You might think that getting fit and boosting your heart health means spending crazy hours at the gym, sweating and getting on machines that look more like torture devices than anything that’s going to help you. Well, GOOD NEWS!  That’s not true. Here are five tips to keep your heart healthy and happy:

1. Start with activities you love
If you’ve had problems making exercise a regular part of your life, you probably only think of exercise as something you have to do in the gym. But that’s just not true! Things like walking, dancing in your living room, bowling and even cleaning the house can count as exercise as long as you’re getting a little out of breath when you’re doing them.2014-11-14 16.06.29

2. Embrace the power of 10
Think you can’t get heart-health benefits from just 10-minute bouts of activity? Think again. Ten minutes of walking three times a day has been shown to lower blood pressure more effectively than a longer 30-minute bout of walking. Something as simple as walking before work, over lunch and after dinner is a fabulous way to squeeze in exercise – no gym required!

3. It’s not just about cardio
When people think of heart-healthy exercise, they generally think of aerobic or cardio activities like jogging. But did you know that strength training (think lifting weights or doing bodyweight exercises like push-ups and lunges) can improve the health of your heart, too?  When you lift weights at a moderate intensity, you get your heart rate up. This means that you’re working both your muscular system and your cardiovascular system. And when you make your muscles stronger, you make your body stronger, which helps everything. So definitely do some resistance training a few times a week.

4. Use exercise to de-stress
Stress plays a critical role in heart health, and exercise is great at kicking stress to the curb. Learn to see exercise not as something that you have to do, but instead as something you want to do because it makes you feel good. While most workouts will pump up your feel-good endorphins, workouts like yoga, PiYo and Tai Chi are especially good for de-stressing and improving the mind-body connection. Try ’em!

5. Support your efforts with a healthy diet
Working out – as awesome as it is – is only part of the heart-health equation. Eating a nutritious diet that’s rich in fruits, veggies, whole grains, lean proteins and healthy fats is key to overall health, along with helping to give you the energy you need to power through those workouts and your everyday life.

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