Bender Ball Method

One key to a good exercise routine is variety.  If you are feeling stuck or feeling bored, you are more likely to abandon your routine.  If, instead, you feel that every day will offer something new and interesting, you’ll be more likely to stick to your workout. To this end, it’s important to find the right combination.

Some people enjoy going to a gym for this reason. They can take a spinning class one day, a hip-hop class another day, and work out on the cardio machines a third day.  The gym enables you to mix up your routine, while still creating a consistent workout schedule.  Certainly, you can always incorporate some consistency into your routine by doing crunchless abs with the Bender Ball or by stretching in the same way each morning.

For others, the gym becomes a stale form of routine itself.  If this occurs, or you know without even going to the gym that it’s not for  you, then find a different way to achieve your exercise variety.  Maybe you enjoy running, walking, swimming or biking?  Perhaps you want to walk with a friend two days a week, go to a nearby pool two days a week and use an elliptical machine two days a week. Finding the right balance for yourself can make all the difference in the world!

Exercise is a very important part of keeping healthy, feeling great and looking your best.  It is important to realize that in the world in which we live, where we spend hours each day either sitting in front of a computer, or sitting behind the wheel, or both, that we do not move our body’s around as much as they need it to keep us working, playing and living at our best. Therefore we must intervene and make the time and effort to insure that our bodies get way they need and that is exercise.

And don’t make the mistake of thinking that exercise is just for weight loss. Even thin and trip people need to exercise regularly. A good exercise routine helps you to live longer and healthier in many ways. Increasing strength and weight-bearing exercises like jumping, running and walking help to combat osteoporosis, the loss of calcium in the bones, leading to brittle, fragile bones, highly common among the elderly.

Exercise can also help prevent highly dangerous illnesses such as Type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and cardiovascular conditions. It has been shown that a regular exercise routine can increase the HDL levels in your body while also lowering the amount of LDL in the blood. This combination can help prevent the build-up of plaque on the arterial walls which can lead to a heart attack or stroke.
Making Bender Ball a part of a regular exercise routine is a great way to stay healthy, strong and feeling fit.

Most people will tell you that it’s easier to stick to a routine than it is to start one.  If you’ve fallen out of your exercise routine - it is very hard to get started again!  Here are a few key suggestions to get you started again and to get you to stick to that routine.

1. Don’t stop - Obviously, this is easier said than done, but if you are contemplating stopping your exercise routine - don’t.  Even if you miss one week, it is much harder to start again than it is to just continue.  Try not to push it aside, with the assumption that it won’t be hard for you to start again.

2. Commit to 30 days - Commit, from today, that you will use your bender ball every day for 30 days or that you’ll walk for 15 minutes a day each day.  Don’t make yourself commit to anything for a year - this is too much pressure; at the same time, if you only commit for a day or two, you may find it hard to follow through.  Commit to 30 days and then take it from there.

3. Showing Up Counts - Often, just showing up is the hard part.  Don’t think about what you’ll do when you get to the gym, or start the video again.  Just show up and be proud of yourself for taking that step.  Then, you can concentrate on actually using the bender ball, getting in the pool, and such.

People spend a lot of time trying to figure out the best exercise routine for themselves.  Should they force themselves to the gym? Should they do more stomach exercises with a bender ball, or concentrate on their legs with a Stair Master?  The bottom line - no matter what you decide - is to get moving!  You can get more fit and see a slow weight loss if you simply incorporate some new creative movement into your day.  Take the stairs at work rather than using the elevator.  Park far away from the mall and walk farther to get to your favorite store.  Take the dog for an extra 10 minute walk each day; use the bender ball for 5 minutes at a time instead of 4.

There are oodles of little ways that you can increase your stamina and get yourself moving without even altering your life very much.  Try it out - you’ll be surprised what an extra 15-45 minutes of movement a day can do for your overall energy level, your stamina and your weight.  What have you got to lose giving it a try?

One problem that many of us face when we go on a diet or start an exercise routine, is our goal.  Often, the goal is to look good.  Looking good, however, shouldn’t really be the goal.  The goal - when you change your diet or start to exercise - should be to become healthier and more fit.  When this is truly the goal, it completely changes your outlook and your mission.  Rather than hoping to fit into your “skinny” jeans, you are hoping to breath more easily, to feel good walking a mile, to have more energy, and to feel healthy.  This completely changes how you approach your food and your fitness.  When using the bender ball, going to the gym, passing the cake by and doing that one extra lap at the pool, you are working towards an overall feeling of well being.  Keep this mind shift in mind - you’ll be amazed by the difference that it can make in your approach to wellness.

There are many benefits to having a strong stomach. A strong stomach helps your entire body to be stronger and more stable. This aids you in picking up objects, in having a strong, healthy back and more.

In addition, a strong stomach, and overall good health, helps you with your mental health. When you feel strong and healthy, it makes your emotional state more stable and helps you to conquer stressers in your life.

And of course, it goes without saying that you’ll love the look of having a strong stomach. You’ll be ready to show off at the beach next summer after using the bender ball or working out at the gym to enhance your stomach muscles!

The Bender Ball method of core training is probably one of the best ways of getting your abs into the shape you want them. It is possible to spend just a few minutes each day and see great results after a remarkably short amount of time.

The Bender Ball was designed by Leslee Bender, master trainer. Leslee has been involved in physical fitness for over 25 years, and designed the Bender Ball and created the innovative Bender Method of Core training.

Crunches are a great way to exercise your abdominal muscles. This exercise is efficient and safe, as long as you don’t put too much pressure behind your head or neck. As great as crunches are, there are easy and fun ways to make crunches even more efficient and even more fun, and that is when you use a Bender Ball.

In just a few minutes a day a Bender Ball can help you achieve your goals of strong and beautifully sculpted abdominal muscles in much less time then you thought possible.

We used to do sit-ups, but because sit-ups are not as efficient and can even hurt your back, we now try and do crunches, also known as curl-ups. These are an excellent method of strengthening the abdominal muscles.

What you do is lie down on your back, place your hands either crossed over your chest or cupped behind your head as a shelf to support your head. Care should be taken not to exert pressure on the back of the neck or back of the head. Excess pressure could cause neck injury.

Bend your knees up toward your body, and then curl up your shoulders. There is no need to lift your back off the floor. Merely lifting your shoulders and bending towards your stomach will exercise your abdominals. And since you are not lifting your back up off the floor, your hip muscles remain relaxed. All the effort you are exerting is going into strengthening your abs.

There are many variations on crunches that we will be discussing in the future.

You know, no one does sit-ups anymore, but do you know why? The object of sit-ups is to strengthen the abdominal wall muscles by using them to bend the spine up and off the floor. However, two other things happen that not only do not contribute to strengthening the abs, but can actually make things worse.

First, when you pull up the spine off the floor, a lot of pressure is exerted on the lower back, or the lumbar region. The weight of your body and the compression of the vertebrae are not such good things for the back.

The second problem is that when you pull up all the way off the floor you also bring the muscles of the hips into play. This reduces the workout you are trying to give your abdominals because the hips are joining in with the effort, helping the abs and taking away from the efficiency of the exercise that you are doing.

Nowadays we do crunches.