Is Karate Good For Health

I've been practicing karate since the age of 12. Even though my training level has definitely lowed since that early stage, as I chose not to become a professional of martial arts, I still practice regularly at the age of 41. When I was younger my physical condition led me approach karate more like a sport, even though I recognized it was far more than that. But now that I can't expect my body a top level sport performance, my attitude towards karate has changed, making me focus more on all those non-sport aspects that may still give my practice great value and sense.

When practicing martial arts or any other sport, health is a matter that shouldn't be disregarded. After all, many people start practicing a sport with the goal to improve their health condition.

Karate is basically an aerobic training. Unless competitiveness is your goal, before starting to train, a simple physical examination from a sport physician would be enough. If you plan to practice competitiveness, further examinations may be required by the gym, according to federation guidelines.

In karate training we basically distinguish two phases. The first is warm-up and physical conditioning, which is basically a set of exercises to warm-up, stretch and empower muscles, bones and body structure. The goal is to make the practicing body become stronger, harder and more flexible. Exercises may vary from gym to gym, also depending on master, style and federation.

The second phase is the technical training, or the karate training itself. This is the phase in which sequences of repeated attacks and defenses are trained; they may be solo sequences or against a physical opponent.

Karate requires flexibility, force, endurance and agility as physical attributes; mental concentration, patience, strength of will and pain resistance as psychological ones.

Karate training philosophy focuses on stressing the body in order to make it acquire more resistance to blows, while providing more precision, force and speed in performing attacks and defenses. The idea is to stress the body to its limits to eventually go beyond them. It is an inheritance of its glorious past, when people practiced karate for survival reasons.

Karate, when properly practiced, can provide a healthy person even more health and a well-being sensation related to the improved control over his or her body. However, some precautions have to be taken in order to avoid troubles related to over-training and over-stressing . As practice is constantly demanding extra efforts, some more delicate parts of the body such as knees and spine may suffer troubles in the long run. It is essential, in order to limit side effects, to execute movements correctly, to avoid knee joint over-torsions and to stop training when the attention level is very low.

Living an Active and Healthy Lifestyle With Sports

Living a quality, healthy lifestyle is more important than the chronological age of a person. To live a healthy lifestyle means to be consciously aware of the choices you make and the things you do that are good for the body, mind and spirit. One of the basic components of having a quality, healthy lifestyle is, of course, eating the right kind of foods and having an active lifestyle such as participating in sports, which in turn, is really helpful.

More and more women, nowadays, are being active in any kind of sports to attain the right fitness and health. Aside from the fact that health starts with your diet, it is also important that we live an active lifestyle to be able to attain a healthy lifestyle. Living an active lifestyle means that you have to sweat it out! Though it does not necessarily mean that you participate in a lot of sports, but it is good that you have participation in other outdoor activities.

The idea of having an active lifestyle is very important for the fact that we get the right kind of exercise that we needed to be fit and healthy. Women in sports are absolutely benefiting a healthy lifestyle. Working out at the local gym is what other women were engaged in and it is simply considerable because exercising should be included in your daily regimen if you want to maintain a healthy lifestyle and live a quality life. You can start slowly if you have not engaged in any physical or strenuous activity for a while. Any form of exercise that will increase blood to the heart and increase oxygen to the body and vital organs will help to keep you working at your optimum and full of vitality and strength.

On the other hand, living a healthy and active lifestyle means getting rid of guilt-filled pleasure. Participating in sports and other outdoor activities can be helpful in the diversion of your attention and avoiding from any addictive behaviors that are detrimental to your body, mind, and spirit. If you are really determined to avoid vices and/or willing to make the necessary changes, you will find that the benefits you get from sports and other outdoor activities will definitely be well worth the effort.

Finally, living a healthy and active lifestyle means keeping and maintaining a happy perspective and outlook in life. To stay fit and healthy, you have to keep your mind as well as body active. Sports and other outdoor activities will keep your imagination and body energy flowing to inspire you to also find inner happiness and help others along the way.