When was the last time you took a moment and celebrated your body? Not because it’s well built or attractive by society’s standards– but because it’s an impressive piece of functional art. We’ve assembled some interesting facts that will help you appreciate your body and keep you motivated to take care of it.
Boost your burning power. Did you know that for every 1 lb of muscle you gain, your body burns an extra 50 calories a day? If you can turn at least 5 lbs of extra “fat” into muscle, you will automatically burn an additional 250 calories per day.
A mini-Charles Atlas. Muscles are comprised of muscle fibers. Each fiber is thinner than a human hair and can support up to 1,000 times its own weight.
Use it or lose it. By age 65, people who haven’t engaged in regular exercise may incur a decrease in their muscular strength level by as much as 80%.
Make your move. A muscle moves by contracting and by its motion, you move. As a machine for moving, a muscle is pretty efficient, using about 35-50% of its potential energy.
More than a few. The human body has more than 650 muscles.
Unique in its own way. No two muscles in the body have exactly the same function. When one muscle is paralyzed, either stability of the body part is impaired or some specific movement is lost.
Watch your step. Forward locomotion such as walking or running is actually the process of losing and catching one’s balance.
The cellulite myth. There is no such thing as cellulite. The skin sometimes appears lumpy in fatty areas of the body because strands of connective tissue attach the skin to underlying structures. These points of attachment may pull tight where the fat is thick, making lumps appear between them. The fat itself is not different from excess fat anywhere else in the body. So, if you reduce body fat, you will begin to lose the lumpy appearance.
Spot reducing de-bunked. Spot reducing will not reduce the fat itself in a specific area of the body. Strength training specific areas of the body will strengthen the underlying muscle, but fat reduction is only accomplished by burning more calories than you take in.
The cardiovascular chain. Your body has approximately 60,000 miles of blood vessels that not only oxygenate the tissues of the body and unburden them of wastes, but also act as stringent regulators of the body’s environment.
Stressful miles. If you are 25 lbs overweight, you have nearly 5,000 extra miles of blood vessels through which your heart must pump blood.
Taking a break. Your heart rests between beats. Over a normal lifespan, your heart stands still for about 20 years.
Now that’s pressure. Your blood rushes through your arteries with enough pressure to lift a column of blood five feet into the air.
Safety valves. When you stand up, if you didn’t have valves in your veins, all the blood in your body would literally fall downward, filling up your feet and legs.