Morning Walks For Faster Weight Loss

0:00A walk in the morning can help, help, I say, actually help you lose weight. Hi, I'm Dave. Welcome to Walking Is Fitness, a daily 10-minute podcast designed to provide you with a little added motivation to get out the door, take the walk, and even more importantly, build a life-changing walking habit. Today's 10-minute walk starts right after this. So my son sent me a text showing me how big his tax refund is this year. There was a time where a refund that big would have actually had a negative impact on our finances because I would have gotten sloppy with our spending. Thanks to Monarch, that season, now in the review mirror, simplify your finances with Monarch. Monarch is the all-in-one personal finance tool designed to make your life easier. Rings your entire financial life, so budgeting, accounts and investments, net worth, future planning, all together in one dashboard on your phone or laptop.

1:03Feel aware and in control of your finances this tax season and get 50% off your Monarch subscription with code fitness. Thanks to Monarch, we have now stayed in budget three months in a row. That hasn't happened in a long time and it feels great. Thank you for your financial goals for good with Monarch. The all-in-one tool that makes money management simple. Use code fitness at monarch.com for half off your first year. That's 50% off at monarch.com code fitness. I'm not even sure I'm allowed to say this. I don't think of it as my daily health drink. I now think of it as my daily fountain of youth drink. I've been enjoying AG1 for three months and one of the things I'm feeling is energy in the afternoon, which is usually my slump time of the day. And I'm about you, but more energy makes me feel younger. The superfoods and B vitamins and AG1 provide nutritional support to help you to stay steady

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3:05That was always great when I was working the overnight shift, doing radio. My normal five and a half hour, six hour shift was shortened by an hour, it's like oh, this is fun. Of course what we tend to focus on, if you're not doing a radio shift, a live radio shift, what we tend to focus on is getting that extra hour of daylight in the evening. And multiple times, even I've been out walking this week after dinner, and I've said you know what, this time next week, we're going to be in daylight, it's going to change everything, or maybe not everything, it'll change a lot. The walks will look different, they're also going to feel different. Once that sun drops below the horizon, things get dramatically cooler here in South Carolina. So having that sun up longer makes these March post dinner walks much more comfortable, much more pleasant, and we are looking forward to that by the way, tomorrow.

4:10I'm going to talk about how you can use the time change to supersize this walking habit that you have. So most people look forward to the time change, getting that extra hour of daylight in the evening. I do as well, but I will also confess that I'm a little sad about the impact on my mornings. The sun's been coming up earlier and earlier. I love that. This morning, in fact, I went out on our back porch, we had a screened in porch, and the sun was pre-sunrise, but there was early daylight, it was brightening up, and the birds, right on cue, the birds. The birds were waking up, and it was a chorus of bird song, and I love that. And the idea that that's now going to be an hour later makes me a little sad. But I love mornings.

5:12If I ever stop doing walking as fitness, I'll probably focus on how mornings are magical. In fact, one of the things that I have had to really control to a certain degree is I love mornings so much, and this is not an exaggeration, it really isn't. I love mornings so much that I will try to live my entire day before 10 a.m., and what that means is all the things that I have to do, all the creative, fun projects, the tasks, try to get them all done before 10 a.m., because I've got energy, I'm thinking better, I'm more creative, I'm more motivated, exercise, let's get that done in the morning, reading, coffee, the whole thing, I try to do it all in the morning, and for a while, that was actually stressful, I'm trying to cram all this in, so I would make sure that I woke up early enough to get everything done, and it sounds silly, and it sounds crazy, and

6:18over the last year or so, being aware that this is what I've been trying to do, and the stress that that has added to my mornings, I've been intentional about slowing the pace of my mornings down, keep telling myself you don't have to do it all before 10 a.m., if you sleep longer and get a later start, that's not only okay, that's good, and this morning actually was one of those mornings, slept a little bit later than I usually do, woke up and thought, oh, okay, calm down, just take it slow, you don't have to get everything done by 10 a.m., anyhow, the point of sharing all that with you is just to underscore how much I love mornings, and I could easily shift the focus of this podcast from walking to the magic of mornings, and when it's really specials when I can marry the two together, when I can talk about the magic of mornings, and walking, and how there are added benefits,

7:25extra benefits, to taking an early morning walk, and if losing weight is one of the things that motivates you to walk, there's research behind walking, and I'll expand that exercise, and intentional movement in the morning, especially before you eat, that can actually help you lose weight faster, so I'm going to talk about three specific things that are happening when you walk in the morning, and if you're a morning person, and you're already doing this, maybe you can be a little more intentional about when you do it, if you're not a morning person, like my wife, Eva, the idea, in fact, I left the house this morning, she was still in bed, the idea of doing anything in the morning is like really, seriously, having said that, three things that are happening, when you consistently walk in the morning, movement

8:29in the morning, exercise in the morning, number one, it jump starts your metabolism, and here's the thing, it not only jump starts it as you're doing it, it keeps your metabolism running a little bit higher throughout the entire day, which means you're burning more calories, potentially losing weight faster, so intentional movement, intentional exercise, intentional walking in the morning gets that metabolism started, and that has an impact throughout the rest of the day, number two, and this is a timing issue, taking the walk, the intentional walk, with a little bit of intensity, before you eat, does something really great, your body is burning fat for fuel because you haven't eaten anything, and

9:32you need fuel, and you take that walk before you eat, your body is burning fat for fuel, you can just camp on that one for a moment, that right there might be the biggest reason to get up early, take the walk, start moving before you eat, and then number three, naturally, our cortisol levels, that's the body's stress hormone, which is a good thing when it's needed, it's not a good thing when it's not needed, naturally our cortisol levels are higher in the morning, cortisol can actually lead to, wait for it, belly fat, and by the way I'm not a doctor, not a licensed personal trainer, this podcast is for education and entertainment purposes only, when you take that walk in the morning, when you add in movement in the morning,

10:36you're starting to reduce those cortisol levels, which is a really good thing, especially in terms of belly fat, and I'm going to add one more, one more benefit of movement in the morning, walking in the morning, which is kind of tied to this idea of lowering cortisol, walking as I've said a lot, and we'll continue to say, is a great way to calm anxiety, to manage stress, so not only does it have that impact on the whole belly fat thing, when you start the day calmer, with lower stress, you also reduce the risk of stress eating, and if that is an issue that you're dealing with as you're trying to lose weight, that can be huge, starting the day calmer, less stress, less motivation to just start eating to

11:40take care of that, so three, actually four reasons to take an intentional walk in the morning, specifically before you eat, it can actually help you lose weight faster, and this time tomorrow, now I'm up, I think the sunrise was maybe an hour and a half ago, so it'll, if I come out same time tomorrow, it'll look different, but it'll still be light, but I'm going from a sunrise at this morning, it was 6.30, like 6.36, and then tomorrow morning, it'll be 7.36, but of course, you know, we're heading into more daylight, regardless, so I will be enjoying that as we move closer to the start of summer, the day's getting longer, more opportunities to get outside, and enjoy nature, and I'm walking through the wooded trail, as we speak, thanks, thanks for listening,

12:46I am back tomorrow, in the meantime I hope you have an amazing day. Support is available 24-7 with verbo care, we're here day or night, ready whenever you need help, because a great trip starts with the right support.