Your Mobility and Your Health

If your knees crackle, your posture slumps, or rising from the couch is an ordeal, don’t blame age. Blame neglect! Our grandparents spent their days in motion, squatting with ease, walking long distances, and putting their physical strength to everyday use. Today, we sit more than we move, and we act surprised when our bodies don’t move very well.

A body in motion stays in motion, and this principle holds the secret to lifelong vitality. Movement preserves strength, flexibility and balance. Neglect leads to stiff joints, muscle imbalances, poor posture and slow decline into frailty.

Facing these facts is the first step to overcoming the latter and enjoying the former.

What happens when we don’t move enough? The consequences unfold gradually, often over decades, largely unnoticed until some damage has been done. But science shows that you can slow, stop, or even reverse this. Let’s look at some practical strategies for you to stay strong, mobile, pain-free and moving well for years to come.

Modern technology has dramatically reshaped how we live, significantly reducing the need for physical effort. Today’s young adults are much less active than past generations, spending more than 10 hours a day sitting at home, at work and in transit, often averaging fewer than 5,000 steps per day, which health researchers classify as sedentary (Tudor-Locke, et al., 2011).

In midlife, prolonged inactivity often leads to mobility problems: reduced range of motion, stiffness and more chronic pain than you would otherwise experience. According to Springer Nature, your physical condition and whether you feel sluggish or energetic depends largely on how actively you engage your muscles.

The senior stages of life will be the most concerning if we have neglected basic preventative care. Without regular movement, the body deteriorates—much like an arm left in a cast, wasting away from disuse. Stiff muscles, weak bones and deteriorating joint cartilage lead to muscular imbalances and bad posture.

This rapid decline is not inevitable. It is preventable.

So many older adults eventually rely on canes or walkers, and physicians often turn to painkillers or surgery. But this approach treats symptoms, not causes—and too often, it becomes a trap. Your need is not for intervention but rather prevention.

Some physical decline is a “normal” part of aging, but the rate at which so many are deteriorating reflects poor physical habits. Recognize the laws of cause and effect, and take action.

• Learn and practice proper exercise techniques.
• Using habit stacking for increased consistency.
• Become posture perfect for better health.
• Recognize exercise as the antidote to frailty.

The results speak for themselves. A Norwegian study in jama Network Open found that walking over 100 minutes per day cut chronic low back pain risk by 23 percent, with moderate or brisk walking reducing it by around 18 percent.

Add targeted strength work and regular mobility movements to your routine, and you could see a 25 to 50 percent reduction in your chronic pain, as well as improved mobility, strength and daily function.

Engaging in physical activity is perhaps the single most important thing you can do to dramatically improve your health and quality of life.

This dovetails with biblical admonition on the subject. 1 Timothy 4:8 says that “bodily exercise profiteth little.” The original Greek conveys that physical exercise profits for a “little while,” in other words, during our physical lives.

God also inspired the Apostle John to write in 3 John 2: “Beloved, I wish above all things that thou mayest prosper and be in health ….” How does this occur? Is it an automatic process? Certainly not—achieving and maintaining health and physical fitness requires deliberate effort and movement.

Accept the Bible’s authority and admonition rather than your own sedentary habits. Don’t settle into the damaging comforts of an easy life, resigning a body to being tired, depleted and unwell. You have the power to change. You can begin your profitable bodily exercise by just walking.

Mobility isn’t optional. It’s a necessity. Your body is your responsibility, and more often than not, its condition reflects your choices and discipline. Neglect it, and it will break down. Move it, and it will serve you with strength, balance and grace. Invest some time and effort into your health, as the Bible admonishes, and get moving!