Principles for health
A minimalist approach to physical fitness
As well as starting this newsletter I have, like a million other saps, begun the year by joining a gym. This week I thought I'd combine both projects by writing about my minimalist approach to physical health.
This is not advice.
No one should take advice about weightlighting from someone with my current body. One of the things I like about the bodybuilding community is that they are relentlessly pragmatic, replying to anyone giving advice with the words 'POST PHYSIQUE' (ie upload a picture of your body) to see whether their theories produce good outcomes.
Before the first lockdown I was making good progress towards my physical ideal. Due to injuries, inactivity, and indulgence, I put on about 7kg of fat over the year. I've managed to shift half of that and hope that rejoining the gym will provide the impetus needed to get back to my fight(club)ing weight.
I'm not there yet, so this is not advice. It is, rather, a set of principles that will hopefully allow me to make steady progress.
1. Health is fundamental
We live in a sick society: obesity, mental health issues, blood pressure medicine, drinking too much. We spend our working lives staring at computers, then our leisure hours staring at TV and iPads. We eat fatty food, seed oils, consume too much, drink empty calories. We prioritise money over leisure, and leisure over health, seemingly unaware that health is the only thing that grants joy to our experiences. One of the richest people in the world is 91 year old Warren Buffett. Yet, for all his billions, who would want to swap places with him?
2. Make it a habit
A habit is something you do without thinking. The less you have to think about going to the gym, the less onerous it is, the easier it will be to build it into your routine. I have committed to doing 30 minutes every weekday, though I often end up doing more. It's enough to break a sweat, but not so much that it feels like a chore. Check out James Clear's Atomic Habits or BJ Fogg's Tiny Habits for some useful tips.
3. Stay injury free
Go hard in the gym, but don't go so hard you get injured. There’s no point in doing any of these things if you end up having to take six months out with ligament, muscle or skeletal damage. It's far better to focus on good form than ego-gratifying weightlifting. Of all the millions of weightlifting YouTubers, I like the advice of Jeremy Ethier.
4. Push yourself
Whilst form is crucial, it is necessary to push yourself outside your comfort zone to advance. Strength comes from lifting progressively heavier things over time, alerting the body that it is time to build muscle. This training gives you a superpower: gravity has less influence over you. When you think of an old decrepit man, you see someone hunched over — gravity has got to that person, dragging them into the ground. I do the much criticised 'Bro Split' as a way of working hard but giving each part of the body seven days to recuperate.
5. Make it fun
The gym is pretty grim most of the time: sweaty, anti-social, painful, all accompanied by forgettable house music. It’s a lot of staring a mirror or jogging on a treadmill under strip lighting. It was only when I discovered this high intensity interval training (HIIT) class called Omnia that I saw the appeal. At the Omnia class, they had an enormous tractor wheel that you'd have to hit with a big hammer. Or you'd push a sledge full of weights, like you were Rocky in the Soviet Union. Slamming medicine balls and battle ropes is a lot more fun than sitting on an exercise bike.
6. Find your tribe
Another way of making it fun is to embrace tribalism. I used to think that tribalism was bad thing, a source of polarisation, and the reason we ended up with Brexit and Trump. But tribalism is universal and basically the opposite of alienation. Watch the Arnold Schwarzenegger film Pumping Iron and it is full of guys bantering and having a good time. The anthropologist Robin Dunbar believes we have the mental capacity to be in a tribe with about 150 people before it becomes too difficult to maintain relationships. Gyms are booming and it is unsurprising that they should have split into weirder niches. Within walking distance of my flat is a clubbing gym with a DJ, a Thai boxing HIIT circuit, a crossfit gym, and multiple yoga studios. Maybe one of them will be your tribe.
7. Be realistic
In an age of photographic manipulation and performance enhancing drugs, the assault on perception is constant. Compare Hugh Jackman in the first X-men film to later Wolverine films. Expectations had changed so much in a few years that he had to go from being fit to being ripped. That kind of physique requires extremely low body fat levels that can cause health problems. Body builders stop drinking water for 24 hours in order to become ready for a show, often resulting in kidney problems. Aesthetics should be a by-product of healthy activity rather than an end in itself.
8. Via negativa
Via negativa is a method of arriving at the truth by identifying all that is false, so that whatever is left must be true. In this context, it means it is better to avoid negative things than do positive things. It is far better to stop smoking than it is to start taking a multivitamin. Likewise, you'd probably do better cycling and walking everywhere than going to the gym by driving. It's crazy when people take the lift to the second floor gym rather and then go on a stair machine. You can go to the gym as much as you like, but if your diet is bad you'll feel bad. My via negativa diet rule is to try not eat anything with ingredients, just eat the ingredients themselves. That is, cook things from scratch so you don't consume a load of unknown mystery oils and syrups.
9. It takes time to make progress
Results take much longer than the end of January, which is when most people give up. One of the greatest lessons of the gym is that there is a reality principle from which you cannot hide. It's difficult to delude yourself about your fitness when you've got 100kg of iron in front of you. I don't take a photo of my torso anymore, but it was a much better way of seeing progress than weighing myself (particularly on scales that don't show body fat).
10. Think holistically
Going to the gym is good, but health is much more than being able to lift weights. Health is calm breathing, loving relationships, restful sleep, laughter, nutritious food, mental clarity, flexibility, balance, stamina, and your ability to adapt to situations. What is the difference that will make the difference? It could be watching a comedy with a friend instead of spending an hour on the treadmill. Do what is appropriate.