10,000 Steps to Happiness
10,000 steps to happiness? Yes!
Beyond the slow-but-sure weight loss that you can achieve by taking 10,000 steps a day, my latest book Weight Loss in 10,000 Steps a Day covers several other benefits of this level of physical activity.
Celebrity trainer Bob Harper — of The Biggest Loser TV-show fame — said in a Reuters interview a couple of days ago that diet trumps exercise in weight loss.
It’s true.
You simply cannot tip the Calories-in/Calories-out scale as much with physical exercise as you can with modifying your diet, especially if you are in a hurry, as the contestants on The Biggest Loser are.
Robert Lustig, M.D., a professor with University of California San Francisco, said this years earlier in his “Sugar: The Bitter Truth” video, and others have said this, too.
Sure, the subtitle of my book — How to Lose Weight without Dieting (Weight Loss Programs Guide) — suggests that I might believe that this physical activity might be superior to modifying one’s diet for the goal of losing weight.
But, I wrote this book with some ambitious goals in mind:
- Reach readers who are sick of dieting and don’t mind losing weight slowly.
- Give dieters an additional way to lose weight.
- Spread some happiness.
That’s right. If you start to take 10,000 steps a day, then not only will you gradually lose weight but also you will become happier with your life.
I identify many happiness benefits in Weight Loss in 10,000 Steps a Day.
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First, increasing one’s activity level to 10,000 steps a day has the potential to:
- Decrease risk of osteoporosis.
- Decrease risk of some cancers.
- Lower blood pressure.
- Decrease risk of hypertension.
- Improve circulation.
- Decrease risk of heart attack.
- Improve mental acuity.
- Decrease risk of heart disease.
- Improve sleep.
- Decrease risk of dementia.
- Increase lifespan.
- Decrease risk of diabetes.
Second, sufficient walking can lead to:
- Decreased pressure on joints;
- Greater flexibility;
- Less stress;
- Less belly fat;
- Greater sense of control of your life.
I substantiate these claims in the References section of the book, so I won’t take the space here to do that.
Once I released the book, I became more serious about making sure that I was taking 10,000 steps a day. Even as someone who is training regularly for marathons, I can tell you that it’s easy to NOT take that many steps on non-training days. Although I still back it off to around 4,000 to 5,000 steps on Sundays (after 15,000 to 30,000 steps from a long run on Saturday mornings), this higher activity level of taking at least 10,000 steps a day for six days a week has raised my energy level and therefore my happiness.
The book certainly has struck a chord among readers, and I am grateful to its readers for the many five-star reviews that it has garnered at Amazon, where you may borrow it at no charge as an Amazon Prime customer. Check it out!
One more thing: If YOU enjoy taking 10,000 steps a day, then please share this article and leave a comment below. Thank you!
