Day 34 - Save Your Pennies, You Don't Need Brazilian Butt Lift!

A song for you, to the tune of the Bellamy Brothers "Let Your Love Flow":

Oh, when you're walkin'

You know it feels good

No need for talkin'

Just get out in the 'hood

And let your lymph flow

It don't matter if you

Don't have a reason 

chorus:
Oh let your lymph flow, 

And just let your arms swing

Yes, let your lymph flow

It'll make your heart sing

Stay off the treadmill,

It's not a nat-u-ral thing

It's for stroke vic-tims...

Uh-huh. For reals. Did you know that?

You know that lymph flows best when you're in a natural walking state, arms swinging in a relaxed, reflex-driven motion. 

You might not know why I want you to NEVER walk on a treadmill. 

When you walk outside, you extend a leg behind you (using your gluteal muscle, or butt), and then push off on that leg to take your next step. 

Easy-peasy, rice and cheesy, huh?

But, when you use a treadmill for walking, you don't extend that leg and push off, because the ground is already moving underneath you. You CAN'T push off. You have to LIFT your leg. Which makes you walk more like this:

When you are on a treadmill, you are PICKING UP your leg each time. Instead of using your butt muscles to extend a leg to walk, as nature intended, you are using your hip flexors, which are these:

WHOA! These suckers are already completely overused for the other stuff you do all day! Like this:

And this

And this

And this

And even this

So you want to get on a treadmill and overuse them some more? And under use your B-U-T-T? 

Why?

You want a nice caboose? Get out and walk. 

Can I get an "AMEN"?

A fact you may not have known:

Treadmills--the relative of the kind we use in gyms today--were developed to aid stroke victims who could not walk well (or at all) on their own. It was a device that could help retrain the muscles/brain for perambulation while securing the patient in a safe, upright position. 

Great for stroke victims, but not for you. You are working the wrong walking muscles when you're on that treadmill. You are not promoting proper muscle development. Same thing with running on one, if you feel you must run. 

Personally, I believe we should only be running when being chased by tigers. 

 

Okay, I'm done. 

As a side note, I don't "hate" many things, but I do hate marionettes. Those of you who know me, know that there is little I fear. However, I've had this inexplicable fear of clowns and marionettes ever since I could remember. Recently, I found out that when we'd stay at my grandparents' place, my big brothers used to chase a 4-year old me around the dark, musty storage barn with a CLOWN MARIONETTE, chanting "I'm going to kill you, Dani, I'm going to kill you!"

That explains a lot, I guess.

Don't walk like a marionette today, please.

Dani

Day 28--Lymph Labyrinth...say it five times fast!

Yesterday in HoopFit class, I was telling one of my students about this blog/project, and she asked, "Oh, do you even walk when you're sick?"

"I dunno," I replied, "I haven't been sick yet!"

This, of course, was code for: Haha, Universe, you big dumb donkey! I have not been sick yet! Make me sick. Okay, you cosmic butthead??

Woke up today with my body on fire, woke up today with my body on fire. 

So, I'm a little fluish today. And I have to walk, right? I got a blog, man, I HAVE to walk. 

It was a short walk. After all, I AM sick. 

But something sort of cool began to happen a few minutes in. 

I began to feel better. I don't think it's just the fresh air or light rain. I suspect---and I'm no scientist---that this pick-up in health was due to the circulation of lymph. 

Lymph, you ask?

Yes. Your lymph system is basically your body's sewer system. It takes blurgy, blechy waste AWAY from your cells and out of your body. When you exhale, poop, scrub your skin, sweat or pee, out goes waste. Courtesy of Mr. Lymphy.

Nice, huh? I think that the waste produced by the icky bug inside my body was building up while I sat with my recovering daughter (yes, she was sick yesterday) and was then carried out of my cells when I started walking.

Something to note: The lymphatic system has no pump, such as the heart, to make it circulate. Instead, lymphatic fluid is circulated as a side effect of the heartbeat and muscle movement. Guess what I'm going to say next.
 

Did you know that walking is the premier way to move lymph through your body, so that it can grab that waste from your blood and get it out? 

Now you do. 

Walk today, so that you can tomorrow.

XOX, 
Dani