Exercising for Life (Aging and exercise)
Even among the most prolific proponents of exercise, few seem to be successful at holding off the ravages of time -- as a convincing case of nullifying the effects of aging. At best, it will be noted, that such a person is in good shape for as old as he is, or appears to be -- and not simply, that that person is in good condition -- and that age is not even a consideration. When is that point of “no return” -- when deterioration overcomes our most valiant efforts to even maintain the status quo?
I think we all know that feeling -- that sense of shock when a familiar person seems to be declining rapidly, alarmingly -- and seems hopeless to bring to the other’s attention, for surely, if it hasn’t disturbed them greatly by now, nothing must matter anymore. The most telling features are the atrophy at the most visible parts of the body -- at the necks, hands and feet, where development, movement and articulation is no longer robust. Those who are, seem very animated, alert and responsive -- by contrast.
That difference is the ability to change -- and bring about change. Yet these are the areas most overlooked and taken for granted in the typical fitness program -- as though nothing could be done about it, when it may be the only areas one needs to focus on -- the movement at those critical joints. If full articulation and health can be maintained in just those areas, it implies the health of all the rest. I’ve never seen the exception --but have noticed the opposite, that diminishing articulation of these areas is the precursor to diminishing and deteriorating function in the capacities contained therein.
Grip strength implies arm and torso strength, as foot strength implies leg and back strength. The development and function of the neck muscles is the single greatest indicator of the overall fitness of that body -- which even the great performance athletes may not be greatly aware of, but which has great impact in the perception of the vitality and dynamism of that individual. So just from a cosmetic standpoint, let alone the most beneficial from an operational perspective, would be the development of these impressive, highly visible muscles -- as a high-impact priority.
People who are very perceptive are aware of this -- and its important role in body language that influences all. The atrophying of the development in those areas, are the great markers of the aging effects -- that can be successfully countered indefinitely, as they are the easiest areas to develop and maintain. Because of that prominence, that would be the logical priority of development -- where it is easiest to develop, most visible, and most useful.
Yet most fitness programs effect so little change, that they require fine and precise measuring procedures to detect their “results“ -- after a fair amount of time on the program has transpired. Meanwhile, measuring improvements in range of movement (performance and appearance) is easiest to detect at the neck, wrist and ankles -- and to enhance quite easily by nothing more than to realize that a further possibility exists -- but is simply unutilized in most people, because they just don‘t think to do it.
In simply moving through that fullest range of possibility, one will already recognize muscles one didn’t realize they had. A similar situation exists for all the muscles throughout the body -- that they are already there, waiting to be revealed in the proper articulation that expresses its prominence. They just don’t know how -- or had forgotten to exercise that capability. The movements they have been taught, are not the proper ones to reveal it.
As is frequently the case, one doesn’t need more -- without first accessing and utilizing what one already has. The greatest gain is not in attaining what one doesn’t have yet; the greatest gain is in realizing and utilizing what one already has but has never thought to use.
posted by Mike Hu @ 3:01 AM
9 comments
9 Comments:
Obviously, the principles of exercise that work with 80-90 year olds will work with 20-30 year olds -- but not necessarily vice-versa, but in the exercise/fitness industry, that is precisely what they try to impose in the wishful-thinking that if they can get an 80-90 year old to do what a 20-30 year old can do, the former will look like the latter.
But the principles that are still effective with the 80-90 year olds, must work with those with more favorable constitutions and predispositions for growth and improvement. The fact that “exercise” has been ineffective at producing that reversal, is because the so-called principles of exercise are not in fact the cause -- obviously. They just eliminate those from the popular sample and the testimonial infomercial, for whom it doesn’t. That is the traditional basis of athletic competition -- which should not be confused for the principles that actually enable and empower people to enhance their health, well-being and functioning -- from whatever capacities they were gifted/disadvantaged with.
Not to make this distinction -- is one of the great flaws in the thinking on healthful practices one can do to enhance one’s capabilities. Even in regular education, they often fail to make this distinction -- and even deny that some may be more artistically or musically talented, as well as mathematically, scientifically, communicatively, etc. The cause is mistaken for the effect.
But that doesn’t mean there is not overlapping possibilities for improvement. That is why there is the diversity of athletic competition -- as well as all the skills that are expressed and mastered by different individuals as well as societies and subcultures. But one should ask, if the parameters are those that simply favor native ability or that which is a universal ability -- to improve. That is to say, is the skill being taught the ability to learn math or simply, the more generalized ability to learn -- without that favoritism and bias?
At least on the most rudimentary level, the value of education and conditioning should be this ability to do well at anything -- rather than merely to exhibit proficiency on a specialized skill, which many might regard as a generalized one. While widespread, not everyone is equally favored by running, or weightlifting, or swimming. Those are specific skills in which people differentiate -- rather than the universal ones at which there is no such bias.
The universal skill is the ability to turn one’s head 360 degrees alternately left and right and see what is directly behind them. The ability to maintain that movement, and its mastery, is the essential universal healthy practice and standard -- and not running, walking, swimming, weightlifting, etc. That would be the skill that implies all the other.
