Ours is a country of extremes, and nowhere do we see this more than in our relationship to exercise. We approach exercise like so many other things – “If some is good than more must be better.” The flip-side to this extreme is the other end which says, “If I can’t have it all, then why bother trying at all.” Neither of these approaches to exercise or life works well.
I have so many patients that are training for the next marathon, or are signed up for three or four different dance exercise classes in addition to working out for an hour a day. Still others mention how they just bicycled 20 miles this morning as they prepare for the 100 mile race coming up.
I also have so many patients that never get away from the computer to even take a half an hour for lunch. Others spend all day driving, putting in 300 to 400 miles a day, just for work. We don’t even want to look at the folks that commute to the Bay area for work – that is just plain insane. Then there are the older, retired folks that just don’t seem to do much other than sit all day. There seems to really be an all-or-nothing mentality at work here.
I was reading an article last week about things that Americans find shocking when they visit Europe. One thing they notice is the absence of this constant drive we Americans have that appear to be behind most of the items they mentioned. E.g. Little things like entire towns that shut down in the afternoon for 3 hours for lunch, or how “fast food” is considered an abomination are examples of how culturally different Europeans are compared to our fast paced American lifestyle. In Europe meals are meant to take a long time and be enjoyed casually. Curiously the article also mentioned how Europeans are generally lean and healthy looking. Nobody goes to a health club and nobody seems to be on a diet – another of American’s obsessions.
Maybe our drive to the extreme is not really the way to go, but moderation does not seem to be in our vocabulary.
Humans in prehistoric times did not live this way. Through most of human development we were a casual, social crowd, hanging out with our buddies and doing little things like chipping rocks and telling stories. Exercise came in occasional brief bursts as we tried to chase down some dinner or maybe run away to keep from becoming something else’s dinner. We would dig up roots now and then and pick fruit when it was available, but only as much as we could eat right away. Eating was not a regular event – feast and famine were common.
The takeaway from our history is that the exercise we were designed and evolved to perform involved brief, high intensity bursts of energy just a few times a day at best. We were not a work obsessed crowd.
Where this is leading to suggests that we might be better off emulating our ancestors. Instead of long bouts of exercise at the gym or on the road a few times a week, I suggest we think about something more like 2 – 3 minutes of rapid movement several times a day. Numerous studies have been done that show the advantage of interval training for cardiovascular health. This means moving as fast as you can for 20 – 30 seconds then taking it easy for a couple minutes before doing another intense pace for 20 – 30 seconds. Most programs have you do this cycle for 5 to 8 repetitions. The really interesting thing is that the good results from this protocol were found to occur even when the bouts of intense exercise were split up to different times of the day.
Another physiological fact is that the heart gets very activated when you do things with your arms. So you can get your heart racing even with arm exercises – something to consider for all those people that say they are couch bound or wheelchair bound. The key here is that exercise is cumulative throughout the day. And if you pump up the intensity, all you need is 8 or 9 minutes of total exercise a day to make your heart very happy. Since you are only doing this in brief spurts each time, exhaustion and burnout is not an issue. Anyone can do this.
Here is a simple example of an exercise routine that uses just four movements.
Dr. Zach Bush, the guy that created the gut product “Restore” that I wrote about a couple weeks ago, put this together. The nice thing about this routine is that you can adapt it easily to fit your current level of fitness.
Another really old exercise I enjoy playing with is called a Hindu squat:
A couple of minutes of this smoothly rolling exercise will really get your blood moving. This is really the key, because when you get that blood moving your body releases nitric oxide, which really opens up your blood vessels. This gets more blood deeper into your tissues to flush away toxins and bring in nutrition.
Many of you already understand the importance of good blood flow, but how many of you also understand that oxygen carried by the blood is a double edged sword? We need the oxygen to enable us to form energy from the food we eat, but too much oxygen creates free radicals that burn and destroy tissue. This is why I counsel against long distance running or long time periods in aerobic exercise. All that extra oxygen damages the inside lining of the blood vessels and causes plaque buildup and hardening of the arteries. This is a frequent problem for ultra marathoners. You think you are doing something super healthy and in fact you are busy digging yourself an early grave.
Stronger, faster, harder is not a health mantra. Driving desire may get a lot done, but at what price? Health is achieved through little movements. A few minutes a day of aerobic activity; lifting heavy things every so often gently and slowly; simple balance activities in the course of daily life; stretching as you get out of bed; these are the things that build health. The American love of excess is killing us. Slow it down a bit and you might live a longer, healthier, and happier life.