“Don’t aim at success—the more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue…as the unintended side-effect of one’s personal dedication to a course greater than oneself.”
- Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, Flow.

Exercise. You might be doing it right, but unfortunately, you're probably thinking about it wrong. And, as with anything, this can make all the difference.

The body will, of course, respond to external stimuli, but we also know that a response can be amplified, diminished, or, in some cases, fashioned entirely from our interpretation of these events, first. This has significant implications when we are looking to exercise to support efforts to change the body, and we can learn to frame the same 'reality' in a way far more likely to elicit this desired response.

In the first of two articles referenced below, Precision Nutrition outline one of the reasons why exercise is not (solely) effective as a means of fat loss - due to a process called hedonic compensation, or moral licensing. In viewing exercise as either, a necessary evil tolerated as a penance for our lifestyle, or merely a sweat session to shake off some stress, we frame it as a 'chore' that is deserving of 'reward'.

This is a blinkered, bastardised definition of fitness and the reason behind all fitness frustrations.

"I've been so good; I deserve to be bad."

Most crucially, as highlighted in the studies, the exercise itself has nothing to do with it - just our interpretation of it. A point demonstrated even more tellingly in the second link, from a study showing that the body will respond in very different ways to the same food. Or more accurately - a response not to the food at all, but to the label - to the 'story' you tell it. Although the mechanisms for this remain unknown, this is not mysterious and is a simple extension of the well-documented placebo effect, or conversely, it's lesser-known evil twin - the nocebo effect. 

The real mystery is that in knowing this, why we persist in casting exercise in a harmful, or at best, unhelpful, light.

You know when somebody says they’ll do something with you, but they just bitch and moan through it so there's no point them being there in the first place, and you can’t have any fun anyway? We are all guilty of it - the type of attitude that ruins it for all concerned. Let's see if we can make it even more distasteful:

"I'll grudgingly accept that I have to do this, but ONLY, if I get something out of it. "

Does that sound conducive either to success or enjoyment in any endeavour? If someone were to say that to you, would you feel excited and motivated to help, or reluctance, obligation and a whole series of other soul-sucking emotions, most of which make you feel like telling them to just fuck off then.

    •    I am exercising to lose fat.
    •    I am exercising to get fit.
    •    I am exercising to get stronger.
    •    I am exercising to blah, blah, blah.

I’ll do this only so I get that.

This mercenary approach is the learned attitude most of us have towards exercise, and all of us likely have examples of our bodies telling us exactly that. 

This is an unfortunate, yet pervasive, stereotype of what exercise is supposed to be, but sadly, we are missing the point. Indeed, exercise plays a role in each of these goals, but if we reduce it to just a means to an end, then we limit it to only that and simultaneously diminish both the experience AND the possibility of what we might be trying to achieve. The way forward is to go further back - to reduce it absolutely.

The underlying reason for exercise is this:

It is a physiological imperative.

 

That's it. What other reason do you need? Not another theory, idea, or gimmick, just a wide-eyed, unblinking acknowledgement of a fact. A fact that is starkly evident at this base level simply because it is yet to be burdened with all the other crap that gets layered over the top of it in this day and age.

Once we recognise this, then we are already more favourably disposed to whatever intention (fat loss, muscle gain, fitness), we might then care to layer over top - on the understanding that we would be exercising anyway.

The goal may be to lose fat. The goal may be to get stronger. The goal may be to walk on your hands for a mile. These differences will readily influence how you train, but if it is no longer your reason why, then immediately the transactional nature is gone and instead of exercising to get something, you are exercising to give.  

Exercise is not something from which you can take, (weight loss, fitness, or even health) and the more we chase these ideals, the more they elude is. You are not a brain in a jar, or some disembodied consciousness floating in the ether. Your body (and brain), grow and thrive on movement, challenge and complexity. Gift it.

Do you water a plant to 'get' flowers? More likely you water a plant to keep it healthy - to optimise the conditions under which the flowers might grow. The flowers will then happen of their own accord.

This is also a lens through which we can ensure any further layers of intention are kept in check. Whatever your goals might be they don’t hold much sway over your body, and especially not in the face of those factors that really shape it. When your goals are aligned with this first truth you can expect success. If not, you can forget it. 

This mindset means we never end up in a situation where we might be training or dieting in a manner that ignore it - which is not only a possibility but is unfortunately almost always the case. Without this viewpoint, it's easy to see how, 'I'm training to lose fat' will unerringly descend into, 'I'll just thrash myself mindlessly and preferably while starving.' And equally so, how that will end in tears  - not the desired outcome, but one you have optimised the conditions for nevertheless. 

The distinction between ‘training for fat loss’ and ‘training for the benefit of body and mind in a manner most likely to elicit fat loss’ is a subtle one, but it is the doorway to a whole other world of understanding about your body. Start to see exercise as enjoyable in and of itself, as a medium of self-discovery. This is the basis of the intuitive training process learned at Leftfield and it all comes down to listening to the body, not telling.

From learning to roll, crawl and walk we are innately driven to move and our physical and mental growth will always be found in the shadows of the next challenge. This simple shift in how we choose to frame exercise does not need to be learned, more remembered. The activity is (almost) irrelevant. It doesn’t matter whether you are washing the dishes, folding the laundry or exercising - it’s not what we do, but how we do it. And more specifically, how we think about it. 

Exercise is an opportunity to consistently ask yourself a never-ending list of questions and go on to enjoy the subsequent compounding knowledge. This mindset, in addition to helping you milk every drop of benefit, also fosters the mystical state of 'flow' - a delicate balance between challenge and skill and as surely demanding of complete engagement, as it is killed off by apathy.

Given that we know the body responds to reality as we perceive it, we also know there are circumstances in which we do have a conscious choice. We can choose to see it in a manner that serves, or a manner that harms. This is a game-changer for physical fitness, not to mention a useful ledge to rest on when scaling the heights of any further cognitive or consciousness development.

If you can frame exercise as something you will do forever, not while you have to; if you can see it as an expression of life rather than a chore, this is the only underlying ‘why’ to all of it. The more you see exercise in this fashion, the more you’ll realise you don't need to strive, hope, or anything else. You’ll find that all those things you want are just there, are part and parcel of that mindset - a happy side effect. They can’t not be. If you can’t make that switch then, like most people, you will always chase them.

Two people in a park doing pushups - to an observer they look exactly the same, but the experience for each is world’s apart. If you are going to be doing pushups in the park anyway, which one do you want to be? 

If you choose to view exercise as a currency, you will only ever come away short-changed.

 

"We are fashioned and shaped by what we love."
- Goethe

 

REFERENCES: 

http://www.precisionnutrition.com/working-out-causes-weight-gain
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21574706