“Conditioning Research”.
When I started this blog my idea was to highlight academic research related to athletic conditioning. There you go, (athletic) Conditioning (scientific) Research.
However, there are other blogs that do that much better than I (check Lyle out or - for diet - Stephan). While I have done some courses to teach weightlifting and weight training and have read about the field voraciously for 20 odd years, my formal academic training is in Economics, Management and Philosophy.
This blog has in fact become something else - a repository for all the weird and interesting bits of information that I come across related to health and fitness; ultimately things that are filtered to find that which interests me. That others find these things interesting and useful too is rewarding.
The material also reveals I think my own prejudices and preferences with respect to diet and exercise.
Eating and Moving as you were meant to.
Evolutionary / Primal / Paleo I suppose is an underlying theme in terms of both diet (low carb basically with some intermittent fasting added) and exercise (lots of easy stuff, occasional bouts of high intensity and lots of fun and play). Things like the importance of sleep (do as I say not as I do on that one), social interaction, stress minimisation, proper posture and minimal shoes have also been thrown into the mix - again natural stuff.
One of the things that Erwan of MovNat and Frank of Exuberant Animal got me thinking about was the whole context of modern life - routine work, chronic stresses, lots of sitting, the tyranny of possessions and competition, the lack of a tribe.
We have become what Erwan calls zoo-humans, living in what is actually a foreign habitat. As Frank says, our bodies are designed for a world that no longer exists.
Conditioning
However, we rarely notice that because we have become conditioned to it! We have learned how to respond , how to act, how to think in this habitat. The habitat trains us and conditions us to live within its confines, even though it is often unhealthy and harming us.
Sometimes I think that when we are discussing fitness we are really re-discovering ways of subverting this conditioning. We are identifying ways to escape the zoo and to reinstate hints of a natural habitat - be that through going barefoot, fasting, playing, sprinting or spending time in the hills.
Conditioning Research?
Researching how to provide an antidote to the conditioning of the zoo, civilisation…..
(I am not into the rewilding stuff totally - I like many of the benefits of modern life - but am looking for the balance)
I hope that makes sense……
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