Before when I could hear about fitness I used to wonder; why subject myself to all that pain and the torture at the gym or on the running track? Is it necessary? Are there other ways to be fit without all the pain?

Now I know better.

With rise in urbanization, the vast majority of people have access to transportation at the door stop. You will find that in our day-to-day living we don’t make more than 10 minutes’ walk to get to the bus stop or to get a bodaboda. Online cab services pick you at the door step and drop you right at your destination.

You can order your food, groceries or shopping online and have them delivered to your house.

This has led us to live a very sedentary lives that is detriment to our health.

There are many reasons why we should be deliberate about our physical fitness. The most common reasons tend to be associated with weight loss or weight management. However, there are others who want to improve their athletic performance, have a better quality of life, or support their psychological health.

Aside from the above goals, we should prioritize our overall health to improve the fundamental skills associated with daily movement and the management of basic physical needs such as:

1. Grooming and personal hygiene – we require flexibility to wash our backs all the way to our toes, brush teeth, comb hair, cut nails, oil our back and so on.
2. Dressing – can you zip up your dress? Tie your shoe laces? Paint your toe nails? We need a strong core to be able to bend without causing injuries or pain at the back now, and as we grow older.
3. Toileting and continence – We need flexible hip joints, pelvic joints and knees to be able to squat at the toilet. A strong lower back, pelvic muscles will ensure that we do not suffer any pain while toileting. We can lower the risk of osteoporosis by living an active life and ensure that our joints can serve us well now and in the future. Exercise promotes bone density thereby lowering the risk of bone fracture.
4. Preparing food and eating– Food preparation requires a lot of movements and body coordination; bending, twisting, turning, standing, every joint on our hands is involved all the way to our fingers. Only when our bodies are fit that we are able to do this without it being an arduous task.
5. Tasks that contribute to income – whether you are working from home, online, at the office or on site, or in the farm, you require physical fitness to perform optimally.
6. Shopping – we need to be healthy to push the shopping cart at the store, bend and pick the items, move them to the car, lift them up to the apartment, and arrange them in the fridge and the pantry.
7. Social gatherings – whether at the funerals, birthday parties, weddings, Christmas, graduation or thanksgiving parties, some form of physical activity is required. Walking, standing or dancing. You do not want to be the person who sits and watch as everybody else is having fun because you are too tired, or you back hurts, or your legs can not support you.
8. Spending quality time with family – your children, nephews, nieces, grandchildren are very physically engaging. We need to be fit to have quality time playing with the children, following them up and down the stairs, and generally looking after them. We need strength to carry them around in the house or going to the clinic, church or shopping.

If we don’t act now, unlike our parents and grandparents who are still active and independent at age 70, 80 and even 90, we shall start depending on other people for help in doing our normal daily tasks, and it can be very frustrating and devastating.

While there are no guarantees of good health, you don’t want your inaction regarding your health now to bring you pain later in your life.

What are you going to do now?