MPF "Sedentary" Lifestyle?

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new_joe
new_joe Posts: 5
in Health and Weight Loss
So I've been reading through a lot of the posts on here and I'm seeing a lot of what some people think is a misinterpretation of the activeness of someone's lifestyle on the setting for the MPF profiles?

I "set" my lifestyle as sedentary because I'm a full-time student so obviously, not much movement going on there. However, I do run 3 miles 6 times a week, so would that make me active? Or lightly active? Running is really all I do and my time is on average about 35 minutes, so I never really considered myself all that active...since it's only about half an hour from a full day.

So what are the cut-offs for sedentary, lightly active, active, and very active? So I can appropriately adjust my caloric intake?:huh:

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  • mrsleonard12
    mrsleonard12 Posts: 66 Member
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    I would say lightly active. 3 miles 6 times a week is far from sedentary! :) the calories will adjust for you and if need be you can always increase or decrease calories
  • new_joe
    new_joe Posts: 5
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    Thank you for your input! :o)
  • 2ht2hand1e
    2ht2hand1e Posts: 116 Member
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    I vote sedentary if you log and eat back the calories you burn running.
  • grimendale
    grimendale Posts: 2,153 Member
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    It depends. The activity level and the amount of exercise you track are linked. I work an office job, so I could techinically set myself as sedentary, but I walk a lot during the day on my own time (I like to walk places) and I don't keep track of this, so I set myself to lightly active instead to capture that activity. Any workouts I do beyond this (currently, I am doing Insanity 6 days a week) is tracked as exercise independently, and I eat extra calories for each workout. If I wanted to set myself to a higher level to account for six workouts a week, it work out about the same.

    If you are on campus, you likely walk a decent bit between classes. Unless you are using fitbit or similar to track all of that, I would recommend setting your activity to lightly active and tracking your runs as cardio. On days when you run, eat extra calories to meet the extra calories burned by your run. Hope that helps.
  • aquarabbit
    aquarabbit Posts: 1,622 Member
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    Not knowing too much about your lifestyle, I would say lightly active. I remember having to walk a lot as a full time student. I would say a sedentary lifestyle is MY lifestyle. I'm an artist. So I sit in front of a canvas all day unless I'm working out or going to get food. Otherwise I'm on my butt. The only "active" part of my job is stretching canvases. And I use power tools that do most of the work for me, so even that's pretty light.
  • VictoriaSnape
    VictoriaSnape Posts: 58 Member
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    Same as above. I'm also a college student and have a part time job and i use the sedentary setting. I run 6 days per week (10 km + one longer run) i do pilates and 30 days shred and log all of my burned calories.
    It depends what you think is easier for you, if you set it to being lightly active, then this means that all the running which you do is already accounted for and must be done for the calculations to be right, so you can't really skip any. Any additional exercise you can just log it.
  • Kanlassak
    Kanlassak Posts: 101 Member
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    There are two general ways to measure activity on MFP: the activity levels you talk about and how it logs exercise.

    You can use the activity levels for your daily activities not including exercise (work, school, transportation, whatever) and then log exercise separately and it will give you extra calories for the days you exercise. In which case you'd probably go with sedentary and then log your runs. If you walk a lot to classes or to get groceries it could bump you up to lightly active in addition to logging exercise.

    Or you can include everything in your activity level and not go for the exercise calories. In which case you'd be lightly active or active depending on how strenuous your runs are (flat track can be very different from hills) and how reliable you are about going every time.

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