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Last week I began a month-long experiment during which I’m trying to drink only water. In response, Greenman2001 wrote:
This post, like many others I read here, makes me wonder how exactly you’re defining the word “fit.” I’d love to see a blog post on that topic.
This seems like an innocuous question. In reality, it cuts to the heart of my goals and motivation. What is it I’m trying to achieve? What does it mean to be fit, and how will I know when I get there? I’ve been thinking about Greenman’s question for the past week.
What does it mean to be rich?
One of the recurring themes at my money blog is the difficulty in defining what it means to be rich (or wealthy). How much money is enough? Is money even a good measure of wealth? Once a person is rich, what then?
There are several problems in defining “rich”:
- The meaning of the term varies from culture-to-culture. Who is rich in Somalia may not be rich in Canada.
- “Rich” means different things to different people. What you view as rich, I may view as middle-class.
- Even for an individual, the definition of rich may be a moving target. If my fifteen-year-old self could see my current self, he’d think I was rich, for example. But I don’t feel rich.
The definition of “rich” is largely subjective. When I talk about getting rich slowly, what I’m really promoting is improving your current financial situation. There’s no finish line. There’s no ultimate goal. There’s just ongoing measured progress to a better life.
What does it mean to be fit?
The same is true with physical fitness: it’s not a destination, but a process. There’s little agreement even among experts regarding what “fit” actually means.
Body mass index, for example, has been used by many medical professionals and organizations (including the U.S. government) as a measure of individual fitness. But in recent years, some have disputed the usefulness of the body mass index.
Or what about the food pyramid? What was once promoted as a useful guide to nutritious food came under fire and was ultimately revised. But how long will the new guidelines be deemed definitive?
To me, it seems senseless to seek some sort of objective measure of fitness. Each of us is different. We have different bodies. We have different minds. We have different goals. Instead, I think we ought to have individual standards of fitness, based on our personal strengths and weaknesses.
Personal fitness
On January 1st of this year, I weighed 207 pounds. I could do three pushups. I could not run for even ten minutes. I could not bench press 60 pounds. I ate poorly. I did not exercise.
Today I weigh 190 pounds. I can do twenty consecutive pushups (and over 50 with short breaks). I can run nearly four hours at a time. I can bench press 100 pounds. My diet is still not ideal, but it is improving. (”I can’t believe you’re my husband,” Kris said the other day after watching me choose fruits and vegetables.) Not only do I exercise most days of the week — I actually look forward to doing so. I continue to take the advice of Get Fit Slowly readers and implement it into my life.
But am I fit? I’m certainly more fit than I was six months ago, but there’s still a lot of work remaining.
And striving to drink only water for one month? Beverages are one of my weaknesses. I drink more alcohol than I should. I drink too much soda pop. I drink a lot of juice. My daily diet is filled with too much sugar, alcohol, and caffeine. How much of these should a fit person drink? I don’t know. But I know that I want to drink less of all of them, and so I’m willing to try a one-month water-only experiment.
Conclusion
Ultimately, I have no clearer definition in my mind of what it means to be “fit” than I do of what it means to be “rich”. In some ways, I believe fitness is more about the journey than any destination. I believe that each of us — regardless of our personal fitness levels — should strive to become more fit than we already are. It’s up to you to decide what that means in your case.
For me, this means a continued battle to develop healthier habits: to eat sensibly, to exercise often, and to get better sleep. The pursuit of fitness is a gift I’m giving myself. It makes me feel good, both physically and mentally.
What about you? What does the word “fit” mean to you?
Mac
19 responses so far ↓
1 Mark Peterson // Jul 8, 2008 at 7:39 am
I couldn’t have said it any better myself. In the end you have to be happy with who you are and what you are doing. About 6 weeks ago I finally decided to get off my lazy butt and start doing something to make myself feel better and more fit. I’m no where near ‘fit’ but I feel a whole lot better and am looking forward to making continued progress. Fitness is in the eye of the beholder. You should do what makes you feel better and happier. PS….love the blog, both of them.
2 Chris Eaker // Jul 8, 2008 at 7:49 am
I think “fit,” like many other things in our lives is a constantly moving target. Today, I’m 240 lbs and about 35% body fat. Fit to me would be about 175 lbs and 10% body fat. But then my target will have moved to something even less. Male body builders are down around 3-4% body fat. That’s pretty fit. But even though they may have such low body fat percentage, they aren’t great runners like marathon runners are. So for me, right now, my first fitness goal is to run a marathon. Then I want to change my attention to building a muscular body. Those two goals don’t work well together, so I’m focusing on one at a time.
