Lean Muscle Verses The 90 Day Wonder

I think building lean muscle trumps trying to be a 90 day wonder. A 90 day wonder literally works their butt off to become a lean, mean, fighting machine in those 90 days. You tell yourself that in 90 days you’ll have lost weight and you will be in the shape of your life. You dream about that flat stomach and well developed muscles.

So, with these delusional thoughts, quite a few of us make the ill fated January 1st promise. Year after year, we make a vow to get into shape. For me, this promise always took place at one of those December holiday feasts. As I am stuffing my face full of turkey, stuffing, pie and ice cream, I imagine a better me where I don’t need to move my belt buckle to a more comfortable position.  As I ponder my fat belly, I realize that the time has finally come to get into shape. And so begins the fitness journey.

The Gym Membership

The next thing you know, you’re getting a gym membership, a trainer and hopefully a sweat towel.  Then, the real fun begins.  It begins with suffering through a grueling workout each day. To make matters worse, your pet hamster would starve on the diet you must follow.  So you are committed to a grueling exercise routine and a horrible diet.  But that isn’t the worst part. The worst part is that these grueling exercise and diet regiments rarely, if ever, succeed.

I was never good at getting beyond a couple of days. I think the reason I never did was because it was too much like being an adult.  We believe that as adults, the things we do are not designed to be fun.  Work isn’t fun and we have to do that.  Marriage is hard work and not very fun at times. So why would we want to top all this off by one more thing that’s not fun? We go from work to the gym and then home.  Waiting for us is a plain piece of chicken and a head of broccoli. What we really need and want is a pizza! 

Oh! The Drudgery of it All

So the drudgery of our new exercise and diet routine becomes too much and we stop trying to get into shape.  Another year goes by and we find ourselves at a holiday party moving the belt buckle over a notch and on and on.  If this seems like something you experience, you are not alone.  According to The Cleveland Clinic, gyms typically lose about 50% of all new members within the first 6 months. Then within a year another 14% of the women remaining and 8% of the men quit the gym.  Wow, over 70% of gym goers don’t last one year.  At this point, you have two options – give up on getting in shape or find an alternative to the gym.

What are my Alternatives?

I chose to find an alternative.  I never really liked being inside, so giving up on the gym wasn’t too much of a disappointment. However, what is the alternative? Then it dawned on me. Who is in better shape, a twelve year old or a sixty year old?  Of course, the answer is a twelve year old.  After all, their body is new, their metabolism is high and they don’t have the pressure of being an adult.

But, even more importantly, they have lean muscle mass. Playing, running around and being outside leads to lean muscle mass. Most people our age played outside alot. Playing outside was great as a twelve year old.  We never considered it exercise but we were running, lifting things and constantly moving about.  We never worried about calories, we were too busy running around losing them.

Go Outside and Play

Great, so now all we have to do is get outside and play.  So two questions, why outside and why play? Well, according to an article (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30650943/) published by the NIH (National Institutes of Health) there are numerous benefits of going outside and playing. First there is a correlation between outside activity and weight loss.  You lose more weight exercising outside than inside. Secondly, there are a host of benefits from being outside and exercising, including better mental health, promoting a positive mood, better cognitive performance and the chance to meet and interact with like minded individuals. In fact, playing outside promotes mental and physical wellbeing.

If you have heard this before, it may have come from something you have heard about – Blue Zones (https://www.bluezones.com/).  I have not seen a single source for living longer and living a better life recommend a get in shape quick method.  Most emphasize the need for a long term approach to better health and a longer life. Great, so now we need to stretch out the suffering over years, not just months. 

The Long Term Approach

But stretching out the suffering isn’t all bad news.  One thing I have learned is patience. Patience can overcome anything.  And one thing we get if we are patient is lean muscle. What? Constant application and dedication to your exercise routine is the key to turning ugly flab into lean muscle. And lean muscle is the key to getting into shape and staying there.  

So patience is the second way to get in shape. It doesn’t have to happen today or even tomorrow. I can wait it out and so can you. And the best part is that you don’t need suffering to get back in shape if you choose the long term approach. Just changing a few habits you have acquired over the years might make all the difference in the world. By taking simple and easy steps, you may find a happy, better adjusted and hopefully thinner and more fit you.

So what are these easy, simple steps?

The first step is to follow a simple but challenging workout three (3) days per week, as religiously as possible. The workout can involve any exercise. However, I want you to pick an exercise that makes you happy.  Remember that happiness can come in many different forms. For instance, we have a thing about “secondary fun”.  This is when you suffer through a workout and after you finish you realize it wasn’t so bad and maybe even fun. For example, lifting weights may not be your favorite way to spend a couple of hours but when you are done, you feel invigorated, ready to take on the world and you are happy. This is secondary fun.

But I think it is very important to have an exercise that you truly like. If you find something that keeps drawing you back in, you have hit the “staying fit” jackpot. Some form of exercise that is more like playing a game and involves the great outdoors is perfect. The activities most often noted by sites such as Blue Zones is walking – https://www.bluezones.com/2023/12/news-blue-zones-study-reveals-the-various-healthy-aging-benefits-of-walking/. 

However, studies (like this one done by Boston University researchers – (https://www.bu.edu/articles/2021/moderate-vigorous-exercise-boosts-fitness/) show that moderate to vigorous walking is much better than walking at a slow pace.  Fast paced walking helps get you into shape quicker and will help you stay in shape. Moderate to vigorous exercise will result (along with a proper diet) in burning calories, getting into shape and losing weight. But how is this fun? And aren’t we looking to make our activity more of a game?

Exercising for Fun

So how can we take a simple activity like walking, super charge it by walking vigorously and still make it a game, not to mention fun? My idea is to turn your exercise into a game.  Walking is a great example.  Just going out by yourself will get pretty boring (and no fun) quickly.  Try to find others like minded folks and challenge them to a fast walk around the block.  Make it a friendly competition. If you can’t find anybody nearby, try joining a social exercise group like Strava. You can then compete with others anywhere in the world.  Keep pushing your limits by recording each walk and compete against yourself.

We are Here for You

We have prepared a series of videos and blogs designed to help you achieve staying FIT without dieting, as quickly as you want.  You can set your own schedule and use our tutorials to get fit.  But just tutorials won’t get you all the way there, so we will be standing by to guide you, assist you and motivate you. Our goal is that this site will provide articles,videos and support for getting FIT the right way.

Whether you haven’t taken a step off the couch in years or if you have a regular exercise routine, you will benefit from subscribing to our youtube channel (https://www.youtube.com/@activeafter5526) or being a regular visitor to our website (www.activeafter55.com).

Thanks and go outside and play!