The world has conspired against us! Energy-conserving devices (i.e., remote controls, escalators, riding lawnmowers, motorized bicycles, etc.) have eliminated opportunities to use our muscles and accelerated age-related muscle loss (sarcopenia). At the same time, inexpensive, ultra-processed food (i.e., junk food, fast food, etc.) is available 24/7. In a nutshell, our environment has made staying strong and healthy an uphill battle. However, contrary to popular opinion, effective Strength Training does not require hours of intense effort or superhuman discipline. Living better is more about healthy routines than superhuman discipline. Here are three ways to build a lifelong commitment to living your best life.
Gain Perspective. Why bother with Strength Training and eating sensibly when everyone around you does the opposite? Questions like this that lack perspective have led many to an all-or-nothing mindset. Health experts agree that this kind of thinking is damaging to our health. Fortunately, gaining perspective makes good decisions more doable. When you combine a lack of Strength Training with poor eating habits, you lose muscle and replace it with body fat at an accelerated rate – a condition known as sarcopenic obesity. This condition puts you on the fast track to developing degenerative diseases, including heart disease, diabetes, and dementia!
Reversing this trend is more doable than most people realize. At 61, I've maintained a healthy, disease-resistant body by making good decisions for decades. First and foremost, I schedule my Strength Training every week (typically Wednesday and Sunday). These efficient 25-minute workouts keep me strong and physically fit by investing less than 1% of my week—a doable commitment by any standard. In addition to my Strength Training, I prioritize a healthy diet centered around unprocessed food (i.e., whole foods including vegetables, fruits, grains, nuts, legumes, fish, and other lean proteins). However, this does not mean my eating habits are perfect. I get my share of high-calorie days and balance them with structured undereating days (i.e., lower-calorie days). My low-calorie days include high-nutrition, low-calorie foods that offset my high-calorie weekends. In simple terms, I plan low-calorie weekdays to balance my high-calorie weekends.
Take Your Medicine. In 2007, the American Medical Association partnered with the American College of Sports Medicine to launch the Exercise is Medicine Initiative.[1] The vision of this initiative is to make exercise assessment and promotion a standard part of the medical system. It calls for physicians and other healthcare providers to assess exercise (Strength Training and Physical Activity) with every patient visit.
The objective is to treat exercise as a vital sign, like blood pressure, body temperature, etc. Making exercise assessments a standard part of every healthcare visit could increase the number of Americans living and benefiting from the Strength Training Lifestyle. At the very least, it should encourage you to view your Strength Training as medicine!
Build a Safe Haven. In The End of Overeating, the controversial former FDA Commissioner Dr. David Kessler tackles the seemingly complex issue of why Americans overeat. Despite the confusion, there is one truth that stands out. If you buy it, you will eat it. Nobody buys food because their goal is not to eat it. You can tell a lot about a person's health by looking at their shopping habits or lack thereof. Despite the notion that psychology influences our eating habits, little evidence links it to the seismic changes in eating over the past five decades. Dr. Kelly Brownell, Director of the World Food Policy Center at Duke University, states, "Our food environment is toxic." His book FOOD FIGHT states that the pressure to overeat is overwhelming![2]
In Food Frenzy,[3] I write about the highjacked eating habits our emotions can create. However, before we go off the deep end, we must realize that our ancestors exhibited the same eating patterns. The only difference is the calorie density of what they overate—our ancestors consumed wild plants and animals (between 5 to 50 calories per ounce). In comparison, we routinely ingest ultra-processed foods (between 100 to 150 calories per ounce). The driving force between the two is the environment. Our ancestors never dealt with two-for-one pizza specials, supersize fries, and bottomless pasta bowls. To prevent your body composition from moving in the wrong direction (losing muscle and gaining body fat), combine Strength Training with a healthy environment (Safe Haven) to make nutritious, lower-calorie foods the default option.
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Stay Strong,
Richard J. Wolff, RDN
References
1. Exercise is Medicine: A Global Health Initiative. https://www.exerciseismedicine.org/
2. Brownell, K., Horgen, K., 2004. Food Fight. The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
3. Wolff, R., Food Frenzy. http://www.medfitnessprogram.com/blog/2020/04/17/food-frenzy-article