When I last wrote a blog post about exercise, the COVID-19 pandemic was just beginning to take hold. None of us knew how long until we could resume our regularly scheduled activities. The "world outside our windows" wasn't so much a scary place, just a really empty place.

As we enter the fourth month of restrictions on our movement and activities, many organizations in Ottawa have pivoted to offering online workshops and fitness classes. And I've been recruited to help deliver some of these offerings. So, here's what's on tap in July and August:

Workshops: How Can Seniors Prevent a Fall?
As we age, our risk of falling increases, as does the likelihood that a fall will cause an injury.  How can we help seniors prevent a fall, maintain their independence, and avoid a hospital visit?  Before the time of COVID-19, falls were the leading cause of injury, emergency room visits, and hospitalizations for seniors in North America, and half of all falls happened in the home. What about now? No data has yet been compiled on home-based falls during the pandemic, but the number has likely increased, as seniors have become more housebound as well as more sedentary.

Amanda Sterczyk, an independent author and personal trainer, will teach participants about the balance "sweet spot", the complexity of our balance system, and how easy it is to incorporate exercise into their daily lives to improve their balance and prevent falls.

There will be three opportunities to join this online workshop:
Friday, July 10th, 10:00 am, Ottawa Public Library's Zoom Portal. The session is free but you must register with the library to attend. 
Monday, July 20th, 2:00 pm, Old Ottawa South Community Association. The session is pay what you can, and you must register with OSCA to attend. (Note: workshop listed as "Balance and Your Body: How Exercise Can Help You Avoid a Fall.")
Monday, August 17th, 2:00 pm, Old Ottawa South Community Association. The session is pay what you can, and you must register with OSCA to attend. (Note: workshop listed as "Balance and Your Body: How Exercise Can Help You Avoid a Fall.")

Classes: Online Fitness for Seniors
There is a three-week series of classes that will be hosted via the Ottawa Public Library's Zoom portal. Each class is free, but also requires registration. If you want to join all three, you'll have to register for each of these classes:
Friday, July 17th, 10:00 am​, standing exercises
Friday, July 24th, 10:00 am, seated exercises
​Friday, July 31st, 10:00 am, lying down exercises (can be completed on the floor or on a bed)

Thursdays at 2:30 pm, MOBA: Stretch with Amanda.* If you're missing classes with me, I've returned to teaching once a week. Please contact me for registration details.


*(MOBA = mobility and balance)

As the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 increases around the world, more and more people are going to be spending time in isolation. Whether you live in an area that is under quarantine or have chosen to self-isolate for whatever reasons, you can still—and should—be physically active every day. Not sure what to do? Read on and I’ll give you some tips on staying active. But first…

Doctor’s orders. If you are sick and have been advised to not exercise, your doctor’s orders trump mine and any other fitness professional’s advice. It is, after all, a respiratory illness that causes shortness of breath. For the latest updates on COVID-19, visit a trusted source. In Canada, that means listening to Dr. Theresa Tam, chief public health officer, and her team at the Public Health Agency of Canada.

“Don’t panic.” Those are the words on the front of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, and they are relevant even today. The same principles of healthy living apply even if you can’t leave your current location: eat a healthy diet, stay active, get a good night’s sleep, stay positive (i.e., don’t panic), and maintain contact with friends and family (phone calls, emails, texts, video chats are all great ways to stay connected). All of these factors will help you maintain a strong immune system.

Move. Just because you can’t get to the gym or fitness class, you can still get up and move. Here are some tips:

1. Dust it off. Did you see the latest clip on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon? Called “Use it and Lose it,” host Jimmy Fallon is finding old pieces of exercise equipment and giving them away to lucky audience members. I’m sure if you were to check the basement or other oft-neglected storage, you’d find one or two fitness gems hidden there.
2. Sit down. Stand up. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. Congratulations, you just completed a set of squats! There are lots of bodyweight exercises you can do that don’t require equipment: squats, lunges, sideways stepping, sit-ups, pushups, bird dog, the list goes one. You can visit sites like Bodybuilding.com and use the exercise finder. On the left, you can select muscle group, exercise type, and equipment (hint: choose body only if you’re light on equipment) and voilà!
3. Dance, dance, dance. Turn on some music and just move to it.
4. Obstacle course. Winters in Ottawa can be tough. So when our kids were little and the windchill kept us indoors, we’d create obstacle courses to complete, over and over. Other days, our main floor became a large blanket fort — try crawling around for a few hours and you’ll appreciate standing up.
5. Go online. There are tons of free workout videos on YouTube that you can follow, should you need some guidance with what to do. There are also lots of paid fitness streaming services and apps too, but I’m here to share the free stuff with you. Another great source are the workout videos on Fitness Blender — also free. 
6. Virtual workout buddies. If you have already have a workout buddy, connect via Skype and do your workouts together there. 

I hope this list helps you to stay active and maintain a positive outlook during these challenging times. Remember: move more, feel better. 

After 10 years in the fitness industry, I decided to pack it in. But not before sharing my experiences as a solopreneur (solo entrepreneur). And some funny, some crazy, things that happened to me along the way. Below, you'll find the complete table of contents, as well as an excerpt from the foreword. And if you'd like to order your very own copy, you can pick it up on Amazon.
Like I say in the introduction of this, my fourth book, "If I'm being honest, I entered the fitness industry for all the wrong reasons."

​From the foreword: “Whether you are an avid fitness junkie, weekend warrior, fitness instructor, or just your everyday Joe, there's something for you in this book…As you read through Amanda's journey from beginning to end, you gain inside information and a few laughs you didn't know you needed. So sit down with a cup of coffee and get ready to have a great conversation with a friend. Because that's exactly what this book feels like — a conversation with a friend about real life.”

And here's a glimpse at the Table of Contents:

Repeat after me: Move more, feel better.
Again: Move more, feel better.
One more time: Move more, feel better. 
Is it starting to stick in your brain? That's the slogan I adopted when I created The Move More Institute​™ four years ago.

It's not "Move more, look better," nor is it "move more, shed fat." It's "Move more, feel better" for a reason. Physical activity guidelines, created and promoted by national organizations in many developed countries, recommend the minimum amount of physical activity your body needs to maintain optimal health. That means how much you need to move to reduce the likelihood of many chronic diseases that will negatively impact your health and shorten your life span. And it's not a lot; we're not talking about living at the gym, we're talking about less than 30 minutes a day. Specifically, 21 minutes and 25 seconds of moderate to vigorous physical activity every day. It's an achievable goal, even for the busiest person.
Breaking down a 24-hour day: assume you sleep for eight hours, that still gives you 16 hours in which to complete your 21 minutes-and-change of physical activity. And this movement doesn't need to be accomplished in one session; you can accumulate the activity over the course of the day. So if you're strapped for time at work and you're waiting for the elevator, consider taking the stairs. Even one flight of stairs works, and won't render you sweaty for that all-important meeting. If you're running errands, try parking further away and walking briskly to your destination. Or leave your car at home and "walk your errands."
​​

I created these activity clocks to help you audit your day and figure out how you can incorporate more movement into it, without breaking the bank. This is just one component of my movement coaching course.

If you are looking for new year's goals that are achievable, try starting out with snacks of exercise. Physical activity doesn't need to be complicated, costly, or even sweaty. But it does need to happen every day. And if you move more, you will feel better. Guaranteed.
My goal for 2020 is to update my website and offer all of my online courses for free. That's my gift to you: help you achieve your movement goals. 

​Early last year, I had the crazy notion that I should write and self-publish a book. So I did, and I loved every moment of the process. At the time, I figured I would be a one-hit wonder, a personal trainer that had written a book, as in, ONE book.

