Active Body Active Mind

This is a very relative question. The answer varies from person to person. It cannot be expected that a sportsman and a general person would define activity by the same scale of measurement. The scale has to vary and so does the definition. 

In this article we are more interested in people in the academic world, mainly students and teachers. So our definition of activity would not go at par with a sportsman but may be more related to any average person in terms of physical activities. 

Human beings are always active. Parts of our body organs and brain are even active when we are asleep. And when we are awake all parts of our body and brain are quite active and consume enough calories. 

So we will not talk about that base level activity. Our interest will be quite a little higher than that. But not as high as a sportsman or so. Our usual average students and teachers usually are not expected to consume calories and be active moderately. 

One may say any usual student or teacher is already in activities. School or college studies, coaching and home studies, personal works, household works and so on. There are so many activities for a student or a teacher that often they can face problems of time management. So where is the need for more activities?

And the fact is these are all collateral activities. For example, the purpose of studies is not to do activities but to do studies and learn facts and develop knowledge. And in the process of studying, students and teachers need to perform activities. And that activity also can largely vary from student to student and teacher to teacher. 

Not all students need the same activity to learn. Some can learn faster than many others. So this definition of activity also is not the standardized one. So we do not consider these as concerned activities for our purpose of discussion over here.  

So we will discuss those activities that are with the primary purpose of activities only. It’s true that such activities hardly exist. Even when a player plays his sport then he does a lot of activities but there also his primary objective is to win. Still the activities of playing an outdoor sport is recommended for our purpose. 

For our purpose here, we can take activities as physical exercises or workouts of different types. These are far more standardized activities with at least more centralization on activities only. And such activities will contribute to active body and active mind. 

There are direct exercises and there are indirect exercises. Like one may choose to do morning or evening walk which will become an example of direct exercise. Also one can choose to walk to the office or market and back. That is also walking but with dual objectives. Sometimes there can be more objectives to a single job (like saving commutation expenditure). 

Though both are indeed walking and both seem to be equal, still both can be totally different. It all depends on the individual and his or her requirements as well as living philosophies. The same walking can be different depending on the way we take them. If we do that for health then we will try to maintain other relevant health oriented moods and methods. We will eat healthy, live healthy, sleep healthy. 

But if the walking is for any other purpose than physical activity, then that cannot anyhow motivate us to eat healthy and live healthy. Instead we will keep compromising our health and even that walking will also become an agent of compromising our health. 

A lot of people do hard work. But that does not mean that a lot of people reap the benefits of a healthy and active body as well as a healthy and active mind. Why so? Because activities are not just about working hard or to keep moving. But it is more about working smartly hard and to keep fit and healthy. There are a lot of biological laws and rules governing our activity and benefit ratios. If we follow all the grammars, then we can easily reap results, otherwise the reverse we have to take.  

As a direct product of Nature and as a winner by theory of survival, we are made to stay healthy and active and not the reverse. It is we who by our lack of understanding and even more underestimating the Natural rules create such weakness within ourselves that we have to think and worry about how to remain fit and active. So it is we who need to change our philosophies and perspectives on being fit and active by both mind and body.

Now we can further our discussion on some ways to keep ourselves active. Many of us speak of being active but often we do not or cannot be one. Being active does not mean that we will do some work at some point of time with some amount of energy and enthusiasm. 

Being active is a spontaneously continuous process that works deep inside our body and mind including our own logical and philosophical beliefs and mindsets. If so then only we can undertake the entire load of being active and still keeping healthy enough, often even more than the much lesser active peoples. 

Being active starts from very small things and transforms to much higher things for the purpose of doing. Small things means small gestures and actions. 

Like, we can opt to walk a little everyday. Nowadays we are having many different options in our life that would discourage us to get out and walk. Now we can get all our daily necessities right at our doorstep. This is good in one way and not so good for the way to our health.

This is something about the individual thought process and philosophy. That’s why I said before that the question of being active can depend on our logical and philosophical mindset. Staying healthy is much more a matter of philosophy than sports and activities. Sports and activities are somehow matters of mind more than body. 

When we have an active body, then already we have an active mind from a perspective. Otherwise who will drive the active body? 

