Being Mindful of Exercise and Why it Works

The New York Times has an article about a remarkable research project that we wrote about in February. But it is such a noteworthy finding that it is worth revisiting. The Harvard University study highlights the power of self-awareness in life improvement. In the case of this study self-awareness was used to lower blood pressure and lose weight. These are things that normally require working out or dieting to accomplish, but this time all the subjects had to do was think about it.

The psychologists told hotel maids what they did each day in cleaning rooms involved enough activity to meet the surgeon general’s recommendation of a half-hour of physical activity daily. They went into details telling them that 15 minutes of scrubbing burns 60 calories, 15 minutes of vacuuming burns 50. They also put up notices in the break room so that the maids were regularly reminded about the physical activity they were getting.

The results after a month were astounding:

The average study-group maid had lost 2 pounds, while her systolic blood pressure had dropped by 10 points; by all measures the 44 women “were significantly healthier.” Yet there were no reported changes in behavior, only in mind-set, with the vast majority of the women now considering themselves regular exercisers. [Harvard psychologist Ellen] Langer sees the study as a lesson in the importance of mindfulness, long a subject of her research, and which need not involve Buddhism or meditation, she stresses. “It’s about noticing new things; it’s about engagement,” she says.

These results add to the growing body of support for mindfulness meditation, which has been documented to affect mood and emotion and is being used in therapy. Therefore it should not be surprising that it could have a physiological effect as well. Except it is surprising to think that a group of workers could have such a profound effect over a control group with the only difference between the two being that one group was mindful of the exercise they were getting.

One should note that the opposite could hold true as well. If you are constantly thinking about and reminding yourself about your own lack of exercise then you are doing yourself a double disservice. First you are not getting in the exercise you should, second you are mindful of that lack of exercise possibly amplifying the implications of your sedentary lifestyle. Regardless, it's a great tool that can be used to help yourself in a great many ways. Best of all, all you have to do is think about it.