4 Exercise Principles You Need to Understand For Fitness

There are 4 basic principles of exercise that I think everyone should understand when it comes to trying to improve personal fitness levels. These ideas work across the lifespan and are applicable to people of all fitness levels (from those totally new to exercise to elite athletes).

Exercise is a Result of Modern Life – You have to Choose Fitness

It’s important to understand that exercise is a result of modern living.  At some point in ancient history before farming and agriculture made food supply more readily available, we hunted meat and gathered edible plants from the land.  We probably also ate insects and other things we would consider fairly odd in present day society.  We probably walked a lot.  Squatted up and down all day long.  Sprinted from time to time.  We probably laughed and took naps when tired.  We probably picked up heavy things infrequently but carried moderate loads like fire wood or carcasses of prey for moderate distances. We didn’t have access to crazy dense calorie sources and we had to use our bodies daily to survive.  The idea that you would run just for the sake of a workout would have probably been a crazy idea during early human history.

Once agriculture solves the problem of feeding lots of people without anywhere near the same effort, it frees our energy up to create societies and technology.  That also means that there is no environmental pressure for us to move our bodies.  There’s no natural incentives built into our environment to make us move with the frequency and daily consistency that might have existed in ancient times.  We’ve all heard these things talked about a million times:  sitting in cars, office jobs, sitting in desks at schools, staring at computers/phones all day, knowledge work etc.  Even if you have a physical job there’s the risk of overuse injuries from repetitive movements and not having the basic knowledge to know how to care for your body outside of that work environment.  The modern world doesn’t create the natural barriers to overconsumption that the prehistoric world did.

So, for my money, we as individuals and hopefully one day as a society have to begin thinking about how we can integrate more movement into our days:  walking, stairs, sitting on the floor, stretching, etc.  For the last 10 years I’ve been a huge believer that most people would do themselves a great service just by finding more ways to move their body throughout the day in simple ways that don’t involve heavy breathing or exerting a bunch of strength.  Add in some focused mobility/flexibility work to combat stiffness and combine that with a good diet and most people would see everything they wanted out of their bodies.  

That being said, there is great power in choosing activities that fit your interests and natural desires.  Some people like dancing, some running, some martial arts, I’ve met many cyclists in my day, and swimmers as well.  Obviously, choosing an activity you already enjoy gives you more incentive to do it.  The point here is that moving your body frequently and daily is the result of cultivating habits.  It’s a change in mindset for many people.  You have to choose fitness. As I said in the last post, you’ll have to develop greater self awareness and you’ll have to be creative about incorporating movement into your day.  This process will involve consistent evolving action.  Incorporating movement into the things you already do rather than building your life around a particular program will be a continual theme.  I’m going to give you principles/resources and you’ll have to figure out how to apply them.  Take ownership.  You have to be the number one healthcare provider/advocate in your life.  

Learn.  Experiment.  Evaluate results.  Adjust.  Iterate (Do it again!).

Move Often at a Comfortable Pace for Stress-Free Calorie Burn

Over the last 10-11 years since leaving the Army there have been 3-4 occasions where a friend or acquaintance comes to me and brags about some hardcore workout they did the other day.  There were 100’s of push ups, sit ups, and sprints.  They’re really sore.  When people tell me this it’s as if they’re looking for me to affirm what they’ve done.  Afterall, they know I was a Green Beret in the Army and they know I’ve been a personal trainer, and they may even know that I weighed over 300 lbs at one point…. And all this adds up to me being in complete favor of a person totally crushing themselves everytime they work out?  Right?  

Usually, I wince at these stories and if I know you well I roll my eyes and sigh.  Is there a time and place to really get on the gas and push yourself hard? Yes, but not when you’re trying to get started and need to start developing long term habits.  Most people just want to lose 10-20 pounds in my experience.   Most people want to feel like they have more energy on a regular basis.  In these cases, (and to emphasize the first point) I’m going to tell you to just move your body more throughout the day with exercise that is easy for you.  That means walk more, do some stretches.  If you are a relatively well trained athlete, walk more and do some stretches!  That athlete may also add 5-10 push ups here and there.  3-5 pull ups.  Sitting in the bottom of a squat for 60 seconds or doing a plank for 60 seconds.  To burn a few pounds we have multiple angles of attack.  One easy tactic is to just move your body more and in ways that are very comfortable.  I often call this ‘stress free caloric burn’.

Pushing yourself to do an intense workout 3-5 times a week for 1 hour each can seem like the answer to developing better fitness but the challenge is sustainability.  How long can you maintain that routine?  How well are you able to recover from it?  Even more pernicious and even more to the point of this particular part of this article is the fact that sometimes the intense workout serves to cause us more distress generally than eustress.  Distress is bad stress that elevates cortisol levels and makes sleep more difficult, causes digestive issues, and causes us to hold or even gain weight in some cases.  I first began doing Crossfit workouts in 2010.  They’re intense and the movements were foreign to my body.  Initially I felt great but by about 2 years in I was doing Crossfit style workouts 5 days a week.  Injuries were piling up and training just wasn’t fun.  It wasn’t the workouts themselves.  It was the frequency with which I was doing them.  I had the same issue when I was young trying to lose weight and get stronger.  I was lifting weights at a high intensity and not allowing my body to rest.  I struggled with strength gain because of this.

This way of thinking is common for Americans.  We figure if we do more and push harder, we’ll get better results faster from our bodies.  Meanwhile, getting more gentle movement more frequently may be the key to getting us the results we want.  When I cut down drastically on the high intensity workouts I actually got leaner.  I was walking a lot, stretching a lot and doing focused strength training sessions involving simple body-weight movements that I had good command of.  I wasn’t getting injured as much because I had the humility to stay away from movements that I hadn’t developed the mobility and strength for.

