Keeping our bodies in shape not only makes us feel younger and stronger - it might just save our lives. Photo / 123rf
Keeping our bodies in shape not only makes us feel younger and stronger - it might just save our lives. Photo / 123rf
Ageing is a topic that is of perennial interest and spurs exploration among the rich and poor, young and old alike.
What exactly is ageing and when does the process begin? Physical ageing-disease risk begins in our genes.
Scientific studies have identified genes that regulate physical strength and biological age(chronological age is something we all experience at the same rate as it is related to how many times, we've taken a trip around the sun). Most notable among them are those genes involved in the sustainability of muscle tissue.
Any decrease in the expression of these genes causes muscle deterioration and drags down the body's natural healing power opening the door to the ageing process.
Muscle downgrade is a major blow to the body. It's associated with more than just loss of muscle size and strength.
As the largest energy facility, the biological role of skeletal muscles goes far beyond locomotion.
The muscle system is responsible for keeping the body's metabolic system intact. It provides protection against metabolic and hormonal decline, diabetes, obesity and cardiovascular disease. It enhances brain function and keeps the body young.
When muscle declines, body fat increases proportionately which increases the risk of some cancers, diabetes and heart disease. It is a major contributing factor behind the current epidemic of obesity, and other related diseases.
There are multiple causes of muscle downgrade, including hormonal disorders such as insulin resistance, inflammatory diseases and others but the main culprit is not doing enough muscle-building and maintenance activity.
Strength training is the simple answer and the one critical component often overlooked in the quest for a healthy, youthful appearance. Let's face it, it's impossible to look youthful without muscle strength and tone. But it goes much deeper than looks.
Strength training is the only type of exercise that stimulates the release of human growth hormone. HGH is a powerhouse for anti-ageing. It helps the body build youthful muscle tissue, use up excess flabby body fat and stimulate hormones for self-healing. It regenerates and repairs cells, makes muscles firm, skin tight, bones strong and joints healthy. In other words, it is empowered to reverse muscle and bone loss.
Unfortunately, at around age 25 our HGH levels plummet and by age 40 HGH dips to 40 percent of what it was at 20. At 55 it shrinks to a measly 20 per cent.
That's where strength training shines. Studies have shown that just 15 minutes of super-efficient type of resistance exercise results in an HGH spike of up to 352 per cent!
And, because healthy new muscle tissue uses up excess blood glucose every minute of the day and night, strength training is key to improving the body's ability to control blood sugar levels and respond to insulin at every possible step in the process. This lowers the risk of diabetes and excess body fat and improves body composition – the muscle to fat ratio.
Sedentary lifestyles that support sitting most of the time rob us of the rejuvenating power of our very own stems cells, our growth and repair mechanism and leave us with sagging, flabby, weak muscles that add years to the way we look and feel.
Resistance training grows strong, dense bones and powerful, toned muscles. Photo / 123rf
Worse yet, research shows that the greater the muscle tissue loss the higher the incidence of weak, thinning, brittle bones, opening the door to the dreaded disease of osteoporosis.
Resistance exercise is not only empowered to build lean muscle, but it strengthens the bones as well. Aerobic activities like running, biking, hiking and swimming are great recreational activities but do little to stress the skeleton while resistance training grows strong dense bones and strong toned muscles.
Knowing this, keeping our bodies in shape not only makes us feel younger and stronger but it might just save our lives. By far the best thing we can do for ourselves is to continually build healthy new muscle tissue. Fortunate for us it's never too late to start. Some studies even suggest that just two to three months of strength-building exercise can reverse decades of muscles loss and positively influence our risk factor for several other diseases.
Exercise is not just about looking good and being toned and fit, it's more about the level of health we experience because of it. Many of the most prevalent diseases in today's world – heart disease, diabetes, and cancer are called chronic lifestyle diseases which means they are preventable by making wise changes to our overall lifestyles. That means eliminating TV/computer/sedentary sitting time in favour of some serious, challenging muscle movement.
Life is about choices. Everything we do should be with an awareness of what it will do to our ageing process. So, while the body may not know how many years old it is, it does know when it is not being used in the manner for which it was engineered – and has been optimised to operate at for hundreds of thousands of years. We use it or we lose it. Youthful appearance, a healthy body and longevity are not a given, but a gift of self-love. We are either turning on the bad genes that lead us down the path of poor health or turning on the good genes – the self-healing processes that promote longevity and stellar health.
The right types of challenging exercise, when supported with a nutrient-dense diet, will always be the best self-healing and anti-ageing regimen anyone can gift themselves with.
