Why Work Out

Henry and I at the Highland Games in Tampa... Or what I've been doing instead of blogging lately

 

"I already have a hot body.  I don't need to work out." 

 

"I know you work out to relieve stress but..."

 

"Man, you can seriously fucking move!"

It's intriguing to me to listen to others in my life ruminate over why I am so serious and diligent about making sure that a day doesn't pass by without some sort of physical training.  Particularly interesting are the people who show marginal interest in working out offer the theories that I find most amusing.  I've heard those three lines from three different people and by far, the third one was the most satisfying and conclusive answer as to why train in the first place.

While a good strength training session can be cathartic and I don't mind looking good in a tight fitting shirt, both explanations are just outside of the ten-ring as to why I enjoy working out so much.  The mini-me in the sunglasses provides the best answer:  because movement is fun!   Modern adults hopelessly miss the mark when they think that comfort and not-moving is the way to be happy.  This trend must have started up a century ago when we started looking for ways to eradicate manual labor from our lives.  It made sense back then since we had spent the last couple of Milena literally working ourselves to death.  Viewed from that fact, taking to desk jobs must have seemed like a form of salvation. 

Our kids tell us a different story.   Confine a child to a chair and watch how pissy they become. They can't stand sitting.  It must be why I use sitting in a corner as punishment with kids for over a decade with remarkable results.   Note how they effortlessly squat as though they had been taught by _____ (insert your favorite fitness guru).   Did they learn that from someone?  Or, is it instinct that we suppressed through years of sitting down way too much?    They're happier squatting ass-to-grass. 

They don't do this just to relieve stress; they do it just because they're happier moving.   Their fresh, new bodies aren't yet degenerated by institutionalised laziness and they don't look at lots of movement as excessive or try to avoid it.  They need it.  Little do we realize that so do we as adults. 

Movement isn't simply cathartic.  It can also be sexy.  People far smarter with me with larger budgets of other people's money to waste figured out that most men are attracted to a certain ratio of hips-to-waist-to-shoulder measurements in women.  What they couldn't understand was why the ratio was exaggerate past perfect why men found it more attractive.  It should have been too much to have such a small waist with big hips... until they realized it wasn't how they looked.  It was how they looked when they moved that turned on men so much. 



You knew something like this was coming...

On a much simpler note, too many of us guys have bedded that seriously hot woman only to find out that they figured that since they were so damn smoking, they didn't have to do anything other than lay there and get screwed.  Or, think about the stripper with no dance moves.   On the less raunchy side of things, I've seen ugly ass men down in South America pick up hot women simply because they could dance so well.  It isn't simply enough to be good looking.  Humans are attracted to how a body moves.


Of course it happened at Bodytribe...This is a seriously cool (and hot) move!

So, we need to be move to be happy and life is happier overall when we move better.  It still doesn't explain why and where some sort of regimen of strength training ties into this need.  That's an easy answer though:  it helps us move better, especially as we get older... or at least it should.  That institutionalized laziness that pervades too much of Western Civilization renders many human bodies a complete wreck by the time age 30 rolls around (maybe that's why, without my knowledge, 30 became old by the time I hit that age).   There's no excuse for it either.  The fact that I move better now at 32 than I did at 27 might be a small accomplishment but still one that I hold some good regard.  I attribute this to the fact that know more about getting strong now than I did 5 years ago as well as being better at doing it.  That's why I find that third statement so satisfying

Whether we want to admit it to ourselves or not, we judge a lot of our being regarding our ability to move.  Ultimately, the better we move, the better our lives are.  Anything that accentuates that is good and worth pursuing.