3 WeightLadder // Jul 8, 2008 at 8:18 am
3 cheers for us all being more “fit” than we currently are.
4 Lucas // Jul 8, 2008 at 10:04 am
I’ve been thinking about my definition of “fit” lately, too. Here’s what I came up with: the ability to perform daily physical activities with ease, and the ability to perform difficult but useful physical activities, period.
I separate “fitness” from “health” in my mind. They’re two separate concepts: fitness has to do with physical capability, health has to do with things like resistance to disease/infection, longevity, etc. They’re related, and they influence each other, but they’re not the same thing.
For example, you could successfully train to run a marathon on a diet consisting entirely of donuts. This would make you fitter (you can run a marathon!), but less healthy (you’re only eating donuts!).
Just my 2 cents.
5 paidtwice // Jul 8, 2008 at 10:14 am
BMI is an invasive crock that permeates the insurance/health culture like a disease and I hate it.
BMI was designed for *sedentary* people but now is used for all people. Have muscle? then your BMI is totally thrown off.
My spouse has worked really really hard to become “fit”. He now has a body fat percentage of under 8%. Seriously. He has a personal trainer and has it measured monthly. Yet his BMI according to our insurance company is in the “overweight” category. Because he’s built up a lot of muscle mass.
It just burns me.
6 James Barton // Jul 8, 2008 at 11:35 am
Crossfit (www.crossfit.com) have spent some time thinking about a definition of fitness. One of their central documents (http://www.crossfit.com/cf-download/CFJ-trial.pdf) includes this: “There are ten recognized general physical skills. They are cardiovascular/respiratory endurance, stamina, strength, flexibility, power,
coordination, agility, balance, and accuracy. … You are as fit as you are competent
in each of these ten skills. A regimen develops fitness to the extent that it improves each of these ten skills.”
It goes on to two further definitions, but what they are saying makes sense to me.
7 brad // Jul 8, 2008 at 1:23 pm
For me, being “fit” is more of a feeling than a definable goal or set of statistics. Usually toward the end of a summer where I’ve been biking every day and eating lots of fruits and vegetables, I feel fit. I have energy, I feel trim and strong, and I have a positive outlook. It’s that feeling that I work toward in improving fitness. I can’t define fitness, but I know it when I feel it.
8 greenman2001 // Jul 8, 2008 at 3:27 pm
I don’t think fitness is subjective. I don’t think it’s relative. I don’t think it’s a moving target. And while I think both “getting fit” and “staying fit” is a process, I think “being fit” is a state, and that state is more-or-less synonymous with “healthy.” Being healthy means being disease-free and living a lifestyle that doesn’t contribute to the creation of disease in your own body. You don’t live to be a hundred by running a marathon: you live to be a hundred by being disease-free. So, as a practical matter, I think “being fit” incorporates both good physical health and a lifestyle that promotes and perpetuates good health.
The epidemiologist Walter Willett has established criteria for a “low risk” diet and lifestyle, one which minimizes the likelihood of a person’s developing serious disease:
• Don’t smoke
• Maintain a BMI below 25
• 30 minutes of exercise a day
• Diet characterized by low intake of trans fat
• Diet with a high ratio of polyunsaturated to saturated fats
• High whole-grain intake
• Two servings of fish a week
• RDA of folic acid
• At least 5 grams of alcohol a day
A few things to note. There’s no requirement to run a marathon on this list. It doesn’t say, “eat a low fat diet:” it says to maintain a high ratio of polyunsaturated to saturated fats. It sets a minimum intake of alcohol.
Back in June, Mac and Pam went to watch the US Track and Field Olympic Trials. This led Mac to ruminate on various perceptions of fitness. I’d argue that what he was seeing was not a demonstration of fitness but a demonstration of athleticism: incredible athletic performance, tremendous fun to watch. I don’t think of athletes of Olympic caliber as being fit because of the degree to which their steroid use compromises the health of their liver and increases the likelihood of disease to a near certainty.
When you set for yourself the goal of purging caffeine, alcohol, and sugar from the liquids you drink, my first thought was, “what do these have to do with fitness?” From everything I’ve read, caffeine has no negative effects and many positive effects on health; two glasses of wine a day is healthier for you than no alcohol; and sugar is sugar – dangerous in large quantities because of the danger of insulin-resistance, but not bad for your health in and of itself. But these three are freighted with moral judgment in our culture for all kinds of reasons which have little to do with the reality of your health. Granted, they might be the gun you shoot yourself with, and you may feel that you can’t be trusted with them, but those are issues that don’t have much to do with your health per se.
