It’s a large world after all
About 1.6 billion people worldwide are now overweight. Horatia Harrod and Fred Mitting compile a guide to the countries helping to tip the scales
Read more: http://bit.ly/JfLTOK
This headline should catch our attention! Overweight and obesity are growing problems (pun intended) that lead to huge medical problems along with life style limitations that need not happen in most cases. Please take the time to read the article. It lets us know how much of a problem it is in a great many countries.
I understand. There are lots of problems ion the world and why should we pick this one to concentrate on? Well, the fact is that it is one that actually affects each one of us right now, where we are. AND, we can do something about it. Two pretty good reasons to at least give it some attention.
Obesity leads to all sorts of problems like diabetes, sleep apnea, heart problems and so on. Those are just a couple of the medical issues. Then there is the whole life-style thing! Our legs are not meant to stick out to the sides from our hip and then down to bear our weight at an angle. That makes walking very difficult. Our spines are not designed to carry such huge weights and so the disks get compressed, giving us back problems that lead to us sitting more to take the weight off. Then there are just a host of everyday, mundane activities that I will leave to your imagination to visualize. The long and the short of it is, the quality of the life is just lacking!!
You may not be obese yourself (yet?) but you need to pay attention and keep it from happening to you. More in a moment. You may know others who are obese. What to do? First of all, do not point a finger of blame or shame!!! We cannot know the story of their life (have you noticed how many of the drug adds list possible weight gain as a side-effect?). They are great individuals who are, at this point obese. Nothing more. Abandon the side-long glances at the plate of food they re eating. That is a form of judging. Don’t judge. Be supportive. If, and when, they talk about weight issues, be supportive and offer any help THEY want and ask for.
Best of all, take care of yourself! Be fit and active. Make sure you enjoy a life-long quality of life that is all that it can be. Did you know that adding 10 pounds of lean muscle mass is the equivalent of running about 1 1/2 hours a day, every day? Muscle burns 10 times more calories than fat just sitting there. So replace some fat with some lean muscle mass. You can do that even if your are overweight right now.
So, get more fit. Stay fit. Be active and happy! In short:
Live well, love always and laugh out loud every day!
