Senior News Line: Two minutes of exercise

For years we’ve heard that getting 150 minutes of exercise per week was necessary for health, and many of us didn’t even try. Working out — or walking, dancing, doing anything moderately aerobic — was beyond us and we felt like failures.

Then there was the added confusion caused by differing opinions about just how long and how many daily steps, not to mention the mammoth study that concluded the best health benefits were to be had with 700 minutes of exercise per week — that’s over 11 hours!

But how do you feel about two minutes? It turns out that two little minutes of exercise can actually have an impact and help us live longer.

There was the study that showed reduced risk of cancer and heart disease was possible by just moving for two minutes three times a day, and the study that showed two minutes of walking after meals can prevent spikes in blood sugar, and so on.

There are many easy, small ways to be more active:

• Take the stairs when they’re available. If you’re feeling especially strong, go up and down a few times.

• Do some strength training exercises — push-ups, squats, knee lifts — that target the major muscle groups, 30 seconds each of several types.

• Aim for short, intense movement: Walk briskly to the mailbox — this will also release endorphins. Cycle quickly on your exercise bike for one minute. Jog or walk in place during a TV commercial.

And what happens when we shoot for two minutes of exercise instead of a half hour that we know we can’t do?

We often decide that, yes, we can do a few minutes more and suddenly that two minutes turns into five or 10.

To quote a professor of cardiology medicine, “It turns out that anything is better than nothing.”