Many times we have said that moving more in our day to day has numerous benefits for our health : we are designed to move, and this has a better functioning of our organs and improving the cardiovascular and respiratory system, among others.

But in addition, the movement is also closely linked to our psychological health : some studies, such as this one published in 2016, conclude that people who exercise regularly and spend more time on the move are less likely to suffer from anxiety and depression.

A new study conducted by the University of Cambridge and published earlier this month has analyzed the relationship between physical activity and happiness from a positive point of view. This is a change in the approach to this subject: although previous studies have always fixed the relationship between lack of exercise and how it may be harmful to our health, in this case the study is done from the reverse perspective.

The more you move, the happier you’ll be

In order to carry out the study, an Android app was designed specifically (no longer available today) that combined questions to users with the movement data collected by the phone.

The conclusions were clear: users reported a better mood if they had been moving during the previous 15 minutes . It was also concluded that those who moved more in their daily lives, including in this “movement” from the walks to the intense exercise, were happier and with a greater degree of satisfaction in their lives.

It is a single study that can not prove causality (we can not conclude that people were happier because they moved more, or moved more because they were happier), but it does show us that happiness and movement tend to go from the hand.

11 ways to move more in your day to day

Keeping active during our day to day life is not as difficult as we think. It is true that because of our work or our studies, most of us spend a lot of time sitting , usually in front of a screen. But there are many small gestures that we can change in our daily lives to be more active.

• Mark objectives with an app and walk more every day: a few days ago we introduced Walk Spain, but there are many apps that allow us to record our daily steps and establish goals to overcome each day. A quantitative bracelet can also help us in this case.
• Learn a new dance: if you are looking for a leisure activity to do to keep you active and the gym does not draw too much attention, you can try to learn a new dance. You will guarantee a couple of hours a week of physical activity and also you can socialize in the different events and parties.

• Adopt a dog or become a foster home: if you have a puppy, you have three guaranteed walks a day, plus other games at home or in the park. If you are still not convinced to adopt, you can always try to become a host for some association: you will lend a helping hand to a dog until he finds his ideal family and you can check if you are ready to adopt.
• Tour your own city (and do it on foot): many of us are strangers in our own cities. You can, for example, design a route with your favorite buildings of your city and go to visit them on foot. Surely there are also many special places that you did not even know existed.
• Take advantage of the meal time to move a little more: in most companies, the time of the meal is usually very long, especially if we eat right there in Tupper. Take advantage of those 20 or 30 minutes that are left over at noon to go for a walk and move, instead of staying in front of the computer.
• Plan active outings with your friends or with your partner: going out to dinner or taking some reeds is phenomenal. But why not do it after playing a basketball game or doing a hiking route? Planning one of these outings twice a month will be the perfect excuse to join the group and keep you active.
• Change the escalators by the normal ones: if you go to work by subway, you have to climb several flights of stairs every day. Take advantage and start up a single sections on foot, and increase the number of stretches as the weeks pass. After a few months, your legs and your heart will thank you.

• Cycling in the city: take advantage of the fact that some cities have set up bicycle services for citizens ( BiciMad in Madrid, Bicing in Barcelona, Sevici in Seville …) and pedals to work, back home or do your shopping
• Start doing sports at home: you do not have to go to the gym if you do not like: with the help of new technologies now you can easily do sport at home. We recently explained how to start doing Yoga and Pilates at home from scratch: this can be a good starting point.
• Have fun with your children’s sports activities: Has your son or nephew gone to basketball? Nothing better to strengthen the relationship and to promote physical activity from small than share with him a party in the park.
• Get up every 45 minutes: If you spend many hours sitting at work, try to get up from the chair every 45 minutes to get moving. You can go to the bathroom, get close to where that partner is instead of sending you an e-mail, go fill your water bottle, take the opportunity to get closer to making those photocopies that you have pending … In this way you will avoid the numbness of your muscles and you can use it to clear your head too.

You do not have to implement all these changes at once: you can choose only two or three, or just start with the one you like the most and add one more every fifteen days, for example. The most important thing is to get down to work and start to move more in our day to day .