Tagged: exercise
The Biggest Loser? So What?
Since its’ inception The Biggest Loser has been a source of controversy, not only in the fitness world but across the internet and blogoverse for the extreme way that they approach weight loss and “health”. Most recently this all came to a head when at the finale the winner revealed a 60% loss of weight, losing 45 pounds in just over a month to win $250,000. The thing everyone freaked out about is that at the finale she looked incredibly skinny and was classified as “dangerously underweight”.
People, let’s have a reality check along with this “reality” show. If someone told me that I’d win $250,000 if I just got on a scale lighter than two other people I wouldn’t give a care as to what I looked like when it happened. I’m quite sure that immediately after that taped the contestant simply rehydrated, carbed back up and gained 15 pounds in a couple of weeks (if not days). In the fitness competition world it is quite common for men and women to drop 8-10 pounds of water in a day. Is it healthy? Of course not. Would I do it to win $250,000? You’re damned right I would. Professional fighters do it before almost every fight. For $250,000 you would be surprised what I would do.
On Season 7 Helen Philips lost 55% of her body weight and 30 pounds between the final episode and finale. She looked really, really unhealthy and her BMI was 18.9. Nobody freaked out. Did I mention that she was 47 years old? At least the contestant who did it this season was a former athlete and in her 20’s. She lost 45 pounds between the final episode and finale. The guy who came in 2nd in this controversial season dropped 57 pounds in the same time frame – nobody mentions that though, because he lost. These people are doing what it takes to win money. Period.
That all under the bridge, this show has never been anything to do with proper health and weight loss. Contestants regularly get injured doing workouts that they have no business doing. It gives a complete false impression of what healthy exercise and eating is (along with lots of product shout outs for marketing dollars). When one of your main sponsors is Subway, which has been proven over and over again to be almost as bad as many other fast food places for health then you really don’t have a leg to stand on. Showing people who are obese getting put through exercise that makes them pass out, throw up and hurt themselves is totally irresponsible, but it gets ratings, right? The “trainers” (and I put Jillian Michaels well into this category as a quotation mark “trainer”) spend barely any time with the contestants beyond shooting the puff pieces used for television. The contestants are contractually obligated to work out for several hours a day and eat mandated amounts of calories. This is about as far from “reality” as you can get, which is also why many of them gain weight back once they leave the show. Surprisingly enough, more often than not the ones who do well and get sponsorships and more promotional deals stay motivated to keep the weight off.
The show is about losing scale weight. For some reason, many people are obsessed with this concept. Athletes don’t generally give any consideration to their weight unless their sport involves weight classes like powerlifting or boxing. They care about what they can do with the body they have and how it performs. In an ideal world, we would all just accept our individual bodies, treat them with respect and focus on what they can do and what we want to do with them, not what a number on a machine says about you. For some sports, like cycling and running if you are lighter it does mean you will be faster, but smart people know that if it means your performance suffers then it isn’t worth it. Let’s focus more on what we can do, not what we look like.
Be healthy. Be strong. Be whatever you want to be without obsessing about a number because the media tells you you’re “too” anything, be it big, small, short or tall. Just get out there and stay active, do it responsibly and respect your body. And please, please don’t take this “reality” show as anything you should aspire to.
What Is Your Bus?
This article was inspired by a little old lady I observed while in my car driving home today. The woman looked to be fairly elderly, walking slowly along the sidewalk holding a large bag. As I drove closer, suddenly she stood up straight, grabbed her bag tight and started to run. Not just run, sprint. I noticed that she saw the bus coming and really, really wanted to catch it rather than waiting for the next one, which is obviously why she made that decision. Suddenly this somewhat frail looking woman could become Usain Bolt just because she suddenly wanted to. She did catch the bus, by the way (good for her).
As a society we typically take the easy way out, unless it is something that we really want. Then we will beat ourselves up, lie, work ourselves into mental illness or neglect other important things simply to get it done. This all comes down to simple priorities and motivation. When was the last time that you missed dinner with your family or an event because you were working late? When was the last time you skipped breakfast in order to get an extra ten minutes of sleep? People tend to confuse “want” as opposed to “have to” more often than they need to. As Tony Robbins would say, if you can change your “shoulds” into “musts” then your brain will literally change the way it thinks about things.
Think about this the next time you tell yourself that you “should go to the gym”. Change the way you say it to “I have to go to the gym”. The intention completely changes. Just like we as trainers manipulate the intention of different exercises, you can literally change the intention of how to spend your day to day activities – without having to drop everything and sprint. Find that reason and everything suddenly becomes easier. I often tell people – what if someone was holding a gun to your head? Would you get it done? What if your children or family were at risk? What would suddenly change that thing from 4th on your priority list to 1st?
