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Myths & Fallacies: "Exercise Makes You Healthy"
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The Live Longer Formula is your go-to podcast for cutting through the noise and discovering practical, science-backed strategies to not just add years to your life, but to add life to your years. Hosted by longevity author and functional health practitioner Christian Yordanov, this podcast dives deep into the truths (and myths) behind longevity, health optimization, and addressing chronic health problems.
Each episode offers actionable insights drawn from the host's own research, clinical practice, and personal journey, helping you make informed decisions to restore and enhance your health. Whether you're interested in reducing stress, boosting your energy and mental performance, improving your gut health, or simply looking to optimize your diet and lifestyle, this podcast delivers the tools you need to live a healthier, longer life.
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Transcript
00:00:00
chrisyzen
Okay. On this segment of myths and fallacies on the how to actually live longer podcast with your host, Christian Ordonov.
Debunking the Exercise Myth
00:00:09
chrisyzen
Let's talk about this one is a little bit, you may, I hope I may open myself up to being crucified or sent to the guillotine for even suggesting this, but exercise doesn't make you healthy.
00:00:25
chrisyzen
and let me sort of explain the rationale here so that's why it's called health and fitness right the two things are not necessarily super interlinked, right? And I'll give some examples, hopefully hopefully it makes sense.
Health vs Fitness: The Resilience Factor
00:00:46
chrisyzen
i And I'm not saying that exercising doesn't have benefits, right? I'm just saying you can be healthy without being very fit, right? And you can be very fit, extremely fit,
00:01:02
chrisyzen
And at the same time, extremely unhealthy or very unhealthy or rather unhealthy. And my, I suppose my, the most important thing I'd say before I started to giving examples is if you're very healthy, that means you're more resilient. You can take more stress so you can take more exercise if you have a health problem. And this is something that I really try to hammer home with my clients is if you have a health problem,
00:01:29
chrisyzen
you really have to take it easy. That is that is all I'm trying to, I suppose, relay here is the healthier you are, the more you can push yourself, the less healthy you are, the more you're sort of trying to restore your health. If you're and on that side of the spectrum, the more you have to take it easy. I'm not saying don't exercise. I'm not saying don't move. Movement is super important.
The Unseen Health Risks of Bodybuilding
00:01:52
chrisyzen
Right, but you can move and use your body without necessarily putting Stress on it like let's say running with for example, so let me just give you some examples of people Who can be very fit strong or lean and still be unhealthy so a bodybuilder on stage um um a women's Physique model right very lean but there at that point in their sort of cutting phase or prep contest prep phase, they're at their least healthy and we it's very well known and they feel the worst. The bodybuilder guy probably can't get an erection. The the lady, she might not even have her period
00:02:41
chrisyzen
um or she might not even be fertile and they they know that they know what they're doing and they understand the risks they're they're going through in order for for the glory the the fame the you know the affiliate deals on instagram whatever the case may be for them right so not not judging here but we know that those folks are very lean they look great well the i mean the the bodybuilders can look grotesque but you know you still have now you have the men's um physique and the classic bodybuilding they look less grotesque but they're still pushing their body and and using ah in many cases a lot of performance enhancing drugs so we know they are not healthy even though they look great right then look at um extreme endurance sports so look at marathon runners they don't they don't even look healthy
Endurance Sports: A Double-Edged Sword
00:03:31
chrisyzen
um but they're very fit they can run a long time and fast as well uh triathletes there was one triathlete dude he's like he was 27 i saw like a video on youtube youtube with him the guy looked like he was in his 40s um what all that endurance training be that you know triathlon outro running marathon running all that is doing is it's aging those poor folks cardiovascular systems and along with that there's there's peripheral sort of aging that's occurring because you're you're stressing your body right that's way way too stressful um who else who can be very fit lean or strong so um look at um gym gymnasts
00:04:21
chrisyzen
ah ballerinas right so my wife was a former professional of ballerina doing ballet from the age of four and and she can she told me like a lot of those girls are infertile don't get periods they're extremely sick when i met her she was getting sick quite often and she was put on antibiotics four times in that first year we were together uh then after that they put her on freaking birth control as you do because you know after the antibiotics you know you develop thrash or whatever and they put you on birth control pills because
00:04:55
chrisyzen
God knows why, you know? um But yeah, so those, the ballerinas, the gymnasts, they look great in in terms of their, you know, how they look, then they're fit and they're strong and whatever else, but are they healthy? They are not healthy, right?
