Walking Is Powerful Medicine

Maybe you want to lose a few pounds or protect your heart from disease or keep your bones strong and your joints limber. Walking can do all this and more.
By Maggie Spilner, Runner's World

Whether you're just starting a walking program or you're already a regular walker, your health likely played a role in your decision to get fit. Maybe you want to lose a few pounds or protect your heart from disease or keep your bones strong and your joints limber. Walking can do all this and more.

But when we talk about walking for health, we must look beyond the physical benefits. After all, health is a rich fabric spun from physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual threads. If one of these threads becomes frayed for any reason, it can weaken the entire fabric. What you eat, how much you sleep, how you handle your personal and professional relationships, how you view the world and your place in it all of these things influence whether or not you feel vital and strong. They also have a real impact on your body.

The same can be said of walking. It supports health in every sense physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually. It enriches and balances your life. And it just plain makes you feel good. No wonder the Greek physician Hippocrates deemed walking to be "man's best medicine."

See: Walking Is Powerful Medicine