We interrupt this program...

I know I said we would follow up last week's conversation with another skin sin, however, I would like to interrupt that train of thought.   I am currently studying for the Alberta Fitness Leadership Certification exam.  The reading I did from the text book today was about target heart rate and the role exercise has on lowering one's target heart rate. The argument is that if you exercise your heart muscle your resting heart rate will lower. The theory is that the less beats you take now, the more you to have later.  Kind of like saving gas by not driving your car every day.  You can save heart beats to be used later because your heart muscle is programmed to have only so many beats in it's life span. You can use them all now or you can save some for later!  Your choice.  I am happy to say that since I started practicing Nia my resting heart rate has decreased from 78 beats per minute (80 is average for women of my age) to 60 beats per minute!  Factors that are responsible for lowering resting heart rate are  regular exercise and  decreasing stress.  People look at Nia and think that it is just a fun and easy movement class.  Which it is, but more importantly it is releasing stress!  So it is the perfect form of exercise because not only are we moving and working our cardiovascular system. The practice releases stress that is held in the tissues of the body (read FAT between the lines). Fitness is the by product of the playful practice of Nia! I started this blog saying that it was interrupting our discussion about skin, but now that it is written it really does relate to good skin.  As I said in the last entry, stress does damage to our skin.  So here is one way to lower your heart rate, get physically fit and have glowing skin!  The healing power of NIa!!!