I’ll go deeper into specific protocols in the future.  For now, I need you to recognize the power of simply choosing more gentle easy movement versus deciding that getting in shape means thrashing yourself daily.  The latter will probably work against most people.

As Intensity of Exercise Increases, Importance of Recovery Increases

Going a bit deeper on the previous idea, recovery is going to be essential if you are someone who has decided that more strenuous activities will be a regular part of their exercise regimen.  Maybe you are into distance running, triathlons, or crossfit.  Maybe you’re into Brazilian Jiu Jitsu or some other Martial Art like myself.  Anything that involves pushing yourself relatively hard but is also an activity that you enjoy has to be anchored in the understanding that ‘more is not always better’.

At one point I really loved doing Crossfit.  The sport introduced me to a totally different way of thinking about health that has ultimately been very beneficial for me.  However, it’s hard for me to even think about stepping into another Crossfit Gym or even watch videos online that involve Crossfit.  Why?  I burned myself out on it.  I spent far too much time chasing the competition aspect of it rather than chasing high quality movement.  This led to lots of injuries that didn’t need to happen and eventually led to me walking away from an activity I had a true love for at one point.  Too many intense workouts without enough recovery in between and without enough attention to the parts of my body that were weak and tight.  My ego and my desire for results caused me to lose sight of the primary reason I participate in any sort of physical activity: health and longevity.

I think everyone would benefit from finding some physical activity that’s relatively hard that they truly enjoy participating in.  The benefits in mental health can’t be understated.  But, care has to be taken that we’re not pushing ourselves so hard that we aren’t able to bounce back from workouts and intense activities need to be supported by proper mobility/flexibility training to keep the body structurally sound.  

Quality Movement is Based on Strength and Control Through Range of Motion

Good strength and control through a wide range of motion is the base upon which high quality movement is built.  The more control and strength you can express through increased ranges of motion, the more durable you will be and the more you will be able to acquire new movements.

As an example, think about your wrists.  How much passive range of motion do you have?  (passive meaning how far can you bend in either direction without adding external force)  I can create an almost 90 degree angle between my hand and forearm on both wrists.  I also can hang from a pull up bar for over 60 seconds.  I have good range of motion and good strength in my hands and wrists.  

What does this mean for durability?  Let’s say I was walking down the sidewalk in my neighborhood and I came across a section where the concrete was cracking and the surface was very uneven.  I catch my foot on a protruding piece of the sidewalk.  As I begin to fall forward I reach my arms in front of me.  As my outstretched hands hit the pavement I whence slightly due to the heat that’s been gathering on the ground all day (it’s summertime in the south) and due to the gritty surface of the concrete.  I’m able to arrest the downward momentum and my hands splay flat on the ground.  My wrists feel fine.  None of my fingers are jammed up and my shoulders don’t hurt.  I get up and go on with my day and remind myself to pay attention when I’m walking in that part of my neighborhood.  

Now, imagine if I could barely bend my wrists, I had poor hand strength, and poor upper body strength. If I had tripped in the same manner that I just described it would be a much different outcome:  

• I may have landed with all the force in the tips of my fingers which would have led to an injury to one of those fingers if not multiple.  
• I may have landed on my palms but that would probably force my wrists into a position they can’t normally handle which will lead to a wrist injury.  
• I may know instinctively that my hands and wrists are weak so I might try to land on my forearms but my shoulders are weak as well, so I may injure my shoulders and hit my face on the ground ( I’ve got a big head so it’s totally possible if I was weak!).

Bad, Bad, Bad!  It’s just a bad outcome for no damn reason other than I’m not doing anything to gain Strength and Control through increasing ranges of motion.

For further clarity, strength is about force production.  Strength is about being able to apply force to a surface or object to manipulate our own bodies or an external object.  Control is about physically being able to do what we want to do at the speed we want to do it.  Being able to do 10 push ups relatively slow and relatively fast are both expressions of control.  Increasing ranges of motion means the ability to access the full genetic range of our joints.  In order to gain the wrist mobility that I describe above I had to develop flexibility in forearm muscles and more mobility in the wrist joint itself.  By cultivating both control and strength through increased range of motion I am not only more durable against injury but I am able to do things like handstands, cartwheels, and front handsprings relatively easily.  They all require high relative strength, control, and range of motion through the wrists among other parts of the body.

Now extrapolate this idea to your entire body.  Are you able to reach both hands straight overhead with your elbows straight and upper arms touching your ears?  Can you squat down fully closing your knees and hips without your heels coming off the ground and your toes pointing forward?  These things are probably difficult for most people but they can certainly be improved over time with conscious effort.  Over time, I will generate articles addressing these issues and more.  For now, understand that all human movement is based on some level of strength (force production), control (neurological engagement), and range of motion (muscle flexibility, joint mobility, and general tissue quality).  Keep this in mind as you approach any exercise routine.

Words of Encouragement

Sometimes exercise and getting healthier can seem so convoluted in today’s world. Regular media and social media are constantly sending us different and sometimes conflicting messages about what’s needed to be a healthy human being. Of course this can be overwhelming but my own journey has taught me that action followed by reflection are the most important things in getting healthy.

You have to take the action of reading a book about diet or exercise. You have to take the action of implementing the strategies and observing the results. You have to take ultimate responsibility for your own health. All the messaging in the world will mean nothing to you without action and reflecting upon outcomes. Nevermind the overwhelm, pick something and go!