Walking is the best possible exercise. Habituate yourself to walk very far.

-Thomas Jefferson

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This is an appropriate quote for today's show. Thomas Jefferson, a great American founding father, Vice President, President and Statesman shared this great quote about the benefits of walking. Walking is the best possible exercise. It can be done by just about anyone that has the ability to walk, as exercise. The most important part of what he says in the the second half of his quote.

Habituate yourself to walk very far. Habituate -- I like that word. One of the keys to developing a great #WorkOnWellness program is to make what you do a habit. Habituating activities that burn calories will make it easier to complete them. When you habituate these activities, your mind doesn't have to think about should I do this. It is conditioned and primed to start as soon as you think it.

Habits

I started getting up at 4:00 a.m. a year ago when I started my podcast. I needed the extra time to be able to write up my show notes, record episodes. When I started interviewing my expert guests, I had to have a couple hours in the morning to be able to talk with people on the east coast. My 5 a.m. is there 8 a.m.  Now, I wake up almost every morning at 4 a.m. without my alarm clock. I, unfortunately, wake up about 10-15 minutes before the alarm goes off....Even on the Weekends when I can sleep in.  So there's power in Habituating your activities. We'll cover habits more in a later episode in more depth, because habits can help you develop the right routines to achieve your #WorkOnWellness goals.

Tool 1 - The Gym

Back to Jefferson's quote. He says you should habituate yourself to walk very far. Walking long distance is an exercise I used frequently when I was working on losing 40 pounds in 16 weeks. I would spend a lot of time in the gym. I like going to the gym. I am a member of Planet Fitness. I have tried other gyms in my area where I live, but keep coming back to Planet Fitness. The main things I like about Planet Fitness are:

* Great Equipment - new or in good shape - I prefer the models they use over the ones at other gyms

* Friendly staff

* Clean locker rooms and facilities

* Prices - great options from $10 - $25 per month. I have a Black Card which allows me to use any Planet Fitness facility, anywhere.

I started going to the one near my office. It's a five minute walk. I would leave work and be there 5 minutes later. If I waited to get on BART for my commute home, I could think of a million things I could be doing better than going to the gym.

Tool 2 - The Elliptical

I still haven't finished my thoughts on Jefferson's quote about habituating yourself to walk very far. That's where the elliptical comes in. Using the elliptical is like walking. I have a "bad" knee. I had my meniscus removed when I ripped in playing tennis a few years ago. Sometimes it hurts, sometimes it doesn't. It isn't anything that stops me from doing any running. I still run some but I like using the elliptical. It's easier on the knees and I can adjust the levels to make it a little harder workout.  So back to Jefferson and walking far. I started doing 1 hour on the elliptical. I worked my way up to doing 5 miles in an hour. That burns about 700 calories with my weight (at the time) and the levels I used. 5 miles is far. It's recommended that you walk at least 10,000 steps per day.

10,000 steps is about 5 miles. After I hit that goal, I started trying to go for 2 hours. I wanted to get in at least 1200 calories burned in that wor...