In short – what is your bus? What would make you drop everything and sprint, possibly sacrificing injury and losing your bags without a second thought? Is it your job? Your family? Or maybe is there another bus you should be running for – like your health? So often I hear stories from clients and people I know that they wish they had started to take care of themselves sooner, or just stayed consistent with what they were doing before another bus came along that they felt they had to start running for. The thing is, once that bus pulls away and you miss it there might be another one coming, but it won’t take you to the same place. You might have to travel a few extra stops before you get to where you want to go.
I’m obviously an advocate of taking care of your health and well-being first, and then everything else kind of falls into place. This can be as simple as meditation, finding an activity that inspires you or setting a goal that motivates you to get out and do something active. And the next time you think about stopping the momentum, just imagine that you look behind you and that bus is coming down the road. Maybe you won’t have to sprint to get there, but it might help you pick up your pace just a bit.
The Cleaver Vs. The Scalpel
I’ve written before many times on how easy it is to kick someone’s ass physically. In fact, I wrote about it previously under “Anyone Can Kick Somebody’s Ass” if you care to check it out. Many times in my industry clients fall victim to trainers pushing them far too hard, or people are victims themselves by putting themselves through a workout that they have no business doing, especially over a period of time. Due to the theory of “no pain, no gain” people think wrongly about forces and how they are applied to the body, imagining that the harder they work the faster things are going to move. In fact many times the opposite is true, and you’re doing yourself far more harm than good by trying to stimulate the body past what it is capable of dealing with.
I was in my local butcher the other day watching a guy cut up various bits of meat while my order was being prepared, and I couldn’t help but think that the instruments he was using wasn’t too far off from what some trainers try to use when trying to mitigate change. For some cuts there was no precision at all, just a big cleaver that hacked up everything as fast as possible for the sake of getting it done. Now, these guys are probably better at using a cleaver than anyone because of experience, which can also be the basis for a skilled trainer to be using force like that. They can hack through a joint without thinking about it because they have done it 1000 times. They know just where to strike in order to separate things without having to do it again, possibly dulling the blade in the process.
However, then I saw a more delicate operation being done on a fish, which was a very precise series of cuts with a razor thin blade in order to remove bones, which if not done properly completely ruins the meat in both look and feel. This is the other side of the equation. If you use a cleaver to debone a fish, you’re going to get a big smelly mess on the floor and the precision that you need just isn’t there. If you use a scalpel to hack up a chicken, you’re likely to not only take forever but get really frustrated when you try to cut through a joint. When I’m dealing with a serious injury case, it needs to be precise, focused energy devoted to doing exactly what I want to have happen, otherwise I’m going to potentially make the person worse, not better. However, if I’m dealing with a person who needs to be able to generate a lot of force for a specific physical act, then maybe they need a different approach.
So does the desired result dictate the tool or the other way around?
In my experience too many people think too much about the outcome and not how they are going to get there. They are so focused on the goal and willing to do whatever it take to get there they forget about the tool, and that in the physical world there is an endless amount of tools at their disposal in order to achieve that goal. This is where real skill as a trainer enters the picture. Just like a master chef, a really good trainer can pull out a variety of tools in order to create the desired outcome that they are looking for, whether it be simple movement, higher amounts of force, or even something like changes to lifestyle for a client. Some people need a cleaver because they need to have things completely changed – and they can handle the force. Some require a bit of a finer touch and just some very precise modifications in order to keep their progress moving forward. Many clients prefer the cleaver, thinking that the best approach is just to smash everything, when the scalpel is often what is needed, especially at the beginning of an exercise program, or a change to what you are trying to accomplish. The ego can easily get in the way.
So the next time you are evaluating your exercise program, ask yourself – what tool do you need in order to make things the most effective for what you are trying to achieve at that moment? And on top of that, would you be better off using another tool at that point because the one you really want to use or are used to using doesn’t do the right thing? This requires thought and constant evaluation. The benefit of working with someone who knows how to do this is that it takes the guess work out of it for you. However, even if you are working on your own just remember that tools are just that – tools. It is the person behind them performing the movement or coaching you through the movement that is actually causing the change. Make sure that you are using the right ones. And that the person you are trusting with your physical health has as many tools as possible in order to get the job done.
And if anyone in Ottawa needs a good butcher, just let me know.
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Therapy and Exercise Refined 