Is EXERCISE a bad word??

If exercising is so good for you why don’t more people do it? This is the question I have been ruminating on. All my social media feeds, magazine, and text books say exercise is key to a long healthy life. So why aren’t people just doing it?

No one likes to get a colonoscopy or a mammogram yet you do because it could save your life. The jury is now out on mammograms but as far as I know no one has ever proven exercising is bad for you. Exercising will improve your chances to live a life worth living. So why don’t people do it more? What is the fear? What is the problem? Lack of education? Feeling that unless you want to look like a body builder or fashion model you don’t need to exercise? Is it embarrassment of the way your body looks now? Even thin people need to exercise because it is not all about weight. It is also about keeping you body functioning like a well oiled machine. Only movement can do that.

Maybe it is the word itself that brings bad connotations to mind. What if we called exercise something else? What if instead of saying “I have to go work out” we say ” I am going to get my active on” or “I gotta go get healthy now talk to you later”. Ok these are lame I admit but you do some ruminating and see if you can come up with a way to replace the word exerciseand all the images it conjures up.

We need to come up with something that makes people understand that exercise is no different from a colonoscopy: it is preventative medicine that could save your life….. and you will have  A LOT more fun doing it.