7 Ways to Move More at Midlife

If the fountain of youth were to exist, you would probably benefit more by walking to the fountain than drinking from it. Staying active is essential to prevent the acceleration of aging in your body. The good news: You don’t have to be an elite athlete to turn back the clock.

“Movement and activity preserve youth,” says Mo Hagan, health and anti-aging expert based in London, Ontario. “Physical activity helps to maintain a healthy metabolism at the cellular level. It helps slow down the aging process and ward off the diseases attached to obesity — diabetes, heart disease, and many others. Plus, the hormonal changes that take place in an older woman will interfere with her ability to gain muscle, to sleep soundly, to have clear mindful focus. These things all decline with age. Physical activity will help correct all of that, as long as you are doing enough of the right thing on a regular basis consistently.”

Here are a few sustainable ways to help you keep moving on a consistent basis and help turn back time:

1. Commit to a Walking Program at Midlife

“Everyone knows how to walk,” says Hagan. “You don’t need to have a gym membership or personal trainer. Just moving your body, using the larger muscles of your legs consistently, is a great start. I like to say that more is better than some, and some is better than none. You can start slowly and build your way up to five or six days a week.”

Legendary distance swimmer Diana Nyad has created a group called EverWalk to help encourage over one million Americans to begin walking each day. The group will soon be launching an initiative called “The Hundred.” Those signed up will make a commitment to walk approximately 3.4 miles per day on average, or 100 miles per month. Nyad has even begun leading 10-mile walks on the first Saturday of every month herself. “People say to me, ‘You want me to walk 10 miles? I can’t even walk down to get the newspaper!’" Nyad says. “And I tell them, well today you are going to walk a half mile, and a month from now, you are going to walk two miles. It may sound like an unreachable dream, but before you know it, you’ll be walking the 10 miles with us.”

2. Learn to Love Water Aerobics and Water Walking

For those who enjoy the pool, movement for your body under water can be an excellent way to increase your low-impact activity. “The pool is like a 360-degree weight room,” Hagan says. “The resistance of the water is something like 800 times the resistance of air, and it creates resistance no matter which way you move, push, or pull.” Hagan also says that water helps to expand your joint base, which can help stiffness you may feel on land. “It also takes away the fear of falling while you are exercising.” she says. “It’s nearly impossible to slip and fall while walking in the pool.” Your local YMCA is a great place to start looking for water aerobics classes in your area.

3. Start Boxing to Boost Upper Body Strength and Manage Midlife Weight

Say hello to boxing gloves and goodbye to batwings. Boxing is the type of high-intensity interval training that is perfect for women looking to maintain their weight and upper body strength. “Most older women do not like the way their arms look,” says Hagan. “But when they box, and they can feel the strength in their upper body and arms, they become devoted to it, because they love the way it makes them look.” Beyond the boutique boxing gyms that have sprung up around the country, more women than ever before are heading to where the pros train to become students of the sweet science.

“In the last five years, we’ve seen our female membership rise by over 50 percent,” says Jenaro Diaz, owner of Church Street Boxing Gym in New York City. “Not only is it younger women looking to compete, but you are seeing older women getting into the ring to spar with one another. These women are absolutely fearless. Once you have the courage to spar (in a controlled environment), you’ll have the courage to face almost anything in life.”

4. Maintain Muscle and Protect Bones With Strength Training

Muscles gets more meaningful, and building it becomes more essential, at midlife. “With every decade of life, a woman can become weaker and weaker,” Hagan says. "When women lose muscle mass and gain body weight, it sets them up for all of the negative things that influence overall health.” Hagan believes that you need to at least maintain the muscle you have if you want to continue to do the things you love doing. But it’s preferable to build additional muscle later in life. “People can begin by doing simple exercises using their own body weight,” she says. “With the help of a trainer, you can then add resistance bands and dumbbells to help get even stronger.” The strength exercises Hagan recommends include the following:

Plank Start on hands and knees on the floor. Hold your body in a push up position with your back straight. If you need to make it a little easier, you can rest your knees on the floor as well. You can also alter this by also holding your body up with your forearms pressed against the floor.

Pushup Start on hands and knees. Lie down with your chest touching the floor and push your upper body off the ground using your hands and arms to help lift your upper body. You can start with your knees on the ground at first. As you get stronger, keep knees off of the ground.

Hip Bridges Start seated on the floor. Lie down with back and the soles of your feet touching the ground, knees bent. Slowly lift hips off the ground and draw in your navel until your back and upper legs are in a straight line.

Squats Begin by sitting in a chair. Raise your body to stand from the chair without using your hands or arms for assistance. Repeat. You want the focus to be on your leg and glute muscles.

Lunge Start standing. Take one step forward and drop your body downward until your knee is bent at a 90-degree angle. Then come back to stand with your feet together and repeat with the opposite leg.

5. Practice, or Deepen Your Practice, With Yoga

Beyond the strength and flexibility that comes from practicing yoga, Hagan believes it is the mindfulness that is an even greater benefit. “As women hit their forties and fifties, there is a big attraction of having a more mindful awareness of who they are and where they are,” Hagan says. “It’s about releasing the negative thoughts that hold you back from being authentically you, and showing up as someone confident and without fear. As your hormones change, you experience this racing feel — everything seems like it’s faster, faster, faster. Your heart races and you feel a bit out of control. It’s really important to know how to breathe slowly and deeply center yourself, to bring yourself back to that grounding, so that you can resume where you are in your day and feel in control. Practicing yoga can help bring you that mindfulness each day.”

Yoga Finder can help you find the studios closest to you.

6. Get out on the Golf Course

Thinking of golf as a man’s game is a mistake. “Women can easily outplay men on the golf course in their fifties and sixties if they maintain their strength and flexibility,” Hagan says. The sport combines a bit of strength and flexibility (swinging the club), leg strength (skipping the cart and walking between shots), and the meditative quiet of nature to relax your mind. “You can golf well into the later years of your life,” says Hagan. GolfLink can help you find the course closest to your area to get started.

7. Dance, Dance, Dance

Hagan has seen a massive uptick in women taking dance since the growing popularity of television shows such as So You Think You Can Dance and Dancing With the Stars. “Dancing is one of the most fun ways you can continue to be active,” says Hagan. “Not only is it a great way to stay fit, but it provides the social support that so many people need, and you can do it anywhere.”

Bustin’ moves may do more than burn calories. According to a study published online December 2018 in the Scandinavian Journal of Medicine & Science in Sports, dancing may help older women maintain the ability to perform daily tasks. It’s unclear exactly why dancing was linked to a reduced risk of disability related to so-called activities of daily life (ADL), but the authors note the numerous factors that dancing requires. In addition to balance, strength, and endurance, a dancer needs cognitive ability, adaptability, and concentration to move with the music and her partner, artistry for graceful and fluid motion, and memory for choreography.

USA Dance has chapters all over the United States where they will help you get started in social dancing.

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