Move Your Body

How regular movement improves mood, reduces stress, and helps you handle emotional triggers

The Emotional Maintenance Series

This series explores ten simple, science-backed habits that can dramatically improve your emotional life. None of them are complicated. Most take only a few minutes. But together they create the conditions that help your brain regulate emotions more effectively.

Here are the ten habits:

1. Take a 10-minute walk (read here)

2. Drink enough water (read here)

3. Protect your sleep (read here)

4. Move your body

5. Spend time in nature

6. Eat real food

7. Ask better questions

8. Diagram an emotional incident

9. Solve one small problem

10. Write about your core beliefs

Each week, I take a deep dive into one of these, and this week we’re on…

Number four: Move your body

In 2023, three psychiatrists from Jawaharlal Nehru Medical College in Wardha, India conducted a comprehensive review of research on exercise and mental health, examining studies published over the previous decade.¹ Their goal was to better understand both the short-term and long-term emotional benefits of regular physical activity. Across this large body of work, they found consistent evidence that exercise improves mood by reducing symptoms of depression and anxiety, lowering stress and reactivity to everyday challenges, and enhancing self-esteem, including more positive body image. Exercise was also linked to improved cognitive functioning, particularly attention, focus, and memory, as well as better sleep quality.

Photo by Gustavo Fring: https://www.pexels.com/photo/woman-and-man-doing-push-ups-4971797/

Taken together, these findings suggest that regular physical activity plays a meaningful role in emotional wellbeing. Importantly, exercise appears to improve what we might think of as your baseline or pre-stimulus mood, putting you in a more stable position before something stressful or frustrating happens. By reducing stress and improving overall functioning, it helps create a buffer that makes emotional challenges easier to handle.

The ten-minute version

Start small. Pick an activity you already enjoy and move for ten minutes. The goal is not intensity or performance. It is consistency. Focus on how you feel during and after. The mental health benefits are often immediate, and noticing them makes it more likely you will stick with it over time.

Take it up a notch

As this becomes a habit, add some variety and, when possible, include other people. Try a class, a walking group, or a new activity to keep things interesting. If you can, move outside. Combining exercise, novelty, and social interaction amplifies the emotional benefits and makes the habit more sustainable.

If mobility is an issue

The same principles apply: start small, choose something you enjoy, and focus on how it makes you feel. Gentle movement, seated exercises, stretching, or light resistance work can all be effective. What matters is consistency and the shift in your mental state. Even small amounts of movement can reduce stress and improve mood.

Why this works

Regular physical activity improves emotional wellbeing through multiple pathways. It helps regulate stress by lowering baseline tension and reducing reactivity to everyday challenges. It also improves mood, supports better sleep, and enhances cognitive functioning, all of which make it easier to manage difficult emotions when they arise. Over time, these changes create a more stable starting point, so you are less likely to feel overwhelmed by triggers and more able to respond effectively. In that sense, exercise acts as a kind of buffer, strengthening your ability to handle stress, frustration, and setbacks.

That said, it is important to start in a way that is appropriate for your body and health history. If you have any medical conditions, injuries, or concerns, consider talking with a healthcare professional before beginning a new exercise routine. The goal is not to push hard, but to build something sustainable that supports both your physical and emotional health.

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Dr. Ryan Martin is a psychologist, university dean, and author of three books - including the recent Emotion Hacks: 50 Ways to Feel Better Fast. Known online as the Anger Professor, he helps people understand how emotions work and what to do with them. His TED Talk, Why We Get Mad, has been watched more than 3.5 million times.

1. Mahindru, A., Patil, P. & Agrawal, V. (2023). Role of physical activity on mental health and well-being: A review. Cureus, 15, e33475.