THE CORRECTIONAL OFFICER

[Music] me [Music] one two three for as long as you can probably remember someone has been telling you to become physically fit the fact is you have probably done most every form of physical exercise at some time in your life sometimes it was fun sometimes it wasn't 20 41. while it's true that many correctional officers like to jog every day or play golf or tennis it's also true that it's not hard to find yourself doing less and less as you get older you might jog a couple of days and then not quite get back to it for six months you find yourself doing a lot of sitting coffee and donuts in the morning a big lunch and an even bigger dinner you sit and watch tv very respected attorney a snack here an extra pound there and at the end of the day you're tired maybe you're tired a lot obviously only you know what's going on with yourself physically whether you feel good or tired whether you're slowly putting on weight or not whether you're active or slowing down and the fact is it's your business you're going to do what you want with your life regardless of what anyone says and that's the way it should be with that in mind the purpose here is to simply review a few basics about the human animal and what we do to ourselves to influence how we are going to live and how long for example we hear that a person like this could die of heart disease and die sooner than a person like this and that's right four times as likely and up to 20 years earlier why well he eats the wrong food eats too much and doesn't exercise it's the same old story we hear over and over and now we're finding out that you not only wear your weight on the outside but on the inside as well inside your arteries and blood vessels cholesterol you eat too much of the wrong food it keeps building up the channel gets smaller blood clots develop and the day one gets stuck in the blood vessel you're in trouble [Applause] [Music] in addition if you're sitting at a desk or moving very little most of the day day after day your heart gets weaker all muscles degenerate with lack of use which means that the day your heart gets too weak to take a sudden strain you're in trouble [Music] obviously even though we know that everybody is going to die someday from something for ourselves that's always in the future but the fact is we're making that future now by the way we eat and the way we act just as the way we are now is due to how we've acted in the past as far as diet is concerned most people know what constitutes a well-balanced diet or can easily find out there are thousands of diets and too much of a good thing isn't on any one of them but when you talk about exercise you come to problems for many people there just never seems to be time for exercising for every officer who does push-ups sit-ups and wind sprints there are a thousand who don't they care about themselves but they don't care about doing push-ups and sit-ups every day what you want of course is to keep your heart strong because everyone knows that the physical side of correctional work often happens in quick bursts your heartbeat may have to double in a few seconds and your heart has to be ready for that and you want the strength it takes to do the job because at times it does take strength at the very least you need to keep your muscles toned to keep strong and avoid deterioration finally most people given a choice would rather be alert than sluggish and correctional workers don't have a choice for example whenever psychologists and psychiatrists study correctional institutions they always come up with something you already know there's a lot of stress involved on the other hand physicians and physical therapists know people are more alert and better at adapting to stress simply because they exercise this is because exercise stimulates the adrenal glands to produce a greater flow of adrenaline it also enlarges them and sensitizes them to quick reactions in other words whenever people exercise and believe they feel better it's only because they do the real question here is how much exercise is necessary to be fit we know that games calisthenics and jogging are good but it's worth remembering that according to the experts this is just as good oldest exercise in the world in fact most experts believe that walking is probably the best exercise walking at a good pace for about 15 minutes a day at least three days a week puts the right amount of stress on your heart it builds a reserve capacity it opens all the new circulation you need it stimulates the adrenal glands to keep you alert and feeling good and it tones a lot of muscles especially in your legs and lower body all the things that mean you're fit fit enough obviously just about everybody walks every day but the fact is walking briskly for 10 to 15 minutes is relatively rare for most people they don't do it every day because they don't need to and as a result most people need exercise as was said earlier only you know if you need more exercise if you play sports or jog to talk about walking probably sounds pretty tame and to you it is but to the person who thinks jogging is a pain doesn't have the time for sports and believes calisthenics are a form of torture it's good to know that if he parks 10 minutes away from work and walks in and then walks back again after work he's done everything he has to do physically to protect his heart keep his stamina and stay alert perhaps the only thing he hasn't done is to keep the muscles in his arms and upper body toned the sort of exercise you get here you can chop firewood build a patio at home or avoid all that and do isometric exercises maybe twice a week while at work simple stuff but it's enough what she's doing of course is pitting one muscle against another or against an object for no more than eight seconds and she is using no more than fifty to seventy five percent of her strength she's toning arms neck and upper body three seconds building up to the degree of force she is going to apply four seconds holding it and on to the next it's the overload principle of exercise which means that if you make a muscle work more than what it's used to it's going to grow in strength whether you lift weights or do isometrics like these of course if you decide to start a more vigorous exercise program you should get a physical checkup first and a regular checkup is a good idea for everyone and that's the story same old story there are real reasons why it's easy to put on weight and not have time for exercising there are thousands of ways to exercise and real reasons why people stop doing them there are minimums like sustained walking and isometrics that do everything a person needs to stay fit and have some influence on his future because the days when someone could actually force you to exercise like this you