How dancing could supercharge your health

I recently asked a client of mine about her physical activity levels. She ashamedly told me that she does no exercise but does go to a dance for 3 class for 3 hours a week. I confirmed to her that that amount of dancing is a fantastic amount of exercise. After digging a little deeper as to why she didn’t think it was, it seemed the only reason she didn’t class it as exercise is that she enjoyed it. Interestingly, exercise that we enjoy and actively choose to do (referred to as leisure time activity) offers us so many more benefits than exercise we have to, like manual labor while at work.

Now, I certainly love shaking it on the Dancefloor after a few drinks, and while the drinks may not be helping my health, studies now show that dancing can improve our memory and our general mood, help us lose weight, make friends and much much more. So it asks the question, why aren’t more of us doing it, or even just trying it sober?

So how does it help you?

Healthy hearts — Dancing is an incredible cardiovascular exercise. It can help people of all fitness levels improve their heart health and a recent study found that people who took up waltzing improved their heart health, breathing and all-round quality of life. These health benefits even stand up against others in the trial who exercised on a bike or treadmill. I know I’d much prefer to hit the D-floor for an hour compared to watching the minutes slowly tick by while pounding the treadmill.

Improves balance - The benefits of dance become more pronounced for those who are ageing. Why? Well, as we age, our balance and muscles decrease in strength and size; this is something called sarcopenia and is responsible is correlated with physical disability, poor quality of life, and even death (Sorry!! I know this seems a bit extreme). This decline in strength and balance increases the likelihood that we can fall and injure ourselves. By dancing, we help to offset this process by challenging our postural and stabilizing muscles helping to keep them healthy. So dancing, in turn, decreases our likelihood of a fall. A recent study found that an hour of dance a week helps to reduce the risk of falling in over 65s. Whatsmore, dancing is a weight-bearing activity, so it helps to keep your bones healthy and prevent osteoporosis. Having strong bones means that if those twinkle toes do fail you and you have a fall, you are less likely to fracture a bone or cause serious harm.

(Pro tip- If you want a simple way of remembering what happens to our bodies as we age, remember the simple term “use it or lose it,” which means that you can maintain your strength, balance, flexibility if you keep active.)

Improve memory- Learning all those different steps and routines has many benefits, and a key one is that it helps improve our memory. According to a study in The New England Journal of Medicine, dancing goes further than just improving our memory and can prevent you from developing dementia as you get older. Our brain’s memory center, the hippocampus, naturally shrinks during late adulthood, which often leads to impaired memory and sometimes dementia. Dancing and aerobic exercise can reverse this loss in the size of the hippocampus, helping to keep us mentally sharp as we get older.

Widen your social circle — Dancing by its very nature is a social activity. It’s an excellent opportunity to meet new friends and widen your social circle. Not only does it improve your self-esteem, making it easier to make new friends, the music, and the need to concentrate on the dance moves help to remove any social awkwardness.

Fight depression — The body’s movement during dance produces big releases of our brains anti-depressant neurotransmitters like dopamine and endorphins (both associated with happiness and good mood). Alongside this, music and rhythm give our brain something to focus on, and recent research has shown that just listening to music can even cause depression relief.

Where to get started? - So, whether you want a new exciting form of exercise, to lose weight or to meet new people dancing could be the activity for you and the benefits are endless. There are websites such as The British Dance Council, One Dance, and Dance Near You, which can help you find a class that’s suitable for you.