But something magical happened when I started sharing my book with people. It was well-received. One person in particular gave me the boost I needed to continue writing. Although we’ve not yet met in person, we have been interacting for the past year. Let me explain. Last Christmas, I was completing continuing education credits to maintain my personal trainer certification. In my case, I had purchased a block of lectures from my licensing body, ACSM—the American College of Sports Medicine.
One of the lectures was by Dr. Barry Franklin. I quite enjoyed his presentation and sent him an email to thank him for the session. In my note, I mentioned that I had just written a book, Move More, Your Life Depends On It, that was in line with the key messages in his presentation, and I offered to send him a copy. He thanked me for my note, accepted my offer, and in turn offered to send me a copy of his book, One Heart, Two Feet: Enhancing Heart Health One Step at a Time. He also invited me to his conference later that winter in Michigan, Advances in Heart Disease Prevention and Rehabilitation. 
Fast forward a few months, and Barry had again emailed me to suggest we collaborate on a book. I was flattered, but didn’t think about his invitation any further. At the time, I had no inclination to pen another book. But then I was inspired to write a second book, and I again reflected on Barry’s offer. I even sent him a copy of Balance and Your Body: How Exercise Can Help You Avoid a Fall along with a request: Would he be wiling to write the foreword for book three, Your Job Is Killing You: A User’s Guide to Sneaking Exercise Into Your Work Day. 
He agreed and again suggested we talk about a potential collaboration. A few months ago, we finally found a suitable time to chat over the phone and hash out the beginnings of a book. Today, I am pleased to announce the title of our upcoming collaboration: ​

​So, who is Dr. Barry Franklin? Here’s his bio from Wayne State University: 
Barry A. Franklin is Director of the Cardiac Rehabilitation Program and Exercise Laboratories, William Beaumont Hospital, Royal Oak, Michigan, and Professor of Physiology, Wayne State University, School of Medicine, Detroit, Michigan. He is the past Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Cardiopulmonary Rehabilitation and Prevention and the American Journal of Medicine & Sports, and is a past president of the American Association of Cardiovascular and Pulmonary Rehabilitation (1988) and the American College of Sports Medicine (1999). Currently, he holds formal editorial board appointments with 15 different scientific and clinical journals, including the American Journal of Cardiology, Chest, Preventive Cardiology, Medicine and Science in Sports & Exercise, American Journal of Health Promotion, and the American Journal of Lifestyle Medicine. He is also the current chair of the American Heart Associations’ Council on Nutrition, Physical Activity, and Metabolism. Dr. Franklin and his associates have studied the hemodynamic and cardiorespiratory responses to numerous occupational and leisure-time activities. Other areas of research interest include the primary and secondary prevention of heart disease and the risks associated with sporadic, high-intensity exercise. Dr. Franklin has written or edited more than 500 publications, including 375 papers, 77 book chapters, and 27 books.
Pretty impressive, don’t you agree? We will begin writing in the spring of 2020, with an expected publication date of late 2020. 

Would you like to see the cover of my next book? Keep scrolling down this page…





​
What do you think? Please feel free to leave a comment below.
​

​Later today, I’ll be delivering the first of three workshops on fall prevention. Each one takes place in a different branch of our local library, and cover the east, west, and central parts of Ottawa. 

Balance is a “sweet spot” between our base of support — typically our feet — and our centre of gravity — our weight distribution — while we’re moving or standing still in an upright position. As we move through life, the dynamic aspect is key. We are creatures of movement, and most people want to continue to move. But our aging bodies sometimes have difficulty balancing the key balance components (pun intended). Our balance can suffer as we become less mobile.
Imagine a dog walking on a slippery surface. They appear more sure-footed than their human counterparts, who are often slip-sliding along the ice. That's because the dogs have a lower centre of gravity and a wider base of support.

Static balance involves maintaining your centre of gravity over your base of support. I like to compare the practice of standing upright to a still photograph. Dynamic balance is when your centre of gravity moves away from your base of support, but you are still in control. That is, your muscles are firing to keep you from falling to the ground. That’s when your balance is more like a video.
​
The exercises in this book target both static and dynamic balance because they’re both important and need to be maintained. ​

As you reduce your base of support, you want to be able to remain standing. There are five foot positions that have you moving from a wide, stable base of support to a narrower, less stable one. They are:

• Feet wide
• Feet close together
• Feet staggered forward and back at hip’s width
• Feet staggered closer together with the big toe of the back foot touching the heel of the front foot
• Standing on one leg with the other foot lifted off the ground.

