Regular physical activity plays an integral part in maintaining good health. Research strongly supports the idea that the more steps taken in a day, the lower the chances of developing chronic health conditions such as heart disease, diabetes and obesity. These chronic health conditions all have negative flow on effects to other health issues, so it’s really important to consider how many steps you are taking each day.
If you want to start increasing your daily step count, start by tracking your average steps taken per day on your phone or fitness watch. That way you have a starting point. From there, create a realistic goal of how many steps you want to take per day in say, two weeks. So if you’re doing 2,000 steps now, it might be a realistic goal to say you want to aim to take 3,000 steps per day over the next two weeks. By slowly pacing and grading the steps completed per day, you are letting your body adjust to this increase in steps and reducing any risk of injury or muscular and joint pain.
Increasing your steps across the day can be really simple. A 10 minute walk in the morning can easily create 1,000 steps before the day has begun. Getting off the bus two stops early can create an extra five minute walk, or an extra lap around the shopping centre can also increase your daily step count. Put simply, its all about moving more! Movement is medicine, so it’s important that you find ways in your day to get up and get moving.