00:05:10
chrisyzen
And i think i mean I think that is that is really
The Hidden Cost of Hollywood Fitness
00:05:15
chrisyzen
it. you know that that when you kind of ah look at um I guess another example is ah actors that get into like extreme shape, super lean or super jacked for their roles. They can also look amazing, sure, but are they healthy? Especially if if they're putting so never mind the drugs but all that effort all that damage that is caused to the body all that stress that's put on the body in order to force it to adapt by becoming leaner stronger or the muscles becoming larger right so that that visual effect is a byproduct of of stress put on the body and the more the more stress they can put on the body
00:06:02
chrisyzen
and ameliorated with drugs and diet and you know good cultures and whatever else that can help the person get through it and recover to an extent. the better the results. But that that also means that the more stress that person has had to endure. okay So there's lots of examples of people pushing themselves to the max and destroying their health. were really This is surely not not that hard to grasp for most people. But and the thing is, again, the the healthier you are, the more punishment you can take. But here's the thing.
00:06:38
chrisyzen
If we know that endurance training, extreme sort of type stuff, ages the vascular system or the cardiovascular system and ages those people prematurely, but that's the end the high end of the spectrum, then maybe 10% less is still bad, maybe 20% less is still not optimal, still pushing way too hard, still accelerating aging and because there's too much ah regular stress, chronic stress on the body. So maybe 50% is not right.
Society’s Misguided Fitness Ideals
00:07:06
chrisyzen
You know what I mean? So maybe 30, 20% of that intensity or or that volume or whatever the case may be, maybe that's starting to approach a more reasonable thing that is going to keep the person relatively fit.
00:07:21
chrisyzen
But also allow them to you know keep their longevity keep their health long for the long term. And I think what right now the way society is we have basically started to glorify who can endure the most pain punishment know the Spartan races the sort of.
00:07:38
chrisyzen
100 mile ultra marathons in the desert in these up these mountains in oh my god you know in the cold plunge you know this stuff so it's like who who is the most macho who can take the most pain and punishment but listen I guarantee you you that most of those folks are gonna pay the price in some way shape or form down the line um and the smart individual aka the person listening to this podcast is going to take it relatively easy if they have a health issue. Very easy. I'm talking walks in the park, right? That kind of easy stretching yoga, this kind of stuff, right? If you're feeling reasonably healthy, this is what I ah like explained to a client of mine the other day.
Stress Balance: The Key to Muscle Growth
00:08:31
chrisyzen
It's not about not stressing the body.
00:08:35
chrisyzen
it's It's about understanding the difference between providing a stimulus to the body. Right. Let's say we're just ah to make it less vague. Let's say we want to some kind of.
00:08:49
chrisyzen
Muscle that we want to add to the frame. Let's say maybe five pounds ten pounds in in the next year, right? um So we have to Not just go and start blasting ourselves with weights and and ah Resistance training we have to think how can we do this in the least stressful manner possible? so providing a stimulus for growth to the muscles and that obviously it will be somewhat stressful but so we we go we don't go from stimulus to downright stress to damage right because you know the the pain and soreness after lifting weights for let's say the first few times after you you've had a long hiatus that's caused by muscle damage and inflammatory stuff going on and lactic acid buildup and stuff like that so that's damage and we repair that damage and we become stronger over time and the muscles become bigger right so
00:09:45
chrisyzen
we can provide a stimulus to the body that is sufficient to cause the adaptation we desire without necessarily taking it so far down that spectrum where it becomes stressful and then it becomes downright damaging, right? Because there's no sense in going, especially once you kind of 35 years, 40 years and older. There's absolutely no sense in doing that because it just takes you longer to recover. Then you create these longer cycles between ah sort of the the muscles repairing. That means your subsequent workouts are going to be less sort of fruitful, right? Putting him more anesthetic load on the body as it were. So adding more stress in the bucket, completely senseless.
