Giving Compass' Take:

• Christie Aschwanden reports that new evidence is showing that 22 minutes of activity or exercise is enough to stay healthy and keep fit. The most important thing is to keep an active lifestyle. 

• How do these findings differentiate between different people? What are the easiest ways to be active and exercise?

• Learn how exercise is related to your mental health. 

If you’re sitting right now, stand up. Walk a few steps or wave your arms in the air. Maybe do a quick dance move. OK, finished? You just did something really good for your health and well-being.

That’s according to the latest Physical Activity Guidelines for Americans, released this week by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The new guidelines update ones published in 2008, and although the amount of exercise recommended isn’t different, the new guidelines incorporate some recent, tantalizing findings about the ways people can get in their exercise, promising to make the standards easier to meet. Whether these changes can overcome the human inclination to lie on the couch remains to be seen.

The new advice in a nutshell: Sit less and move more. What matters most is your total activity — whether it’s continuous or not — and every step counts. As before, the guidelines call for 150 to 300 minutes of moderate-intensity activity per week, unless the exercise is vigorous, in which case you only need 75 to 150 minutes per week. The guidelines also call for some kind of strength exercises twice per week.

Read the full article about exercise by Christie Aschwanden at FiveThirtyEight