Summary:
Do we really need fancy gyms with the latest technologies in order to keep fit? Why don’t we just use our bodies to do the things they were designed to do? This blog ponders the concept of “designer” exercise and looks at how we can get back to basics.

Details or Sample:
There’s a scene in the film “Back to the Future” in which the Michael J. Fox character is explaining to a cowboy he’s met on his travels sometime in the 19th century what the people of his world do for recreation. “They run,” he tells the cowboy. The cowboy looks mystified. “Why?” he asks. Michael J. Fox is lost for words, and can only shrug his shoulders.

“Designer” exercise has been around for quite a while now. By designer exercise I mean the exercise we do at the gym—and nowhere else. And the gym being that place we drive in our car to get to, of course. It seems that we’ve lost sight of the way we once used our bodies every day for those activities that not only kept us fit but served a purpose. That same cowboy Michael J Fox met would probably find it absurd that someone would pay a considerable sum of money to sit on a stationary bike in a gym, having driven there in order to do so. But is it just that this way of exercising fits more neatly into how we run our lives today; or is it our view of exercise that’s responsible for how, and when, we exercise? Perhaps we don’t see a walk to the gym as exercise, whereas what we do in the gym is exercise because we have to get changed in order to do it, we sweat during it, and we need to shower afterwards. This way of exercising allows us to condense the daily activity we’re told we need to undertake in order to stay healthy into one hour. We can now forget all about it, until the next session.

Is this compartmentalizing approach to exercise the best one? What happens when we can’t get to the gym? We become cranky and upset and disappointed in ourselves, unable to shift our mindset to be able to seek out alternatives to make up for our missed session. And that take-away meal we had planned for dinner is now going to have to be passed up for a home-made salad—with no wine; and all because we couldn’t get to spend one hour lifting our legs and moving our arms.

If we had walked into work that morning, or gone for a stroll at lunchtime, would we still be feeling cranky? Wouldn’t that have compensated just a little for that missed session and meant that we could’ve still ordered take-out and had just the one glass of wine with it?

Perhaps we need to take a more holistic approach to exercise. Try to incorporate it into our lives on a daily basis, make it something we do without thinking, something we don’t need to schedule in. That way, there’s probably less chance of not getting to do it.
I used to have a neighbor who cycled to work for many years. He cited being able to cycle to his place of work as one of the reasons he’d stayed with his employer for so long! Even if work, one day, was too far to cycle to, he said he’d like to think that he would cycle at least part of the journey—to the station, say. Or better still, he said, he would invest in one of those “folding” bikes and hold centre stage on the platform while his fellow commuters looked up from their daily papers in awe at how quickly he would be able to pack the bike away ready for transporting on the train.

But I know that not everyone can embrace the idea of cycling as a serious mode of transport, for whatever reason. However, we can use our legs for walking if the idea of cycling doesn’t appeal. Walking is one of the best forms of exercise. It really is “prêt-à-porter” exercise requiring no specialist equipment, just motivation.

Incorporating either walking or cycling into our daily commute is the best strategy for exercising, as in order to get back home, we have to do it! That gym membership isn’t going to provide the same discipline as these methods are. After a long day at the office if we don’t fancy working out, we don’t have to, but when getting home depends on cycling or walking then we’re probably going to do it, either that or find an alternative way to get home…

Someone once remarked, when they found out I swam regularly, that it was good insurance for the future. It’s true, of course, although the whole fitness issue is as much about quality of life as it is quantity. But in looking to the future, using our bodies on a daily basis is the best way we can show our children that exercise doesn’t have to be carried out in just the one place, at the one time, and that there are alternative modes of transport to the motor car. We should all be thinking, when we reach for our car keys to make a journey, whether it´s absolutely necessary to take the car. We all worry about our kids’ diets and the amount of activity they’re getting. It’s natural that a child who sees his or her parents eating take-away food often is going to develop the same habits. Likewise, if a child’s parents aren’t active at all and rely solely on the car to get around there’s every chance their child is going to grow up doing the same. So let’s lead by example, and show our kids—and others—that there are alternative ways to get about: they may be a little outmoded but they’re the ways for which our bodies were designed, and on which our bodies thrive.

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Written by: JD
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