Exercise and Mental Health Benefits

This assignment delves into the significant benefits of exercise for mental health. It examines how exercise reduces symptoms of depression and anxiety, enhances mood, increases energy levels, and boosts self-esteem. The document emphasizes the role of exercise in preventing mental health issues and improving the quality of life for individuals facing mental health challenges. It also highlights the importance of healthcare providers incorporating exercise interventions into treatment plans alongside traditional therapies like psychotherapy and psychopharmacology.

Does Engaging in exercise improves person's mental health
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Does Engaging in exercise improves person's mental health
Yes, engaging in exercise improves a person’s mental health. In this age of an increasing
growth of obesity and mental illness, lifestyle modification is the most cost effective means of
enhancing health and the quality of life. Lifestyle modification is of great importance especially
to persons with mental illness. Most of this people are at risk of developing chronic
complications linked to inactive behaviors and drug side effects, including hyperlipidemia,
diabetes, and heart diseases. One of the effective lifestyle modifications is the engagement in
exercises. The benefits of exercises is not clearly understood and appreciated by healthcare
providers and patients, however, according to Network (2017), exercise is one of the most ideal
way to improve the mental state of an individual. In this case, the essay will discuss on the
importance of engaging in exercises to improve the mental health.
Aerobic exercises are the most important and easy to do exercises that reduce depression
and anxiety. Aerobic exercises include cycling, jogging, swimming, dancing, and gardening.
These exercises have a positive improvement on the mood, because, during exercise, there is an
increase in blood flow to the brain influencing the “hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal”,
consequently, a reactivity to anxiety and depression (Stanton, Reaburn & Happell, 2017). The
psychological effect can be explained by the influence of the HPA axis on several part of the
brain, which include the limbic system that controls mood and motivation, and hippocampus,
which enhances memory formation.
Exercise can treat depression as efficiently as antidepressant drugs but of cause without
side effects. Other than relieving the symptoms of depression, a research conducted by Morell,
Rosenbaum & Parmenter (2016) reveals that exercise can prevent a patient from relapse.

Exercise is ideal depression for a number of reasons. The most important one being that, it
influences the brain positively enhancing the feeling of calmness, this is important as it breaks
the cycle of negative thoughts which bring depression.
In addition, exercise is beneficial in the treatment of anxiety. Exercises can serve to
reduce stress and tension, boosting mental and physical energy, and promoting mental health. In
this case, it is arguable that, anything that anything that keeps you moving can be of help,
however, you will get more benefit if adequate attention is paid rather than zoning out. For
instance, during exercise, try to feels the sensation of the feet as they hit the ground or the
rhythm of the heart. By adding this elements and focusing more on how the body feels during
exercise, there will be an interruption of he worries that run through the head, thus, easing
thoughts of depression and enhancing mental health (Zopf, Cormie, Joseph & Galvao, 2016).
Further, one a person is under stress, the muscles around the shoulders, neck, and face are
tense leaving an individual with painful headaches or neck or back pain. Other times, there are
tightness on the chest or muscle crump. In addition, one an individual is under stress, symptoms
of stomachache, heartburn, frequent urination, and insomnia are common. The discomforts of
these symptoms and worry can worsen the situation causing a nasty cycle between the body and
mind. However, with exercises, this cycle can be broken. Exercise relieves tension and relaxing
the muscles bring a feeling of calmness. Since the mind and body are closely connected, when
the mind feels better, so is the mind (Eather, Morgan & Lubans, 2016).
A research conducted by Druss (2017) shows that, by focusing on the body during
exercises can help the nervous system “unstuck” helping it to move from immobilization stress
reaction that characterize trauma. During exercises, it is important to focus in order to deviate

from the negative thought that cause trauma. Additionally, exercises like rock climbing, sailing,
hiking, mountain biking, and skiing yield the same symptoms of reducing the symptom of
trauma.
The other benefits of exercise in enhancing the mental health are social interaction, self-
efficacy, and distraction. Program can work for persons with mental issues, however, exercises,
which include moderate to intense activities can work to some of these patients. In fact,
adherence to exercise interventions in patients with mental illness appears to have the same
health benefits o that of the general population (Christie & Cole, 2017).
Exercise is important for cognitive decline and dementia in older people. Developments
in healthcare have led to a considerable i9ncrease in the life expectancy and general population
growth of people above the age of 60 years. beside the increase in life expectancy, there is an
increase in the number of people living with cognitive decline and dementia. The main
symptoms of dementia being memory loss; It is a condition that makes people become impaired
over time. Decline in functions like concentration and attention occurs mostly to older people.
Exercise has been identified as one of the defensive mechanism to reduce the decline in
functionality. According a research conducted by Bautista, Chen & Raisch (2016), there is a
15% to 25% reduced risk of dementia and depression for adults who engage in exercise
regularly. In this case, it is evident that exercise is ideal in the treatment of depression and
dementia symptoms.
According to Bonilla, Vautour & Castro (2017), engaging in exercises enhances mental
health by suppressing negative mood, depression, and anxiety and improving cognitive function
and self esteem. In addition, engaging in exercises alleviates symptoms of social withdrawal and

low self esteem. In this case, exercises are more beneficial to patients suffering from
schizophrenia patients as they are at higher risk of obesity as they are exposed to antipsychotic
treatment. Schizophrenia patients should engage in exercise as it is beneficial in weight control,
significant reduction in blood pressure, fitness, and mental wellbeing. Therefore, it is important
for persons with mental health issues to engage in exercises in order boost their mental health.
Overall, exercise are beneficial as they promote thinking and a sharper memory Ten
(Have, Graaf & Monshouwer, 2017). The hormones produced by the brains that make the body
feel better are the same hormones that promote concentration. Exercises boos self- esteem.
When done on an everyday basis, exercises can foster a sense of worth. In addition, exercise
enables a stronger resilience. When going through emotional and mental challenges, exercise can
help cope this challenges in a healthy manner instead of using drugs, or alcohol, which at the end
worsens the symptoms. Exercise regularly can also boost the immune system reducing the
impact of stress. However, it is important to note that mental health does not necessarily mean
being in good mood all the time and neither does it mean that one can nit experience painful
emotions or negative experience like failure, loss, or grief as they are part of our normal life. But
regardless of the age, exercises are important for the mental health (Bola & Shen, 2017).
In conclusion, engaging in exercise improves person's mental health. For instance,
exercises reduce depression and anxiety, thus, enhancing mental health. In this case, exercises
has a potential to improve on our mental health. Even a little bit of exercise like walking increase
our alertness, positive mood, and energy. In addition, participation in exercises boost our self-
esteem and a significant reduction in anxiety and stress levels. Exercises also play a considerable
role in preventing mental issues, thus improving the quality of life for the people going through
mental problems. Therefore, it is important for healthcare providers to provide exercise

interventions when handling patients with mental illness. Such interventions should be combined
with the traditional forms of treatment like psychotherapy and psychopharmacology in order to
improve the mental health.

References
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and Wellbeing-Findings from a Community Project in a Woodland Setting. Journal of
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Stanton, R., Reaburn, P., & Happell, B. (2017). Group exercise at self-selected exercise
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