Frequent, flexible, and free. That's my motto with Your Job Is Killing: A User's Guide to Sneaking Exercise into Your Work Day. Please read on to enjoy an excerpt from my upcoming third book. It will help you understand why I wrote this book, and how it can help you and your fellow professional sitters to sit less and move more at work. Your very life depends on it. 
(copyright 2019 Amanda Sterczyk, all rights reserved)

It was an office job that precipitated my career change into the fitness industry. After spending several years at home with my young children, being confined to an office took its toll on my emotional and physical well-being. Endless meetings and conference calls where I felt chained to my chair were the norm. All I wanted to do was get up and go for a walk. In fact, at one point I was reprimanded for spending too much time visiting colleagues’ offices. Even though I was applying a 1980s solution to a 21st century problem, my boss thought my added movement was making me unproductive.
​
Do you have a desk-based job? Are you a professional sitter? The knowledge-based economy means that many adults sit at their desks and in meetings for hours at a time every day. Productivity, profit, and professionalism lead people to remain seated at all times. But we're not in an airplane, and there is no turbulence. This physical inactivity is killing us.

This book will help teach you how to sneak “snacks” of exercise and movement into your work day. This is not some “let’s crush it with squats in the boardroom” type of book. It’s not about how to get the most out of your new treadmill desk. And it’s not an exercise manual either. There are plenty of resources available to show you how to exercise at work, including my free online course, “Add Movement at Work.”

With this book, I want to show you that adding stuff to your office to encourage movement is not the most practical or cost-effective solution. Instead, I’ll show you that moving more at work needs to be frequent, flexible, and free. I’ll leave the sweaty, costly, and complex office workouts to others.

If you read my first book, Move More, Your Life Depends On It, you’ll notice some similar content in this book. When Move More was first published, I was often asked, “Who is this book for?” My response was: for anyone who sits too much — for physically inactive office workers, for sedentary older adults, and for anyone who needs to break up the time they spend on their duff.

Regrettably, some of these groups didn’t identify with the message in Move More because they didn’t “see” themselves portrayed in my first book. Hence this updated perspective, which is targeted specifically to professional sitters.

You can visit Amazon to purchase your copy today.

 This month’s blog post is an excerpt from my third book, Your Job Is Killing You: A User's Guide to Sneaking Exercise into Your Work Day, which will be published later this year. If you like this — or any of the excerpts you’ve read from any of my books — please buy a copy. Authors depend on sales to pay the bills. If you’re in Ottawa, you can contact me to purchase your copy. If you’re elsewhere in the world, you can visit Amazon ​to purchase a paperback or e-book version.

​Do you work in a knowledge-based environment? That is, do you spend most of your working life either at a desk or at a table in a meeting room? If so, then congratulations, you are officially a professional sitter! But you’re not alone. Many adults around the world spend 50 per cent (or more!) of their waking hours mostly sitting.

You know who you are — office workers who nab the first available seat on the daily commute, colleagues who remain seated during the breaks in meetings (seriously, the seat belt sign is off, you’ve been granted permission to move about the cabin), individuals who opt for the elevator/escalator/moving sidewalk instead of employing the heel-toe express, “watch watchers” who take a seat and await the timer countdown on their microwaved lunch. You get the gist — too much sitting and not enough moving. 

My slogan is “move more, feel better.” This simple message holds much power: the solution to your aches and pains, lack of motivation, and foggy brain is in your control. You can do it! Get off your butt and move about the cabin.
​
As my client Janice said, “This is needed! I am retired after 35 years at a desk, getting up only to sit in a meeting. Only in the last few years was there recognition of the need to move more during the day. Good luck with your book!”

