Bust A Move

Two Left Feet? Step Out Of Your Comfort Zone And Shake Your Tail Feathers – Not Only Will Your Body Thank You, Your Brain Will Too! Erin Fisher Explains Why

Whether you can naturally move like Beyoncé, or are more inclined to shimmy your way around the house like Hugh Grant in Love Actually, there’s undoubtedly something seriously fun about getting your groove on. Humans have been dancing since the beginning of time as a form of ritual, celebration, entertainment, exercise and creative expression. It’s an incredible form of movement that has wide-ranging benefits for all aspects of wellness – physical, mental, emotional and social. If parties and weddings are the rare occasions that you bust a move, maybe it’s about time you made yourself a playlist and let loose.

Like any form of exercise, dancing will burn calories and increase your metabolism and can help you to achieve or maintain a healthy weight. If the movement is enough to get your pulse racing and lungs puffing, it will also improve your aerobic fitness and the health of your cardiovascular system too.

Improves overall mobility

Compared to a gym workout or forms of cardio like running, cycling and swimming where you are moving in much more predictable and repetitive patterns, the average dance routine will get you jumping, turning, squatting, twisting and leaning in all sorts of directions. In a song, the pace and mood of the music also changes constantly, and this is often mirrored by the constant change of direction and speed throughout a dance routine.

Doing exercise that requires such a large range of motion can do wonders to improve your coordination, agility, mobility, balance and spatial awareness. This can make it much easier to pick up new forms of exercise, increase your ease of movement in everyday life and reduce your chance of injury.

A study published in the Scandinavian