What fitness culture gets wrong

We are more obsessed with fitness than ever before. More people than ever have a gym membership, yet we are also the sickest generation yet. How can this be? The disconnect comes from where fitness culture strays from true health. True health isn't to be found in blue-light gyms, extreme workouts, polyester clothes or chasing high protein goals. It's a return to what was once normal for most people but that we forgot.

Good fitness is a sign of good health, but chasing the former and ignoring the latter isn't being "healthy." In this article, we'll dive into what fitness culture gets wrong about health and what you should focus on to truly be healthy.

If you've spent years chasing numbers in the form of calories, scores or any other tracker without feeling any different in your overall health, this article is for you.

Calories vs. nutrients

Ask most gym-goers and they'll tell you a calorie deficit rules all, protein is the one key macro, and what you eat doesn't matter as long as it fits your macros. They have been conditioned to believe in the power of pre-workouts, calorie counting and obsessing over protein. But is this really the key to better health? Most definitely not.

The moment we started trying to hack our food, reducing its meaning to calories and macros, we lost what truly matters about food: its nutrients. Fitness culture focuses on calories because it focuses on shape over health. Now don't get me wrong, body fat percentage and muscle density are most definitely key areas of health, but being in shape at the cost of your health isn't worth it. Feeling awful just to look good isn't how things are meant to be.

Instead, when we view the food we eat as extremely important for our hormones, energy levels, skin, mental clarity and overall health, we realise food is a lot deeper than just calories. Focusing on calories will lead to chasing the lowest number regardless of the ingredients that come along with it. This is why we see the explosion of low or even zero-calorie foods, and the scary thing is people flock to these in the hope of better weight loss and health, but they couldn't be further from being conducive to good health.

Real, organic whole foods full of nutrients that your body actually recognises matter way more than the amount of calories you are getting. After all, hormone health and metabolism improvements can help you burn a lot more calories at rest. A healthy body will return to a healthy weight; restricting intake through a deficit will just force a sick body to be sicker rather than healthier.

Stress vs. nervous system reset

The modern world is a very stressful one. Jobs have become more demanding, toxins and blue light increase our stress, and our bodies are less able to deal with that stress due to exposure to ultra-processed foods and harmful pesticides. The last thing we need is to add more stress to the equation, yet that is exactly what so many people do.

So many throw themselves into long-distance running, HIIT training and Hyrox, all of which add more stress to an already stressed-out body and mind.

It's not that these activities are inherently bad, but in the context of most people's current state of health, the additional stress wears down their health rather than building it up. Most people need to focus on healing their body and rebalancing their nervous system first. It's not about completely avoiding all stressors, but about being smart with what you choose to expose yourself to, and giving your body what it needs to rest and enter that parasympathetic state that eludes so many of us.

You don't need to run to lose weight, get in shape or be healthy. You can see greater health changes, and therefore bodily changes, by nourishing your body through nutrition, gentle exercise, removing toxins and prioritising relaxation. Movement is key for health, but that doesn't mean we need to go to extremes to force our bodies to shift weight. Often the best approach is the one that feels the most healing to you.

If you're an athlete who loves these forms of exercise that can be stress-inducing, then make sure other areas of your life are supportive of your health and lower cortisol.

Again this isn't about avoiding all stressors and shutting yourself off from the world which is the wrong approach. It's about rebuilding your resilience to them and not copying what everyone else does for fitness. A calming walk can do more for your body than an intense long distance run and very few people see this.

Chasing numbers vs. healing the Body

Big tech has also found a way to capitalise on health, by giving us numbers to track, whether that's calories, steps or health markers on wearable tech. But we don't need a device to tell us the state of our health. Algorithms tell us how stressed or rested we are instead of us listening to our bodies.

There is nothing wrong with wanting to chase better PB’s or achievements, but chasing numbers in the hope of better health isn't the way to do it.

Feeling good, energetic, rested and calm cannot be measured in numbers; instead, it is felt by you. Having hormones balance out and weight shift can happen regardless of the amount of calories or protein you consumed. Why? Because nutrients matter most, not calories.

Two people can be the same weight and height but be vastly different in the state of their health. Heal the body first, then have a look at the numbers if you so wish.

When you focus on healing your metabolism and thyroid health, your hormone levels balance and weight loss comes a lot easier, as your body returns to a healthy weight naturally. Instead of forcing a struggling body to lose weight through a calorie deficit, we should focus on giving our bodies what they need: nourishing them with nutrients, healthy (saturated) fats and plenty of carbohydrates.

Workout Environment and Clothing

Take a look at the modern gym environment: filled with blue light, little to no windows, everyone in polyester workout clothes, air conditioning pumping out recycled air. This isn't the environment we were designed to work out in.

I get it, we cannot work out with weights outside all year long (unless you live in a tropical location), but we are so often glued to screens and stuck indoors that our workout time becoming an extension of that further harms our health. The more we can get outdoors and work out in the sun and fresh air, the better our health will be. Hardly any of us spend enough time outdoors, but it is one thing that can greatly improve your health and is extremely easy to do more of, especially in spring and summer.

Workout clothing is another area fitness culture has leaned into that has drifted far from true health. Polyester dominates most activewear, leaching toxins, microplastics and estrogenic compounds into your bloodstream. The effects are even more pronounced when sweating, and especially around intimate areas where they can affect reproductive and hormonal health. Ditch the polyester and embrace natural alternatives such as cotton, linen or hemp.

Plastic bottles also dominate the gym floor. Switching to stainless steel or glass can greatly reduce your plastic (and therefore estrogen) exposure. The final area to assess is Bluetooth headphones. The EMFs (electromagnetic frequencies) from these devices take the shortest route possible to talk to either side of the head, and unfortunately that route runs straight through the brain. Reducing your EMF exposure can relieve the burden placed on the brain and lower inflammation, so returning to wired headphones is the best choice here.

Fake Fitness vs. Real Health

Sports drinks, pre-workouts, low-calorie versions and synthetic supplements are all fitness culture's way of working around real food and an ancestral lifestyle. Unfortunately, they aren't helping your health one bit and are often causing more harm than good. Real health and fitness is about reconnecting to nature, functional fitness for everyday life, real foods for energy and micronutrients, and workouts that help the body get healthier rather than stress it further.

Our ancestors had a different way of life. Sprinting was common in catching food, climbing was a crucial skill, and carrying was part of daily living. They naturally exercised outdoors without hitting "start" on a fitness watch or app.

Yes, we should work out, resistance train, and even have a more stressful workout from time to time, but doing it in a way that helps your body rather than harms it is key. Leave fake fitness in the past, focus on real health, and notice how much better you feel. Nothing compares to a workout in the sun or a walk in the forest to boost your health.

Conclusion

Fitness culture has strayed far from what is true health. We often don't need extremes to become a lot healthier. Despite how it may seem to others on the outside, returning to real food, reducing toxins and moving outdoors really isn't extreme, it was considered the normal way of life not that long ago.

Healing your body means addressing whether your lifestyle is conducive to good health. It's not that you need to work out more aggressively, run further or take extreme measures. Health is about how you feel day to day, not how many miles you ran.