{"id":4188,"date":"2015-10-05T06:00:09","date_gmt":"2015-10-05T13:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/?p=4188"},"modified":"2015-10-04T08:44:42","modified_gmt":"2015-10-04T15:44:42","slug":"walking-in-circles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/?p=4188","title":{"rendered":"LIVING WITH A NAG"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"My<\/a>

My very first nag<\/strong><\/p><\/div>\n

By Suzanne Sparrow Watson<\/p>\n

I’ve been thinking about my brother this past weekend, what with him scaling Machu Picchu<\/strong> and all. \u00a0We both like to walk, although putting our “walking” in the same category is like comparing Kohl’s to Nordstrom. \u00a0He goes for the big stuff (who can forget his wonderful posts from the Himalayas?) while I’m a bit more\u00a0lazy<\/del> down to earth. \u00a0I huff and puff riding up an<\/strong>\u00a0escalator<\/strong>, so climbing mountains is definitely not my thing. \u00a0But for the past five years I have worn, in succession, an Omron pedometer, Jawbone Up band and a Fitbit Charge. \u00a0My goal with each of them is to walk 10,000 steps per day, which works out to about 4.5 miles. \u00a0Although the technology has varied among these devices, they do have one thing in common: they all<\/strong> nag<\/strong>. \u00a0There is nothing worse than checking my Fitbit mid-day only to discover that I’ve walked a measly 4500 steps. \u00a0How can I sit down to read or knit or watch a movie when “the nag” on my wrist is shouting “Get Off Your Ass!”? \u00a0Okay, maybe it isn’t really shouting at me but that’s what I hear in my head. \u00a0In general, it’s a good motivator. \u00a0 I tell myself that by walking extra steps I am able to indulge in more cake, although I’m not sure that’s the intent. \u00a0The other day I got to\u00a0wondering what is so magical<\/strong> about\u00a0the 10,000 step standard. \u00a0The results of my research were surprising – and ultimately, depressing. \u00a0So, I thought, why not share it with our readers so I won’t suffer alone?<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>

The beginning of the \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0craze<\/strong><\/p><\/div>\n

It turns out that the origin of 10,000 steps per day as a health guideline started in Japan in the 1960’s<\/strong>, right around the time of the 1964 Tokyo Olympics. \u00a0Apparently walking became a national “sport”, perhaps to show the world how athletic and health conscious they were. \u00a0At the time Japan was blessedly free of the U.S.-based fast food joints. \u00a0They consumed much less animal fat and fewer calories overall than most nations. \u00a0Even today, with the advent of a McDonald’s on the Ginza<\/strong>, the Japanese eat a healthier diet than we do; \u00a0I think it’s safe to say that Japanese television doesn’t advertise Triple Bacon Chili Cheese Deep Fried Taco Burgers. \u00a0 \u00a0Anyway…back to the 10,000 steps. \u00a0With the advent of the walking clubs a daily walking goal was\u00a0proposed as a marketing gimmick<\/strong> by a company that invented a pedometer, or as it’s known there, a\u00a0man-po-kei. “Man” stands for \u201810,000,\u2019 “po” stands for \u2018step,\u2019 and “kei” stands for \u2018meter\u2019. Ten thousand, it turns out, is a very auspicious number in Japanese culture so people thought it good luck to walk that many steps. \u00a0For the Japanese, who consumed about 2600 calories<\/strong> per day back then, it magically resulted in improved overall health and weight loss.<\/p>\n

\"Probably<\/a>

Probably should be illegal in 47 states<\/strong><\/p><\/div>\n

The 10,000 step craze started picking up steam in the U.S. about 20 years ago when that pesky Surgeon General<\/strong> said that, as a nation, we were becoming too fat. \u00a0That led to the “30 minutes of exercise a day”<\/strong> suggestion and then it was a quick downhill slide to the 10,000 steps phenomenon. \u00a0Americans started walking more, buying pedometers, and expecting to lose weight. \u00a0But there was one snag: the average American consumes about 3800<\/strong> calories<\/strong>\u00a0every day, much of them unhealthy<\/em> calories. \u00a0Which leads one quickly to the conclusion that if we’re consuming 30% more calories than the Japanese did in 1964, then we need to commensurately increase<\/strong> the number of steps we walk if we want the same results. \u00a0I consulted with the fitness instructor at our club, hoping she could make sense of it. \u00a0Alas, when I told her I was walking 10,000 steps a day she said, “Well, that’s good. But if you really want to lose weight, you’re going to have to walk at least 13,000.”<\/p>\n

I can tell you right now, I’m not going to walk<\/strong> 13,000 steps per day. \u00a0And I’m going to continue to eat cake. \u00a0I’d rather be nagged by the device on my wrist than be like all those people on the Titanic whose last thoughts were “Damn! \u00a0I wish I hadn’t passed on dessert.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Suzanne Sparrow Watson I’ve been thinking about my brother this past weekend, what with him scaling Machu Picchu and all. \u00a0We both like to walk, although putting our “walking” in the same category is like comparing Kohl’s to Nordstrom. … read more<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":4194,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1950,1936,1940,1935,1934,1939,1938,1937,1941,1933],"class_list":["post-4188","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-opinion","tag-10000-steps-per-day","tag-american-calorie-intake","tag-fitbit","tag-japanese-caloric-intake","tag-japanese-diet","tag-jawbone-up","tag-omron","tag-pedometer","tag-surgeon-general","tag-tokyo-olympics"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/10\/pedometer150large.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p31aN0-15y","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4188","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4188"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4188\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4219,"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4188\/revisions\/4219"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4194"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4188"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4188"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fromabirdseyeview.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4188"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}