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June 9, 2023
When most people think of exercise, they think of burning calories.
The result is that when people decide to get healthier or lose weight, they think they need to find the most intense and demanding workout possible.
They might look up an hour-long HIIT workout video that claims to burn 1,000 calories or attend a circuit training session at their local gym. They huff and puff through the workout (nearly vomiting in the process) and at the end lie semi-conscious in a pool of their own sweat.
To the average person, this is what "working out" entails.
But there are multiple issues with this approach to exercise:
First, those workouts burn fewer calories than advertised - in fact, people probably eat back all of those calories (and then some!) in the smoothie they slurp down at the end of the workout.
Second, those workouts are typically too much intensity too soon for metabolically unhealthy people to recover from. They soon burn out and quit exercising altogether.
Finally, people neglect proper strength training (which incorporates plenty of rest within the workout) because they don’t feel like they’re working hard enough.
I propose that we value exercise less for what it "burns" and more for what it “builds.”
Reducing the value of exercise to simple calorie burning is a massive disservice. It would be like saying that a Lamborghini is merely a way to get to the neighbor's house a few doors down.
Exercise is so much more than a means to burn a few extra calories every day. Here's how Peter Attia puts it: “Exercise might be the most potent ‘drug’ we have for extending the quality and perhaps quantity of our years of life.”
When we grasp the power of exercise, “workouts” turn into “training sessions.” The “workout” mindset merely checks off a box - “burn 500 calories so that I can indulge in this dessert later on without worrying about gaining weight.”
The “training” mindset looks for what capacities our bodies need and starts building those qualities through carefully structured training sessions.
Then we stack training session after training session, slowly but surely building those qualities that will help us live better now and age better in the future.
The whole concept of exercise is that we are intentionally exposing ourselves to stressors, then allowing our bodies to recover. During that recovery process, our bodies adapt in order to shore up our ability to withstand further exposure to that stressor.
This positive adaptation to stressors is known as “hormesis.” It is the process of our bodies becoming more resilient in response to repeated stressors - like the stressor of picking up heavy objects (i.e., resistance training).
We are discovering more benefits of exercise every day.
Strength training protects our muscle, which in turn bolsters our metabolic health (our ability to take the energy from the food we eat and translate it into energy for our cells).
Strength training also builds strong connections between our brain/nervous system and our muscle cells, resulting in better coordination, strength, and power.
Resistance training is one of our best defenses against both sarcopenia and osteopenia and osteoporosis (muscle and bone weakening).
Furthermore, when muscle contracts (as it does during a strength training session), it secretes signaling molecules known as myokines, some of which are anti-inflammatory and cross the blood-brain barrier. This might be one reason why strength training is correlated with cognitive health and mood regulation.
Both strength training and cardio (in proper doses and intensities) signal to our bodies to build new mitochondria, the tiny power plants found in our cells. It also makes existing mitochondria more efficient and creates a better vascular system for delivering nutrients throughout the body.
Dan Go says it well:
You can think about your exercise this way too. Decide on your goals, design your workouts in a way that incrementally gets you closer toward that goal, and then train (and recover) like it's your job.
And of course, don't forget to have fun along the way, because getting stronger and smarter is fun and rewarding...unlike those exhausting calorie-burner workouts.
Helpful resources:
Article: "Muscle Mass and Cognitive Function" by Peter Attia
Morpheus training platform for proper cardiovascular exercise
A guide to developing an effective strength training program
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