​And I’m not the only one who feels this way. Take biomechanist and movement guru Katy Bowman. I’ve been reading her books for years, following her social media posts, and sharing her insights with my clients. You could say we’re kindred spirits in the world of natural movement. And she even has a book to help people incorporate stretches and movements at work. Bowman, like many of us in the world of practical fitness, feels strongly about more movement, more of the time:

Now that my second book, Balance and Your Body: How Exercise Can Help You Avoid a Fall, is available to the public, I’ve had several people ask me who this book is for. As in, who is my target audience? 

I wrote this book as a self-help exercise guide for caregivers, family members, and, most importantly, seniors. It features a dozen foundational exercises with step-by-step instructions and illustrations that they can use as a home-based exercise plan.

​What’s different about my book? The exercises don’t require special equipment or the need to get on the floor. Each exercise also includes modifications on how to make it easier or harder, depending on abilities.  Falls are the leading cause of injury, emergency room visits, and hospitalizations for seniors in North America. The goal with my book is to help seniors increase their confidence — after all, the fear of falling contributes to the risk of falling — and improve their strength and balance so they won’t sustain a life-altering fall.

So let’s see how these distinct groups can utilize my book.

Caregivers. “Would you present to our staff about how to help our senior clients? You know, teach them easy exercises that they can do with clients during visits.” Be it a personal support worker, care aide, nursing assistant, or nurse, there are many professionals that provide care and support to seniors in their homes, in retirement homes, and in long term care facilities. Knowing how to help senior clients maintain balance and strength improves their ability to serve their client group. When I’ve presented to caregiver groups, they are so appreciative of the information I have shared. My book is easy to read and compact, so they can easily carry it from one appointment to the next.

Family Members. “Can You Help My Aging Parent? They’re living alone and I’m in another city. I’m worried they’re going to fall and hurt themselves. They won’t go to a gym, and I saw on your website that you offer in-home fitness training to older adults.” I’ve seen many emails and received just as many phone calls like this. Increasingly, adult children are living in different cities from their elderly parents and they feel helpless. They may see their parents infrequently, and each time, the changes in their loved ones can be an eye-opener. Time is marching on and the physical declines are more marked with each passing visit. In many cases, they want to help their parents maintain their independence and stay in their homes. And they know one slip, trip, or fall is all that separates their mother or father from permanent residency at a long-term care facility. When I do visit their parents, we begin to work on the main components of fall prevention: balance, strength, and mobility.
​Do you have aging parents or grandparents whose lives you need to monitor in addition to your own life? You can pick up a copy of Balance and Your Body for your loved one, go through the exercises with them — remember, each exercise includes instructions on how to make it harder if you’re doing it with them — and/or leave the book with them for their own practice. Or are you an employer whose staff have aging parents? I’ve also presented to businesses, so their employees can help aging parents stay in their homes longer. These card-carrying members of the sandwich generation don’t have the time to research fall prevention exercises that they can teach their parents/grandparents. A lunch and learn to cover the basics of balance and how to prevent a fall will ease their minds and let them focus on how to help their aging loved ones when they’re not at work.

Seniors. “I want to be able to go for a walk with my husband.” This is just one of many fitness goals I hear from my senior clients. Finding time to do these exercises doesn’t have to be complicated. When I work with clients in their homes, I send follow-up emails that list and describe the exercises we’ve done together. My goal is to make clients comfortable doing the exercises on their own. In many cases, they write out the exercises on a sheet of paper for quick reference. You know, something that they can leave on the counter and refer to throughout the day. They often tell me that their list allows them to tackle the exercises one at a time, without feeling overwhelmed. I decided to compile these exercises in a book, as a quick reference guide for other seniors. And each exercise is a standalone passage. You can start with just one or try them all in one session. Whatever works for you. You will benefit either way.

How to buy. Would you like a paperback or e-book version of Balance and Your Body? It’s available for sale worldwide on Amazon.  And if you’re in Ottawa on July 11th, why don’t you join me for the official book launch? Because even if this book isn't geared to you, there's probably someone in your life who could benefit from it.