The problem with many of the ancient practices for health maintenance is the dependency on the teacher -- because that conditioning is based on memory and practice to reinforce -- rather than being self-evident, verifiable truth discovered in the moment and movement itself. Many people shown this movement, like it so much, they don’t want to stop -- even when they have achieved the required minimum of repetitions -- because they like that sensation of movement, that simply moving the head, provides like no other. Humans are built for this movement -- above all else.
Questioner: “Why isn’t my workout working?”
Response: Obviously, your certified trainer has no idea what they’re talking about. Many people think that a good explanation or excuse for why things aren’t working, is an indication of expertise -- instead of not needing explanations or excuses because things self-evidently work out as they should.
A lot of people are used to believing anybody who is designated or certified as an expert tells them is true -- and not questioning whether it makes any sense at all, and does what one expects it to. Those who are particularly gullible to those who only claim to be knowledgeable but have no direct experience in discovering the truth of anything for themselves -- are those whose entire experience of life is the mediated learning experience, or formal education. In such education, the answer is already known and predetermined before one inquires to find out -- and it is that inquiry that is important and not just knowing the answer without knowing that process of finding out.
Such truths are just a remembered (accepted) thing -- rather than a verified or verifiable truth (fact) As long as there’s a plausible explanation, some people are satisfied that they have the “answers.” It does not occur to them that the “right” answer should have some basis in reality. What makes the answer “right” is that that is what the experts agree is the right answer -- whether it is or not. That’s mainly true of those whose disciplines and curriculums are opinions as facts. What is right or true, is merely what the majority agree is right or true. That is the tradition of knowledge -- rather than the science of knowledge.
Science is what is verifiable -- to anyone, anywhere else -- and not just what the hierarchy says is what is to be believed by those further down the line. That was knowledge in prescientific times. But then history had guys like Copernicus, Galileo, Paracelsus, decide they would test things that were widely believed to be true and inspired people like Columbus to discover what else might be false that were widely believed to be true, and vice-versa. Then people realized they could discover and do all kinds of things they had been warned not to.
What passes for the truth for a lot of people is just “authoritarianism” -- which is seeming to know rather than actually knowing anything. They rely on people not to be able to tell the difference -- or not to care, but simply do as they are told to do.
What really ticks me off are those people having surgical procedures done for those conditions that could be remedied by people just learning how to use their msucles to improve their shape. That's what muscles can do -- and that is not a "fake" ability of muscles but an actual one.
You've seen the wildlife shows to know that a major activity, if not the primal activity, is this fighting for turf and mates that is mostly and sometimes entirely, this posturing behavior. In athletics, it is done all the time as is referred to as "body language" -- of the beaten and the triumphant.
It is an ability to effect change that is instantaneous -- on demand, and not a permanent state of only potential ability in body composition. The well-conditioned body is notable for this ability to change, to transform iself -- as needed. The greatest change is to go from a fully relaxed muscular state of having virutally no form and movement (lifelessness), to producing a supreme effort (contraction) in a millisecond.
Sustaining a low level activity at a constant pace for hours is usually not a useful or meaningful activty -- but is familiar to many people as "going through the motions," "looking busy" -- and that is the world they live in -- all image, illusion, delusion, pretenses, "credentials," signifying nothing.
The only question is, "Can YOU tell the difference?"
When I used to conduct the Scientific Weight-training class at the Boston YMCA in the mid-1970s with many health professionals and researchers, we used to take a "Before" picture at the beginning of the six-week training session and one at the end, which were always extremely dramatic.
However, most of that change would have been reflected in merely comparing a "Before" photo and "After" on that last day alone -- in which the trainee's ability to effect that dramatic change, was largely their learned/conditioned ability to do so!
However, not every (personal) trainer can produce that change, and surely those whose "certifications" come merely by enrolling in a weekend class for that "credential." But the world-champion bodybuilders do it all the time -- but won't reveal themselves "before" they've pumped up to look awesome. So the uninformed public is not aware of that possiibility because the bodybuilders wish to perpetuate the myth that they look awesome as they do, all the time -- and don't relax to look otherwise.
A person who is really skilled at muscle control -- can look like the worst conditioned person before, and shortly, a model of perfection in a few minutes later.
There are similar dramatic transformations seen in infomercials all the time -- because consciously or not, the objecitve is either to look as good as possible or/and as bad as possible -- which is the normal range for any individual, no matter what condition they're in.
In performance, it is the ability to express and emote -- happiness and sadness, confidence and trepidation, victory or despair -- and there are those who as observers, are equally gifted at reading the body language. Many, however, only believe what they are told by somebody more intimidating than they.
The most disappointing thing is learning that the major sources of information about these things (the mainstream media, schools, universities), are frequently the most susceptible to the bogus and fraudulent -- while casting a suspicious eye to those who aren't hyping them in the familiar way they've come to regard all information. Only if one has an angle, a gimmick, some sensationalistic tidbit, are they interested in the story as a springboard for their own career aspirations.
If it is just the unvarnished and unhyped truth, no matter how fantastic, they can't relate to it --because there is nothing to manipulate, fabricate, pontificate.
