Don't Work Out
(if you want to be creative)
Disclaimer: this article targets those that are trying to advance themselves in some way through creativity. If you are content with your life and you aren't striving towards some greater purpose, please do keep working out.
Introduction
If you want to further yourself in a way that requires creativity, such as founding a startup or becoming an artist, stop working out. If you spend hours every week in a gym, it will leave you happy, healthy, and unfortunately, complacent. Vigorous exercise will suck the motivation and spark of inspiration from you. This is heterodox thinking, especially within the context of the grindset(1) subculture. But extraordinary results require uncommon thinking.
My Story
Throughout college and my first couple years in the workforce I have been quite active. In college I tried to bulk up. And once covid hit, I had no options as far as a gym was concerned so I started distance running. I grew to fall in love with running. I started running every day. It felt amazing. I worked my way up until I was running 50-60 miles per week, and I ended up running a couple marathons. In the summer of 2023 I signed up for the California International Marathon with an impossible goal: go sub-3 hours in the marathon. I ended up pushing myself too hard, getting injured, and having to pull out a month before the race.
Taking a break
The injury I sustained required almost two months of non-running from me. I took this opportunity to utilize my time differently: Read more books, learn Spanish, build cool software. I noticed that over time my motivation grew. I felt the urge to build things and try new things. These are sensations I was not a stranger to but I had not experienced since the last time I felt under-challenged, which, for me, was somewhere in high school.
Taking stock
Over time this fundamental urge only grew and grew. I went from desiring to learn to desiring to build. I started a blog and started an open source project(2). It was at this point I began questioning my return to running. Which, if you know me, borders on sacrilege. I wondered, where did all this energy come from? And then it occurred to me:
... I'm smoking all of my excess energy while running.
While I was running, all of my energy went to my day job and running. And after that I would collapse onto the sofa and vegetate. But now, I was eager and willing to go above and beyond in investing in my own human capital.
Qualifying
Ok let me pause here. It's important to stay active. Frankly, I think it's the second or third most important lifestyle choice, behind sleeping and possibly eating.
Instead of going to the gym or running, I stopped driving to work. I take some combination of transport, walking, and bike riding. In addition to this, I take multiple long walks a day with my dog, an after-lunch walk, and strolls whenever I need a deep think.
Overall, I am a very active person. But I do not exercise in a dedicated manner. I walk to think. I walk to enrich my dog. I ride my bike for fun. None of my time is "wasted". I can get double duty out of my exercise. Whereas whenever I would "work out," I was only doing one thing: building my fitness. So not only was I not using my time as efficiently, I was sucking away my energy.
Furthermore, there is evidence to suggest that exercising as a part of daily life is more congruent with the way that humans have lived for the majority of our existence. Dedicated exercise is a distinctly modern phenomena, as is sitting down for 8+ hours a day. Some of the longest-living humans in the world, the people of the so-called blue zones(3), all practice an integrated lifestyle.
Why save time driving to work just so you can spend that time exercising at the gym? Why not do both at the same time?
Conclusion
I've discussed why the current "hustle-culture" possibly has it wrong with its emphasis on vigorous exercise. I told my story of how I transitioned away from this model to a model of my own: A model where one's entire lifestyle is integrated. Exercise is work, exercise is play, exercise is growth, exercise is transportation. We don't have to subdivide all parts of our lives.
Footnotes / References
- hustle culture
- Unfortunately not public yet at the time of this writing. :(
- blue zones