By a raise of your hands, how many of you live in pain every day? How many of you have aches that prohibit you from performing the basic functions that are required of you during your day? It is estimated that 60% of Americans suffer from some form of aches and pains every day. This seems to be growing at an alarmingly high rate. So many people are on medications for arthritis, back pain, headaches, stomach pain, and hip pain. You can literally go to your doctor and say you have an ache or pain somewhere in your body and they will prescribe a pill for you to take. Something about this does not sound right to me.

Now, without knowing an exact percentage, I would venture to say that a good majority of those people that have aches and pains do not exercise, are somewhat overweight, take prescription drugs and mope around everyday wondering why they are not getting any better. Well, perhaps you have heard of this thing called EXERCISE! This is not a new concept. People have been doing some form of exercise for as long as people have been around. Cavemen used to run and hunt for their food (also could be a fear of getting eaten by big wild animals). Knights from the Middle Ages used to perform various physical feats just to win the tournament or the girl. My dad used to play stoop ball back when he was a young boy in the 1950's. The point I am getting at is we as humans have always been physically active. Being outside, playing ball, running, jumping, lifting things and throwing, that is what our bodies crave.

You may be wondering how you can fit exercise or any kind of activity into your very busy schedule. Well, you just answered your own question... schedule it! That's right, put exercising into your weekly schedule and treat it like it's as important to you as completing your project at work. I'll tell you right now, without it, living in pain and taking those prescription drugs, you will not be around to complete those work projects because you will be in to much pain, sick or even worse... I forgot to mention, your family will not have the benefit of YOU as a parent to tell them to get out and be active. It does not stop at you, the children follow exactly what you do as a parent, it's time to set a good example for your children.

I see nowadays that the National Football League is promoting 60 minutes of physical activity per day for every child. They can see that staying active in some form has tremendous benefits towards living a healthy lifestyle. This pushing of our youth should not stop at our youth, being an adult means acting responsible, how can you tell your children to be active and exercise when you sit in front of the TV with them instead of playing ball with them. I challenge you to take time for yourself to get in any kind of exercise. Maybe you take your dog for a walk, a bike ride sounds like fun or get into the local gym and find a trainer that can help you with planning the best exercise program for YOU. Becoming more active helps stretch out your muscles, lubricates your joints; your core gets stronger, your posture improves, more blood flow gets to those tight muscles and the best thing of all happens, you feel no pain. I would even venture to say that your stress levels will decrease. There in itself is a huge reason why people are in as much pain as they are in. I'll leave that to the next article though.

There are so many reasons why people DO NOT live in pain; there are also so many people that live in pain. Which way do you want to live out your days? Myself, I choose to be pain free. I would love for you to join me in that feeling.