling good. We are all multidimensional beings. This blog post will focus on the physical, but every part of our being is connected. When our physical body is healthy and thriving, it’s easier for our mental and emotional spirit to thrive as well. Also, if we are struggling with mental or emotional wellness it can be very challenging to get our physical body to thrive.

Physical Well-Being

The feeling of being free of aches and pains and disease but also feeling strong, powerful and energized are all part of feeling good physically. Being able to accomplish daily tasks without even thinking about pain or limitation is something that can be taken for granted. If we struggle with pain or disease, completing daily tasks, let alone exercise can seem daunting. Learning how to cope and move beyond wanting to sit still because we have pain or we’re stiff is critical in aging well. Bottom line, if you want to feel good and age well, you need to move your body and build muscle strength and power and keep your cardiovascular health strong too. 

Strength

We not only need to build muscle, but we also need to be able to have power. Power is the ability to lift or push something heavy quickly. Your goal should be to participate in an exercise program that works your major muscle groups twice a week. You'll want to work up to fatigue at 10 repetitions max in order to help build muscle. Work up to three sets of 10 repetitions.

Power

Include some power exercises in your workout. Step ups, squats with a quick lift and slow lower, throwing a weighted ball to the ground all will start to help you build some power.

Cardiovascular Exercise

Effective cardiovascular exercise that will help you beyond burning calories. Old school thinking was to get on a piece of equipment and burn a certain number of calories. We are wiser now. There are four ways I think of cardio. Meet yourself where you are at and build on that. Don’t stress out but continue to challenge yourself. 

All Day Movement

Find as many ways as possible to move your body throughout the day. Just because you do a 30-minute walk or go to a class for an hour doesn’t mean it’s ok to sit the rest of the day. If you have a job where sitting is involved, get up and take breaks to walk and get a glass of water, go up a flight of stairs to use the bathroom or just march in place hitting alternate hand to knee for a minute.

Zone 2 Cardio

The easiest way to think of Zone 2 cardio is when you are exercising, you can get a whole sentence out, but just barely. Three hours of Zone 2 cardio a week is really only a 30-minute walk 6 days a week. Push yourself a bit on your walk so finishing a sentence is a challenge.

HIIT- High Intensity Interval Training

Aim for two or three HIIT workouts a week with no more than 45 minutes of high intensity total.

I want to stress that this is different in menopause than what you’ll see in a HIIT class with a bunch of 30-year-olds. Your HIIT training will be a five-minute warm up, then push as hard as you can for 20-30 seconds, then recover till you come back down to Zone 2 or lower. Allow your body to recover. This could take anywhere from 40 seconds to 3 minutes or more depending on your starting fitness level. Then take it up again as hard as you can for another 20-30 seconds. You’ll repeat this up to 10 times. If you’re just getting started, start with four or five rounds and build from there.

V02Max

Shows how much oxygen your body absorbs and uses while you are working out. V- volume, 02-oxygen and Max- the maximum. You don’t have to have your V02max tested in order to work on improving it. Doing HIIT workouts and increasing your Zone 2 workouts will help your V02max. Once you feel you have a handle on the above forms of cardio you can challenge yourself a bit more. One workout a week, instead of a HIIT as described above, warm up, challenge yourself and push hard but not all out effort for three or four minutes, then recover to Zone 2. Repeat this and build up to eight to ten repetitions.

Mental and Emotional Well Being

This is where what I call your Primary Foods comes in. Your health, physical activity, joy, relationships, home environment, creativity, spirituality, finances, career, education, home cooking and social life all play a role. When a client comes to me for help with their health and wellness this is where we start. I recommend taking into consideration these important aspects of your life. They don’t have to be perfect, but helping to bring balance to your Primary Foods will help you as a multidimensional being achieve the health and wellness you desire.

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