If you’re anything like most people, you’ll have “lose weight” at the top of your resolution list. At the most optimistic, 12% of you will keep that resolution, and at the most pessimistic — only 8%. Then, if you’re anything like me, you throw something out there so you can break it in a few minutes and give up the illusion that you even tried.
With our love of gardening to help strengthen our resolve and form better habits, it doesn’t have to be this way.
According to WebMD, gardening provides the three types of exercise we need to keep our bodies going strong: endurance, flexibility, and strength. Anyone of us that turned soil knows about endurance and strength. We dig the shovel in, use the legs to squat down, our arms for leverage, and our backs to help stabilise it all. Then, with a mighty heave, we scoop, lift, and turn. Even if you are limited to containers you have to dig in and turn the soil giving your arms a good healthy workout.
And all that bending, reaching, and planting? That’s your flexibility training right there. We really do have it all.
We urban farmers have an advantage over country farmers — our yards and plots are generally small enough we don’t invest in machines to do the work for us. We do most of the things with throwing our backs into it, which means we have a greater chance of keeping that New Year’s resolution of dropping those pounds.
So, how to make the most of it?
WeightWatchers put together a chart of comparable activities that match each of the activities that we gardeners do.
| Doing this… | Uses as much energy as |
|---|---|
| Watering the lawn or garden | Sitting, knitting or sewing |
| Walking, applying fertilizer to a lawn or seeding a lawn | Walking while shopping |
| Trimming shrubs or trees with a power cutter | Walking at a moderate pace |
| Raking; planting seeds and shrubs | Leisurely bicycling |
| Weeding; cultivating; trimming shrubs and trees | Heavy cleaning; golf |
| Carrying, stacking and hauling branches | Playing softball or baseball |
| Shoveling snow; mowing the lawn with a hand mower | Aerobics or swimming |
As a person that likes to make things more challenging and fun, I look at watering as a necessary evil that doesn’t do much in the way of exercise. But, then I think of how many ways it can be made to be more challenging than just standing in one spot. To make it more interesting, try the following:
The wider the legs, the deeper the pose, the more challenging it gets.
Add in a side lunge or Warrior II pose from yoga to both strengthen and stretch the inner thighs while watering. Can’t you just see the hose extending from the arm? Or, if you feel you need more leg strength, do simple plie’s/sumo squats instead.
Plie, squats, and releves are all possible to add to your gardening routine. No goofy outfit required.
But, wait? I don’t have a yard!
Clearly, city folks that rent an apartment won’t have to do much in the way of pruning, raking, or shovelling, but here are a few suggestions to help you work that in:
- Travel to the suburbs and help out the elderly.
- Form a large community garden at your community centre, church, school, or even right in your own apartment complex.
- Instead of waiting for someone else to shovel around your car, make it a DIY job.
- Take a class on pruning — you’ll get the skills and the exercise.
- Hit a trail and clear the debris from it.
Yeah, I admit, it’s a little unconventional, but developing habits to keep the resolution is the key, and if you love gardening, you’ll have to be creative. With the recent push for “greening” of cities, it won’t be as hard as it once was to find ways to either create a community garden or help people create and protect ones that are already in their yards. (And you can also tackle those financial resolutions by charging for your services.)
We all know that gardening can be great exercise, but it takes more than this to keep those good habits forming. What are your roadblocks? Have solutions that you’ve already found? Share them in the comments! We’d love to hear your ideas.