While a popular critique of modern capitalist society has often been: ‘The rich get richer and the poor get poorer’, in this world of polar extremes, a similar critique of modern exercise and fitness society might be: ‘The big get bigger and the small get smaller’. Many men in the gym lift weights to get ever bigger and stronger, while many women blitz the cardio machines to get ever smaller and leaner.
We need not fall into gender stereotypes, because such goals may be interchangeable across the sexes; however, the extremes of training to get big or training to get small seem to dominate the efforts of so many. Taken to extremes, anything can become unhealthy.
It has been said in pharmacy that too much of any substance is toxic. A substance in this case is just like a goal, or an interest. Interests may blossom in passions, but passions sometimes tread that fine line that separates them from obsessions, where they start to affect our lives in negative ways.
Many will be familiar with disorders like anorexia, and its less known equivalent to which men can just as easily become afflicted: the colloquially-termed bigorexia.
Both cases involve a syndrome known as body dysmorphia, which basically means what you see in the mirror isn’t necessarily what you get. When sufferers of these conditions see themselves, they struggle to accept the reality that is presented in front of them.
You can suspect you have anorexia when everyone tells you how thin you are, and you still look in the mirror and think you’re fat. The opposite holds true for men in furious pursuit of more muscle mass. When people start telling you not to get any bigger and you still look in the mirror and see a skinny runt, you may be stricken with a case of body dysmorphia.
When everything we do is consumed by the goal of transforming our bodies, and nothing else seems to matter quite as much, then we have crossed that unfortunate shift away from a life of balance. When we start leaning too far in one direction, just as we do when we are stretching out with our hand for something just a little too far out of reach, we lose balance and could end up falling over.
Becoming consumed with things rarely means finding fulfillment upon achieving those same things, because becoming consumed is a habit difficult to break. Once you achieve that thing you craved, the habit forces you to crave something else with equal intensity, simply replacing our obsessions with others.
Repeating this cycle reduces our lives to chasing a series of finish lines that keep moving further away.
But when do we stop to smell the roses? When are we ever happy with what we’ve got?
The extremes of training to get big or training to get small seem to dominate the efforts of so many. Taken to extremes, anything can become unhealthy
Just like in the discipline of yoga, which has been firmly entrenched in the exercise and fitness scene for many years now, I often propose the middle way, or the way of balance.
Striving for and achieving balance is also a habit, but it is a habit a lot more likely to lead you down the path towards contentment and appreciation rather than tension and disappointment.
We can start developing this habit in a practical sense right away and, with time, allow it to spill over to other areas of our lives if we let it. If you wish to pack on muscle size, stop lifting weights day in, day out, and introduce some activities or exercises that increase your heart rate.
You will feel healthier and fitter, have more endurance to indulge in even harder workouts that will help build more muscle, and best of all, burn body fat, which means you will be leaner and the muscle you have will show even more.
If the idea of slaving away on the treadmill appears too detrimental to your muscle-building efforts, never fear, because there are other ways of introducing a cardiovascular element to your workout you might find more interesting.
Organise phases of your workout into circuits, performing each exercise immediately in succession without rest, and repeat the entire circuit three times rather than performing three sets of each exercise in isolation. And my personal favourite choice: add in high-repetition, full-body moves to your session, like squats or clean and presses. The clean and press involves lifting the bar from the floor to all the way over your head and engages virtually every muscle in the body.
If you wish to lose weight, avoid getting trapped in the cardio rut. Spending hours exclusively on the stationary bike or crosstrainer will shed weight at first, but unless you start lifting some weights too, your fat loss will eventually slow down.
Spice up your routine by breaking your cardio from one big block down into 10-minute chunks, and perform some resistance training exercises between each chunk.
Building some muscle mass will raise your basic metabolic rate, or in other words, the amount of calories your body needs on a constant basis, even at rest. In short, lifting weights will lead to better overall shape and more fat loss.
Even in dietary terms, avoid extremes and balance your essential nutrients. If too much of any substance is toxic, then this holds true for food too.
Strive for balance and it will soon become a habit, and far more beautiful rewards will await you.
matthew.muscat.inglott@mcast.edu.mt