Longevity Through Moderation
00:10:32
chrisyzen
completely senseless and the thing is you don't need all of that for your longevity because at the end of the day who is living the longest Is it big, muscular dudes or is it those French ladies that eat bread and sugar and smoke cigarettes and drink wine or whiskey every other day? Who's living the longest? And they managed to get to like whatever, 122 years with not all that much muscle mass, but they're still functional. They can ride their bike, they can do their gardening. So again, I'm not saying don't have movement, don't um you know do all of this stuff. It's super important.
00:11:13
chrisyzen
But you don't need to run. You don't need to run the kilometer even. Unless you really want to, right? And you don't have to blast yourself with resistance training like four times a week and stuff like that. For longevity, I really think this is this is such ah um a myth that you have to have a lot of ah ah as much muscle mass as possible and the you know be as your VL2 max has to be as high as possible and
The Pitfalls of Stress-Driven Fitness Gains
00:11:44
chrisyzen
whatever else. you know like i think that is The VL2 max thing particularly, it's a measure
00:11:50
chrisyzen
ah For most people, now unless you're born with a very high VO2 max and it's all natural and you don't have to do any much to maintain your muscle or your strength or your fitness, that's a whole different story. But if you are relatively unhealthy or sorry if you're relatively unfit and you you take it to the the place where you are very fit, like you can run a marathon in three hours, let's say,
00:12:12
chrisyzen
Or you can lift a lot of weight, right? If you came from a relatively unfit or weak state to to get to that strong or or fit state or whatever, or lean state, it usually means you endured a lot of pain suffering, i i.e. you put a lot of stress on your body to get there.
00:12:32
chrisyzen
right So that's a lot of stress that you endured. Stress is aging. right it Stress is degenerating and contributes to disease. And then if all of those gains be they again leanness, strength and or muscle size for example,
00:12:50
chrisyzen
If those gains go away, let's say, or the majority of them go away within, let's say after you stop training after a month, two, three, four, six months, if after that time you lose most of your gains or a lot of them are very significant a portion of them,
00:13:08
chrisyzen
then that is again clear evidence that the only way you were able to maintain those gains of strength, size, ah leanness was by continuously stressing your body. That is how you were able to maintain those gains in this specific example. And That is, again, detrimental long term, right, from a longevity perspective. Because, yes, we are able to adapt to stress, but being adapted to stress is really no measure of health. Okay, so this is just a quick one, trying to keep these under 10 minutes. We're going to do a deeper dive on this and in the second volume
Healing Over Exercise for Health Issues
00:13:56
chrisyzen
of
00:13:56
chrisyzen
the help to actually live longer book series. I was gonna do a whole chapter on this um because there's a lot of, the the thing that really kind of irks me the most is people that are really have a lot of health issues and they're pushing and forcing themselves to exercise this to me is the most kind counterproductive thing a person can do because you need that those that energy and those nutrients that you waste pretty much by exercising when you have a health issue or a number of health issues they could have been diverted that energy and those nutrients could have been diverted
00:14:35
chrisyzen
for healing repair and regeneration processes. So each time you stress your body because you are stressed or because you're putting yourself under stress physically, psychologically, work-wise, whatever the case may be, that holds the stress of that holds repair regeneration for the most part and impedes healing. So you may be doing a lot of other good stuff like supplements, practitioners, lab testing,
00:15:00
chrisyzen
But you're taking one step forward, one step back, two steps forward, one step back, one step forward, two steps back, depending on ah the level of exertion that you have willpower to foist upon yourself, basically. So that's what I'll have to say. I know it's a little bit controversial, sacrilegious, but that is that is my view on it, and I hope this this has been helpful for you. And thanks for watching and or listening, and I'll see you on the next one.