My other blog, http://hawaiirepublican.blogspot.com/ , discusses this meltdown of the old institutions that were the pillars of society a generation ago -- but now have fallen badly into disrepute, and really are to be questioned more than trusted. Under the old scheme, one became the “anointed, approved, certified,” and then could do what they willed -- having secured the public’s trust and confidence.
The whole professionalization/certification movement may have peaked in the mid 1970s with the advent of the “personal trainer” phenomenon riding the phony/inflated credential movement. At that time, janitors became “certified sanitation engineers.” All this was done so one could command higher pay for their professionalism and specialized expertise -- but mostly because they greatly restricted the number of people who could compete for those jobs/work. However, that protected monopoly led to the weakening of those so protected -- because they no longer had to earn their esteem against all challenges and all-comers. They were king of the hill because they could pass laws that nobody could challenge them -- and everybody now had to remain in their places.
That’s the beginning of the end for all rigid social pecking orders (a status quo) -- as the media, schools, universities, trade associations had become. Everybody knew that their credentials meant nothing -- if they had no merit of their own that enabled them to stand on their own. That the association or the laws will be on one’s side is not as compelling when reality is on the other side.
Around 1975, one had a choice of going with the crowd or going alone -- as an individual, and many who should have known better, threw their lot in with the crowd and became lost in it -- and have ever since longed to regain their souls, their own voices, their own identity. Only a few chose to retain their integrity -- even at the cost of the harder road ahead. But if you google the sites of the most respected voices on training and conditioning, none claim as their greatest credential, a certificate saying so. That’s an obvious marker from the world’s best -- who don’t need that kind of testimony; they are their own self-evident proof of their widsdom gained through their own pursuits.
So when you read your newspaper and see a balloon-faced Ph.D. expert on fitness, you know that the judgment of that group has been so compromised that they cannot tell anything from anything else anymore. They separate the wheat from the chaff and print the chaff -- because they are legitimately in such confusion, disarray and disintegration that they no longer oare capable of distinguishing the authentic anymore, but rather instinctively fear it. You can’t lecture them on a better way -- because that is not an appeal to them. Their own madness and control is their all-consuming concern -- and nothing else matters. There is no hope for them, no possibly of a turnaround; they have to crash and burn. There are no saviors among them.
Democracy is not merely the tyranny of the majority, or that might makes right. There’s something much more profound -- which is the truth. It is not tricking and manipulating others into thinking the false is the truth, or the truth is false. And that is the critical challenge of every age and time. Those who fail to rise to it, are dead or dying. Only the living can rise to that challenge, are interested in it. For those, it is life’s passion -- and what makes them alive.
There used to be a time when there were intellectuals of integrity longing for the truth -- but today’s professors and intellectuals are only interested in getting more pay than every other “professional” group, and no longer serve as the sentinels for the collective wisdom -- but use the tactics of union brute force to impose their desires on those less clever than themselves to maintain their esteem.
Obviously, they can’t buy the respect and esteem they so much long for. It doesn’t come that way.
I am fascinated by your writing.
Are you familiar with a practice called NIA? It is a way to find health through movement, blending martial arts, dance arts and healing arts. I have recently become certified as a NIA teacher, more than anything because I love the practice and find that increased mind-body connectivity has changed my life.
I will browse around your blog a bit more, but I really like your ideas.
best,
Ali
Thanks for writing. You have a very good blog yourself -- http://ali2africa.blogspot.com/ -- and I read your recent entry on NIA.
The purpose of my writing and study, is to integrate everything -- in response to increasing specialization, and fragmentation of life and experience. One has to, and can, confront life wholly -- and not only from a partial and partisan entry point.
So fitness and conditioning is not just about a physical activity, but a totally integrated one, requiring all the parts to function as one -- and achieving that, is the primary objective of being fit and able. The traditional and conventional, teaches/conditions the mind to work gainst the body, the heart to work against the brain, the biceps to work against the triceps, individuals to compete against every other, etc.
And that produces disintegration and deterioration, which we experience normally as confusion, contention, and distress. The conditioning that is popular is to increase one's tolerance to stress and distress -- which are the body's primary signals that something is wrong and needs adjustment and adaptation.
Instead, we are taught (conditioned) to tolerate, accept, and eventually deny that information. So of course things go wrong with the body -- and our lives, creating more work and job security for the health care industry and professionals.
Health is not what somebody else wants for you; it ultimately is dependent on how much one wants it for themselves -- and to the extent those possibiliities are made manifest to us.
The present popular model is the conditioning based on the notion that we are simply rats in a laboratory, turning a treadmill, as the highest objective and function of human purpose and understanding -- and that motivation is externally provided rather than generated within the individual -- as their categorical imperative of life.
Most scientific studies don't measure this most meaningful of all attributes in the success of human activity -- because that would upset the "blindness" of the study. But with human achievement and activity, knowing what one is doing, and questioning it, questioning the authority that makes one do it -- is the supreme indicator of health,actualization, fulfillment and purpose.
I might suggest my favorite site for:
The Complete Works of Krishnamurti
http://tchl.freeweb.hu/
My favorite is Think on These Things.
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