In this blog, you and Mac are mostly focused on exercise. You don’t talk much about your diet, except when you suffer willpower failures, and these posts are often painfully full of a sense of moral failure: here’s proof of my weakness, my lack of willpower: chocolate cake immersed in a glass of milk for breakfast. Eating well – eating to maintain good health — is kind of boring: there’s no Eat for the Cure fundraiser with prizes for the guy who polishes off two servings of fish most consistently. But I think the Willett criteria are good ones for establishing whether you’re fit or not, and would be good to return to in the blog periodically to give people a sense of where you are in your path to fitness, and to lend some perspective to readers who have trouble relating to your desire to run for four hours at a time followed by dumping a 25 lb bag of ice on top of yourself in the bathtub.
9 kazari // Jul 8, 2008 at 4:38 pm
I think about being fit in terms of ‘fit for purpose’. There are things I enjoy that require being able to walk all day, or lift my bodyweight. I love hiking, but I enjoy it more when I’m not completely struggling up the hill. I dance and rock climb for fun (not usually at the same time!) and both of those things benefit from increased stamina, strength and flexibility. Like greenman, i find the idea of running for 4 hours completely unappealing - my current fitness goal is being able to climb across the ceiling at the climbing gym.
10 Early Retirement Extreme // Jul 8, 2008 at 4:46 pm
Verily, if we hadn’t gotten so disconnected from physical labor, fitness would be fairly easy to establish. Can you walk or cycle for hours without needing to rest or sit down? Can you sprint for half a mile? Can you swim or tread water for an hour (no rest)? Can you dig a large hole in the ground? Can you lift a 70lbs round of wood or split it? Can you push a wagon? Can you stack 50 corn sacks of 100 pounds each in 10 minutes without puking? If you can, then you’re fit. Indeed, this may be farmer centric. A more general definition is “can you do whatever life physically demands of you under the worst conditions”. The short condition I like to use is “can you carry an unconscious person out of a burning house without breathing”? That’s fit enough for me. Anything less is actually somewhat unacceptable.
11 Andrew is getting fit // Jul 8, 2008 at 4:47 pm
Oh I’ll be stealing the content of this post as it encapsulates what I’m about so perfectly.
12 Sheamus // Jul 9, 2008 at 12:00 am
Lucas has it pretty much spot on. Let’s not confuse fitness with health. Being fit has nothing to do with how much you weigh, or what you eat. It certainly has nothing to do with how much you can bench press.
There’s lots of confusion here!
Being fit is a part of being healthy. Being healthy is eating a good balanced diet, not smoking or taking drugs, not overindulging in alcohol, not overindulging in anything. It also means good mental health, maintaining a positive attitude, surrounding yourself with good people, etc.
Being fit is a smaller component of the full package.
I think a lot of people believe that dropping lots of weight means they’ll automatically be fit. While often you will get fitter simply by having to move to lose that weight, they don’t necessarily go hand-in-hand. Lots of 150-pound men can’t run for four hours straight. They might look lean and ‘healthy’, and even fit, but looks can be very deceptive. They might smoke 120 cigarettes a day or eat nothing but Ding-Dongs. I know lots of very lean people who eat a terrible diet – with them it’s all about their genetics.
Are bodybuilders fit? Very few of the top ones are - it’s well documented how Ronnie Coleman couldn’t even manage to walk a small hill without having a near-asthma attack.
Dean Karnazes eats super-clean when not running, but has an ‘anything goes’ attitude when he is - which includes pizza, burritos, high-sugar snacks and all manner of crap.
Likewise, the top German triathletes in the 1990s, who dominated the Ironman-distance side of the sport for years, used to eat very similar diets - pizzas, chocolate, etc, often directly before a race. It’s well-documented, however, that Thomas Hellriegel, after finishing runner-up at Hawaii twice in succession in 1995 and 1996, switched to a super-clean diet in 1997, and won (albeit against a slightly depleted field).
Most serious adventure racers eat nothing but garbage during their 4-5 day treks. The body needs what it needs – if they tried to compete on cabbage soup and rice cakes they wouldn’t last a day.