Our brain or mind is the main driving unit of our biological system, including our body. Without the proper delegation of different parts of the brain, we cannot carry out even the most basic activities of our limb or other voluntary or involuntary organs. 

So when we use our body organs better and faster then we may understand that somewhere behind that there is some part of the brain that is also active equivalently. More is the performance of the body parts, more activity and efficiency will be demanded from the brain and mind also. 

And exactly this works vice versa. When we try to make our body parts active and efficient then indirectly we are also trying to make our brain and mind active and efficient (at least portions of them). 

This is the base theory on which this article is written. We can assume that every activity we maintain for our body also creates a lasting impression on the mind and brain. And we are trying to use this as a means of developing an active brain (at least partially).

When we are talking about fitness of mind and brain, there are so many factors that can directly or indirectly affect fitness and activity efficiency. One major factor is neuronal stimulation. Almost all kinds of activities generate or trigger some degree of neuronal stimulation. Such simulations often lead to new synapses or neuronal connection creations which is the most important issue of an active and young brain. 

As we grow our neuronal stimuli go reverse downward. And thus the performance of the relevant neurons gets damaged which is almost never reversible. For growth of brain and mind, regular formations of new synapses are mandatory. But as we can see for most cases, hardly anyone is much concerned or worried about the health of their body and mind. We remained more concerned about many less important or even many futile things in our life. 

Now the question is how to make those neurons fresh again? It needs a lot indeed. Good food, rest and many other things. But everything will go in vain if there are no neuronal stimuli. Actually every other factor helps to intensify the neuronal triggering and stimulations, and to retain the neuronal map that is generated as the outcome. 

So with all the favorable factors, activities that will trigger and generate desired and important neuronal maps becomes the most necessary thing that we are in choice to do or not to do. And for the same reason is this article. This may at least provide some stuff to ponder on and work on. 

Thus our activities are so closely associated with our brain and nerve health and performances. But there are more to this.

We know the brain is a very oxygen requiring and energy craving organ. The heart and blood vessels are performing the task to keep the supply of the brain high. With less and less activities, our cardio-vascular performances also degrade and sometimes even degenerate. The effect of this can reach straight to the brain as resultant deficiencies of energy and calorie. If such a thing happens, we must keep very cautious and help the brain to get well. Otherwise it can be a great loss to the capacities and performance of the brain and most of which are highly probable to be irreversible. 

Thus to keep the heart and the brain healthy and properly working we need some activities that can serve the purpose. 

This far I have tried to sketch the picture as how an active body can help to build and maintain an active mind. Now let us see the reverse. How a less active or even an inactive body can lead to an inactive brain or at least less active brain. 

Teachers and students often ignore their health. The excuses can be many, like, lack of time, lack of energy, procrastination and so on. Usually all academic works are sedentary in nature. So, by avoiding proper activities and fitness drives, tutors and students are actually cultivating a sedentary lifestyle throughout the day. 

Figure 1: WHO warns against inactive and sedentary lifestyle

The whole medical and fitness world is very concerned with a sedentary lifestyle. It is found that most of the disease prone and unhealthy people belong to this type of lifestyle. So it is always advised to minimize a sedentary lifestyle. And unfortunately the teachers and students are often trying to maximize their sedentary lifestyle. 

Figure 2: Harvard Medical School advices for an active body

Inactivity can lead to many diseased conditions like hypertension and high blood pressure, cardiovascular issues, obesity, diabetes, some types of cancer, bone and structural disorders, and so on. 

If a person gets too overwhelmed with diseases then how can he or she put the mind to studying? We accept it or not, there has to be compromise in the quality of studies and learning. Moreover, most of the above diseases somehow have direct or indirect effects on our brain. 

For example, poor cardiovascular performances can lead to poor blood supply in our brain. The brain gets oxygen, energy (as glucose) and other nutrients through blood. If blood supply is poor then the brain can suffer deprivation from oxygen, energy and nutrients. This can lead to poor performance of the brain, even can lead to brain and nerve cell death. 

So, to conclude, it is not a good choice to practice a sedentary or less active lifestyle. Not for any student, not for any teacher and not for anyone. For better performance in life, may it be in studies, or professional work, or just anything.