It really is pretty uncommon that I will write, comment or otherwise vent on the net but soon after thinking the notion over I’ve decided to share a couple of of my thoughts with you about what fitness is, what it is really about and who must be thought of fit. Of course this is only my opinion at this point in history, but it deserves being pointed out nonetheless. I’m writing this, admittedly, out of disappointment. I read match people’s articles, newsletters and blogs continuously in order to learn and increase myself in this business we call fitness but lately I’ve come across a number of incredibly fit men and women drawing lines in the sand (with regards to what fitness is), that, in my opinion, do not really require to be there.

Now you have heard me say it a million instances! Fitness (technically) is normally defined in a way that has a thing to do with possessing optimal levels of:

cardiovascular endurance,
muscular endurance,
muscular strength,
flexibility,
physique composition (fat vs. lean physique mass)
Though this is accurate and I undoubtedly agree, I believe what we are talking about is a quantitative way to look at a qualitative issue. Yea sports are quantitative. How substantially, how numerous, how low, how higher, how robust, how far, how big, how long – these are factors we associate quite generally with sport. In America we have a tendency to be a quantitative society. We want to know how a great deal money a particular person has, who has the most close friends, who spends the most on clothes, who has the lowest physique fat percentage, who can bench press the most weight and who can run the longest distance in the least amount of time. We are obsessed with numbers, quantities and maintaining score.

So I raise the query: Is physical fitness definitely a quantitative issue? Or could it be that physical fitness is a qualitative point? Possibly a combination of both? What do you assume?

The only thing I can say about this is that (to me) physical fitness is additional than how several instances you can lift a weight, how far you can run or if you are versatile sufficient to put your feet behind your head or not. To me physical fitness is about factors that cannot normally be measured with numbers, it’s about a lot more than a number, a weight, a distance, a score.

I tell my customers that we all have strengths and weaknesses at numerous points in our lives. At 24 years of age I had 9% body fat year-round, I could squat 700 pounds and bench press 405 pounds for reps. I can not do that any longer. But I can do 35 pull-ups, stand on a stability ball for just about as long as I want and touch my face to my knee when stretching, all items I could not do as a beast-boy 24-year-old. So was I far more match then or now?

Take a appear at the folks around you. What’s their story? What are their experiences? Are they fat? Are they as well skinny? Maybe they’re really weak and can’t lift much weight. Maybe they have a low-level of endurance and can’t run pretty far just before getting winded. Think about it for a moment then ask your self: if maybe their current level is greater than it was previously, does the fact that they never live up to your concept of what fitness should really be definitely matter? If you assume about any of these factors they all rely on 1 point: your perception of that individual. I take the stance that fitness evolves as a particular person passes through life. What you believed about fitness early in your life may not be the similar notion you have about fitness later on. I encourage you to embrace fitness all through your life no matter what face it at present has.

Boost! Get superior in some way. You may well not generally be in a position to do what you did as a young particular person but there are approaches exactly where you can turn into even better than you were. And I’ve noticed folks who had been extremely sedentary as young individuals who have steadily enhanced their physical fitness level as they’ve aged. One particular client of mine, Lisa, told me she’s (in her 60s) in the finest shape of her adult life. Is not that what fitness is about? If you seriously think about fitness, is not it about obtaining better, improving and carrying out what you have to have to do to feel much better about oneself and your physical physique? Are not these things mainly about high quality and not quantity?

I think so. I assume fitness has an infinite quantity of faces and requires on an limitless number of qualities. I encourage you to try not to see fitness in such a narrow scope that you overlook that fitness, above all, is about people. It’s about people today having far better, not being the finest. Fitness is not a sport, it really is not a race and no a single is maintaining score. Fitness is about you as an individual. Fitness Magzine could be a phenomenally thriving athlete like Lance Armstrong or Drew Brees (both match people) or you might be like my client Lisa (also a match individual) who in her 60s decided she wanted to walk with extra energy, really feel a lot more stable and be able to play with her grandchildren.

Now I encourage you to look at this: Lisa can honestly say that she is in the greatest shape of her adult life, can Lance Armstrong at present say the exact same factor? So which person’s fitness level serves them ideal? I will let you decide.

Attempt to feel of fitness as something that is inclusive, not exclusive. Sports are fantastic and in order to have a winner we have to retain score and examine one against the other. I encourage you to leave the score keeping to the athletes on the field-of-play, and only on the field-of-play, and not in the day-to-day activities that folks lead in their pursuit of fitness.