Athlete In The City

I hear this a lot when I talk to people about how much I love to workout.  At some point in the conversation there’s a mention of time.  It’s one of those mental things I guess.  You probably have time to eat a piece of chocolate cake though, no?

I like some of Keith Ferrazzi’s writing.  He has a piece on the Time Myth.

A snippet from “Mind Wide Open” by Steven Johnson speaks directly to what frequent exercisers know, but what those of us who don’t exercise often, tend to doubt…

“Brain researchers had long suspected that the family of painkilling drugs derived from the opium poppy — heroin, morphine, codeine — targeted a dedicated site in the brain, but it wasn’t until the early 1970’s that a handful of researchers working in separate labs discovered the receptor: a synaptic lock contoured precisely to fit the opiate keys.  This was one of those discoveries whose existence suggests a further discovery.  Though the narcotic allure of the poppy has been part of the human experience since at least the dawn of agriculture, it seemed unlikely that the brain would possess a recepter for a chemical found in a plant that grew in only a few scattered locations around the globe.  The existence of the receptor suggested that the brain produced its own endogenous opiate, and sure enough within a few years scientists had discovered two of them: the enkephalins and endorphins — meaning ‘in the head’ and ‘morphine within,’ respectively.”

He goes on  to the really good part for all of us exercise addicts — or aspiring addicts:

“Newspapers, magazines, and talk radio were flooded with excitement over the brain’s ‘natural high’.  And the surge of interest in fitness and jogging that began twenty-five years ago owes its existence in part to the discovery that these powerful chemicals were released during strenuous activity.  People don’t get in shape simply because it’s in their long-term interests.  They get in shape because working out makes them feel good, and their brains remember the feeling”

Yep, just a little bit of science to throw in there!

As a personal trainer, I find people at parties asking for advice from time to time. What gyms are good, how to I improve at this or that, how do I lose the tummy?! That’s the classic question. I do find a lot of people get to a certain point and reduce things to “I don’t have the time”, or “I’m too stressed to find more time in my day” or some such. It’s almost a litany, and living in Manhattan, it’s very understandable.

Many people find themselves still at work when it’s 7pm or 8pm at night.

That’s why this article Manage Your Energy, Not Your Time really struck a chord. It’s by Steve Wanner a partner at Ernst & Young. With four kids and a wife at home, he found himself working long hours, not having enough time for family, feeling guilty and generally unsatisfied. It’s a familiar feeling to many of us. But he managed to turn it around by changing his routine, cutting out the drinking, waking up and exercising, and taking ample breaks during the day.

He turned things around quite dramatically, a very interesting read.