Posts tagged Phd
Do The Reebok Easytone Trainers Really Work?
Sep 24th
Sports giants Reebok have claimed that their Reebok Easytone trainers can improve the tone of your hamstrings, calves and bum by nearly 30% more than regular trainers just by walking. They claim the trainers can “train muscles your trainers never knew you had.”
They seem too good to be true; you can exercise the same amount or simply walk around and your legs and behind get a workout that would usually take hours a day at the gym. But do they actually work or is this all just some marketing campaign? A team of scientists with backgrounds in exercise, sport and physiology at the University of Wisconsin conducted a study to test the claims on each of the shoes.
Heading up the test was John Porcari PhD who agrees that in theory the trainers should work the muscles harder because it creates instability that the body attempts to counteract. The shoes are based on a curved sole which creates an unstable surface which forces the wearer’s body to constantly struggle to find equilibrium.
The team tested the Reetone range on a group of females aged between 19 and 24. The subjects were tested through exercise trials and measured by muscle activation, heart rate and caloric expenditure.
The trails were also conducted with a group aged 21 to 27 and both groups were tested with regular trainers to compare. The first results were not impressive, using the Reetone trainers did not increase caloric expenditure or heart rate and only produced aching of the muscles.
The scientists also surveyed users of the shoes over a period of several months and found that they experienced a degree of toning of the legs and bum. But the team struggled to determine whether the toning was entirely due to the imbalance the shoes created or the motivation to walk more.
Five Steps to Enjoying the Journey
Sep 9th
When I was a child, I had a recurring dream in which I was leaping from the top of one pillar to another and each pillar started to fall the moment I landed on it, so I had to keep leaping.
As an adult, this is the way I’ve lived my life – leaping from one accomplishment to another – degrees, accreditation, various different careers. My mother used to say it made her tired just listening to me, because I was always pursuing new challenges.
But it struck me one day when I was saying to her, “I can’t wait ’til I finish this program and get my certification” and she said “Don’t wish your life away!” She was so right! I was failing to enjoy the journey.
I also realized how different my husband’s attitude is! To him, life is a “walk in the woods”. He truly enjoys the moment. When we went to England to do our PhD’s, I was always working hard and focused on the goal, while he simply enjoyed the process itself. To him, the goal was incidental but not that important. He was simply enjoying the research he was involved in.
This difference in attitude was even more evident when we returned from England and searched for employment. For six months, I was frantic and impatient, while my husband enjoyed our little ‘vacation’. He said “Relax and enjoy this time. Before you know it, we’ll be back in the grind, with very little time off.”
We have both accomplished many things in our lives, but I lived in a state of “gotta get THERE” and he lived in the state “Isn’t THIS amazing”.
So many people live all their lives, waiting for the future. You hear them say “when I graduate…”, “when I have a family…”, “when the kids are grown up…”, “when I retire…”. Life happens but we’re not there.
Here are five steps that may help you to live and enjoy life fully in the present:
Take responsibility for where you are now. Some people say “Well I have to provide for my children”, but you decided to have children and you did that for a reason! So your next choice is to decide HOW to provide for them. No matter what limiting beliefs you have, you DO have choices about where to go next. Set your next goal, creatively finding a way to achieve a joyful life, while fulfilling your responsibilities. This requires: introspection (to find what makes your heart sing), research (to investigate the possibilities) and courageous leaps of imagination (to overcome limiting beliefs about what is possible). Focus on the moment and savor the journey. As my mother said, “Don’t wish your life away”. Appreciate what you have now and find the joy in every moment. If your children are little, take a moment to appreciate them, because when they grow up and leave home, you will miss these times. So don’t miss it now! Welcome challenges and failures as skill-building opportunities. Challenges help us to get creative. Sometimes you will seek out a mentor. These experiences will also help you to become a mentor to others. All the best teachers tell us about their challenges and failures because these were the times when they learned the most. Remain flexible. If at some point, you feel that this is not the direction you want to go, allow yourself to reconsider and modify your goal to something that truly inspires and energizes you. I have changed careers many times in my life and everyone thought I was crazy, but what others think does not matter – as long as you follow your heart, you can never go wrong.”Enjoying the journey” does not mean “not planning”. It means planning with both your heart and your mind and then immersing yourself in the journey with all your heart, learning and changing direction as you go, accepting all the ups and downs and always moving in the direction of your joy.