As Brad says, in a general sense fitness is quite difficult to define, but you know it when you see it, either in yourself or others. At rest I’m very aware when my heart is beating slowly (i.e., < 50 bpm) as I feel relaxed and even slightly euphoric, even though I’m simply lying still. Likewise, in the heat of battle, when you’re going almost full-out but somehow sustaining it, you feel fit then, too.
I would suggest that, simply, fitness is being able to engage in rigorous exercise for 60-minutes, daily, and being strong and healthy enough to do it again 24 hours later. Rigorous is a loose word, but for me it means at a semi-competitive speed. Being able to walk for an hour is not fit seven days per week, although it may well mean you’re fitter than the next person.
However, if you can run flat-out (or near-enough) for an hour, then yes, you’re a fit person, inasmuch as your heart has the resources at its disposal to get you through that workout. But, again, that doesn’t necessarily mean you’re healthy, as what you can do on the outside, and what’s taking place on the inside, are two very different things.
13 DPS // Jul 9, 2008 at 8:46 am
I’m with Early Retirement Extreme on this one.
“The short condition I like to use is “can you carry an unconscious person out of a burning house without breathing”?”
Or in my case 2 small kids and a person. Anything less is VERY unacceptable.
14 Sheamus // Jul 9, 2008 at 9:26 am
For a normal person (i.e., not a firemen or similar trained professional) being able to do that has less to do with fitness and more the adrenaline that arises from the sheer panic/survival instinct/protective nature of an awful situation like that.
It’s a bit like the likely urban legend – although similar examples do exist, as above – of a mother lifting a car off of her trapped child*, but when adrenaline really kicks in people can do all manner of unbelievable things, certainly those involving endurance (i.e., running away from a lion) or physical strength.
From Ikai and Steinhaus, “Some Factors Modifying the Expression of Human Strength,” Journal of Applied Physiology, 1961, we learn the following: “The maximal pull of forearm flexors was increased and, in some instances, decreased in predictable fashion by a loud noise, by the subject’s own outcry, by certain pharmacologic agents (alcohol, adrenaline, and amphetamine), and by hypnosis. Significant average changes ranging from +26.5% to 31% were observed.”
The authors suggest that the normal human inability to exert oneself to one’s physiological maximum is the result of “acquired inhibitions that in turn are subject to disinhibition by pure Pavlovian procedures, by anesthetization of inhibitory mechanisms, or by pharmacologically induced symptoms serving as stimuli for disinhibition.”
i.e., everybody is capable of some magnificent feat of strength of endurance – it just requires a crisis situation for you to actually perform them.
Sources: Various, including The Straight Dope.
* Which, incidentally, is a scene Jack Kirby claims to have witnessed which led to his creation of The Incredible Hulk.
15 What does fitness mean? « Fitter Fat // Jul 9, 2008 at 2:12 pm
[...] does fitness mean? I originally was going to post a response to J.D.’s post at Get Fit Slowly. He asks, “What does it mean to be fit?” Then, Macdaddy posed another good question [...]
16 Scott // Jul 9, 2008 at 9:09 pm
Great Question. One thing I think is you need to define your goal. Visualize it and it will come true. — By defining your own goal, you’ll know what success is for you. Everyone has their own definition. I was extremely obese, just the ability to bend down and put my socks on would be an accomplishment. If I am just mildly overweight, then lower body fat % and increased bone and muscle mass will likely be a goal.
It’s all relative, and it keeps changing.
I find it a difficult balance to be happy with yourself at where you are in your life with the continuous improvement of self.
There have been many studies about people who say they’d be rich if they double their salary. Then, once they get there, then they are not rich anymore.
I think that’s the same for being fit. I’d be fit, if I had a size 32 waist. Yet, when I get there, I know my definition will change.
The question I have is at what point, if ever, does one need to be content with the way they are?
17 What does fitness mean? « mouthing hard words // Jul 15, 2008 at 6:04 am
[...] does fitness mean? I originally was going to post a response to J.D.’s post at Get Fit Slowly. He asks, “What does it mean to be fit?” Then, Macdaddy posed another good question [...]
18 What Is Fit? More Thoughts on the Definition of Fitness // Jul 22, 2008 at 9:57 am
[...] If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!Earlier this month, I shared my thoughts on what it means to be fit. [...]
19 Sue // Jul 23, 2008 at 10:35 pm
I actually do agree with the moving target theory, and with greenman who doesn’t….
Because our physiology changes - the definition of being fit - or healthy and disease free (dis - ease) changes along with that. Being fit at 16 isn’t the same as being fit at 40…
you just need to be sure that you can see your target at all times…
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