UN-Podcast 053 and the True Meaning of Fitness

Raise your hand if you think you know what the word “fitness” means.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

Hint: It’s NOT this.

 [image source]

Here—let me get rid of the mystery:

the condition of being physically fit and healthy.

the quality of being suitable to fulfill a particular role or task.

an organism’s ability to survive and reproduce in a particular environment.

Nowhere in that definition did I see the requirement of being able to do 30 regimented minutes of supersets or an extra mile of marathon training.

I used to think that fitness meant achieving some level of athletic or aesthetic perfection—PRs and 6 packs were the visible, quantifiable means for me to prove that I was “fit.” But when I was a runner, though my race times kept getting lower, I wouldn’t have been fit to lift an injured runner on the course and carry him or her to safety. When I was a lifter, though I could squat to parallel with a bar on my back, I wouldn’t have been able to outrun an attacker or take him to the ground. When I was doing two-a-day yoga, I could go deeper into Standing Bow, but I couldn’t muscle up over a fence if I needed to take a shortcut.

I was “fit” for my exercise because I was training for my exercise, but I was not fit for usefulness in my environment. And here’s the thing…in this post-Venice-Beach physical-culture-and-24-hour-fitness-for-all era, many of us are very fit for exercise, but very few of us are fit for our environments.

The government and the media think we need about 30 minutes of exercise a day, so we all go out after work, take our interpretation of that word (“exercise”), strap on our special shoes and moisture-wicking pants and spend 30 minutes doing a series of movements in an attempt to be healthy.

Some of us leave it at that. 30 minutes and done. Curled for my biceps, sat up for my abs.

Others take it to the next level. Fitness means becoming an athlete and competing for perfection—not that there’s explicitly anything wrong with that.

But implicitly, due to the ubiquity of fitspo and perfect body promises and 30-day fitness transformation stories, we believe that we have to exercise every day in order to train for athleticism—because we have an inherent misunderstanding that fitness is athleticism.

But here’s the thing: athleticism is a type of fitness, but not all fitness is athleticism.

As I am more and more frequently coming to realize, the problem is in the semantics.

So let me define a couple of terms as I am coming to understand them:

Movement, n.: natural human activity in an environment; includes walking, playing, and otherwise interacting with the environment (and other humans).

Exercise, n.: A series of strictly defined repetitive motions, meant to practice specific movements whether in or outside of a natural environment for those movements.

Training, n.: The process of repeating exercises in order to specifically prepare for or achieve an athletic activity or goal.

Athleticism, n: relating to the attainment of goals related to a specific training regimen; excellence at certain movements in a defined environment

Fitness, n: relating to usefulness in a given environment; the ability to move naturally. Does not require perfection, athleticism, or aesthetics—just health and a little bit of strength and cardiovascular readiness for whatever comes one’s way.

I really want to stress how important it is for us to recognize that fitness is about quality of movement and quality of life—not about your metcon or your triathlon or your PR. You can be great at your bootcamp circuits or swim like a pro, and that’s great—but there’s more to life than writing your scores on the board or logging your miles on MapMyRun. And don’t get me wrong—I still love the gym. Barbells can be a wonderful thing. I think Crossfit has its merits, and I say, best of luck to you, if you decide to run. But I just want to stress that exercise—and training—are NOT more important than moving…and that for those of us with body image issues or exercise addictive tendencies, movement—pure, unfettered, natural movement and play—may be the most important kind of fitness of all.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

In today’s podcast with Darryl Edwards, the Fitness Explorer, we touch on what it means to be truly fit, functional, useful, and playful human beings. I met Darryl a year ago during a Primal Playout at Paleo F(X), and it had an absolutely revolutionary impact on how I can approach fitness in my recovery from an eating disorder and exercise addiction.

I really believe in everything Darryl is teaching—and I hope that you’ll take this as inspiration to get out and just…play. No workouts logged, no reps counted…just grab a friend, a playground, and spend some time giggling. Oh…and–

Go Listen Now!

  Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

Stay hungry,

@MissSkinnyGenes

PS to learn more about Darryl’s approach to fitness, you’ll definitely want to grab a copy of his book, Paleo Fitness.*

PPS I reviewed it here.

*That’s an affiliate link–and if you click on it and decide to make a purchase, you’ll be helping to keep the Finding Our Hunger podcast alive!

The post UN-Podcast 053 and the True Meaning of Fitness appeared first on In My Skinny Genes.