What’s the Perfect Fitness Tool?

. . . it’s actually your attention.

A lot of us out there think we can’t truly get stronger without heavy weights or big machines. There’s a whole industry of heavy-lifting, “Do You Even Lift Bro?” style workouts to reinforce the idea. On the other hand, there’s a countercultural revolution of body-weight training, whose adherents love the adaptability and simplicity of needing no equipment at all, and who claim just as much benefit from body weight as heavy weight.

Who’s Right?

Actually, they both are. Wait, actually, no one is. If we’ve met, you’ll likely be giving me your “not surprised” face right about now - yes, I live to point out a false dichotomy. It is 100% possible to get serious strength and muscle growth gains WITHOUT HEAVY LIFTING. For real. Listen, I have a bias here- lifting heavy stuff usually isn’t my jam. I have never owned a weight heavier than 15 lbs, and as an acrobat my own body is my favorite weight to lift, hands down. But that bias is about personal preference- it’s about what’s FUN for me. It’s not a bias about effectiveness. You can get to whatever type of goal you’re after using any of the tools available. Not to mention, it is also possible to do all the cool bodyweight moves and be going nowhere fast.

What? But I thought I was told if I didn’t buy this new tool or that new miracle device I couldn’t reach my goals?

Nawp.

So how could you get strength gains from no weight and mobility gains from heavy weights and any gains from any tools you want?

The secret is attention. Specifically, the more you’re able to connect your brain to your body actively and specifically during your workouts, the more likely it is that your body will respond in the ways you hope it will.

In 2016, a study was published that had participants train with heavy weights on one arm, and with no weights- but paying lots of attention to maximally contracting their muscles- on the other. What they found was that muscle growth was actually similar in the no-weight arm to the weighted arm. Essentially, they found that muscle tissue responds more than initially expected to what the participant was paying attention to. With their brain.

A separate study from Ohio University found that if participants with casts placed on their wrists for 4 weeks imagined doing wrist exercises, their muscle loss was cut down by half.

And then of course, there’s the classic suite of studies that show imagining exercise can have similar physiological effects to actually exercising.

So what’s going on here? While mechanical strength- how much muscle tissue you have, and where - responds more clearly to mechanical load (stuff in your way - ie resistance in the form of a weight, or pushing against the floor, or a resistance band) - muscle recruitment, or how much of your muscle tissue gets stimuated to participate, starts primarily in the brain. For a more thorough explanation of this, this article is a great start.

Ok, so what does this mean for your workout? Firstly, you can chill on finding the “perfect” workout tool, unless you have something very specific you’re trying to do - like lift a car, or swing a human around like a juggling ball. In those cases, you still want to get as close to that stimulus as possible because the body loves specificity. Secondly, no matter WHAT tool you’re using, the main thing you can do for yourself - the one thing that is always free and available - is pay attention.

Did you ever have a coach ask you to imagine your hip flexor melting and loosening in a hip stretch? Did you ever have a coach tell you to imagine you were pushing away a heavy boulder? Squeezing a giant beach ball? Did you do it? The main takeaway from this new line of research is that images like these are having a literal, physical effect on you. The beauty of this is, if you’re not able to get to your 200 lb weight one day, you still have your brain. You can imagine lifting it, and you’ll still be doing a lot of great body building. On the other side, if you’re snoozing through your workout? Checking your phone, watching the Golden Girls? It might be relaxing, but you’re not getting as much out of it as you would by putting your brain into your body. Ever notice that a lot of “active flexibility” moves look suspiciously like a lot of “workout” moves which look suspiciously like a lot of “pre-hab” moves? You’re right. The difference isn’t necessarily the motion. It’s what you’re paying attention to when you do it that changes the results.