Shannan’s Journey

Your ability to withstand stress-related, inflammatory diseases may be related to your personality. Especially in aging women, a lack of the personality trait known as extroversion may signal that blood levels of a key inflammatory molecule have crossed over a threshold linked to a doubling of risk of death within five years.

A study found that that extroverts, and in particular those high "dispositional activity" or engagement in life, have dramatically lower levels of the inflammatory chemical interleukin 6 (IL-6). Extroverts tend to be focused on the world around them and are most happy when active and surrounded by people. Introverts look inward and are shy.

Introverts vs. Extroverts, and Why Optimists Live Longer

The famous Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung defined introverts as people who are shy and tend to look inward rather than to others, whereas extroverts focus on the world around them, desire to be around others, and tend to think happy thoughts and be more actively engaged in life.

Previous research has also linked the more extroverted trait of having a sunnier disposition with health benefits and longevity. One such study concluded that optimists tend to be better insulated against stress and depression because they develop more effective coping skills and usually have a more supportive social network than pessimists.

The ability to form strong ties with others has been shown to be one factor in being better able to handle stress, which may be another explanation for why extroverts have a lower inflammatory response.

Since this could very well be a case of “Which comes first, the chicken or the egg?” I think it does offer fuel to the idea that by changing your mind you can change your health.

Developing a more positive outlook and embracing life with greater zest can indeed have potent, positive consequences for your health.

Many are naturally shy, introverted people, but that doesn’t mean you have to stay that way. “Fake it ‘til you make it” is one way to go.

Become More Extroverted by… Exercising!???

Yes!

While the researchers were hesitant to conclude that exercise is a definite answer to how you can become more extroverted, they did state that it can be a part of the solution for those who wish to become more outgoing and socially engaged.

Past studies have linked exercise and extroversion, and daily physical activity has also been linked to lower IL-6 levels.

Again, it’s possible there’s a positive feedback loop between a lowered inflammatory response and improved ability to handle stress, with more optimistic and outgoing personality traits. One feeds and generates the other.

“Beyond physical activity, some people seem to have this innate energy separate from exercise that makes them intrinsically involved in life,” Dr. Chapman said.

It will be fascinating to investigate how we can increase this disposition toward engagement. Potentially, you might apply techniques developed to treat depression like ‘pleasurable event scheduling’ to patients with low dispositional energy, where you get people more involved in life by filling their time with things they enjoy as a therapy.”

Exercise has definitely been shown to have a very powerful impact on your psyche, and is a very potent tool if you’re feeling blue, no matter what the reason.  It actually increases your levels of endorphins, or “feel good” hormones, in your brain. And, when you feel good, it’s definitely easier to see the silver lining, and become more engaged with life and the people around you.

How Exercising Too Much Can Hinder Weight Loss

According to Marc David, the idea that eating less combined with more exercise equals weight loss is based on antiquated science, because we now know that a calorie is metabolized differently in different people, depending on a variety of factors. Variables such as your stress level, and even your breathing habits, will impact how your body processes calories.

Additionally, exercising too much can have the opposite effect, causing your body to hold on to unwanted weight.

This happens because when you exercise too much, your body goes into a more extreme physical stress response. This can cause your cortisol levels to remain high.

Cortisol, also known as “the stress hormone,” is secreted by your adrenal glands and is involved in a variety of important physical functions, including:

• Metabolizing glucose
• Regulating your blood pressure
• Releasing insulin for blood sugar maintenance
• Your immune function
• The inflammatory response

However, when your cortisol level is chronically elevated – which can happen if you exercise too much — it stimulates your body to store fat and not build muscle.

This may be the underlying problem if you engage in excessive amounts of exercise on a regular basis and find that you’ve hit a plateau where you cannot lose weight or build more muscle.

So, although nearly everyone reading this is probably exercising too little, it is crucial to understand that you can indeed sabotage your weight loss efforts by over-exercising.

The key points to remember are moderation, and individualization.

Ideally, your exercises should be broken up with short breaks in between for maximum effectivenes There are many stories about the benefits of interval training, which has led me to incorporate interval training (sprints) with endurance cardio training (running) in my own routine. You certainly don’t have to run to achieve these benefits. You can receive similar effects by using properly supervised weight training. Interval training is also a welcome relief for those who dread, or don’t have time for hour-long cardio workouts.

Getting the Right Ratio of Nutrients is Essential for Successful Weight Loss

Additionally, what you eat is just as important as how much. Simply counting calories is not the answer.

Marc David described the case of a young marathon runner who simply could not lose her unwanted weight, despite her intense exercise regimen and eating a mere 1,400 calories a day.

Because in addition to her over-exercising, another problem was the ratio of carbohydrates, proteins and fats in her diet. She ate mostly carbs, and was likely fat deficient as she consumed very little essential fats.

When your body is deprived of essential fats your metabolic rate slows down, so you can’t burn calories as efficiently.

In addition, omega-3 fats, which are essential to optimal health, improve your cells’ response to insulin, neurotransmitters and other messengers. They’re also very important for the repair process when your cells are damaged.

In fact, weight gain is one of the symptoms of omega-3 deficiency.

In the case of that young lady, simply replacing her excessive daily running with milder forms of exercise that she truly enjoyed, combined with a higher level of essential fats in her diet, she was able to lose 15 pounds in one month!

High Protein Meals Help Burn More Fat

A number of studies have also suggested that high-protein diets may help people shed weight more easily. I firmly believe it’s very important to eat some protein with every meal, as protein is the most satiating type of food, beating out carbohydrates and even healthy fat.

However, the amount and type of protein you need (as well as the ratio in relation to carbs and fat) can vary quite dramatically according to your gender, height, weight, exercise levels, and, most importantly, by your nutritional type, which is now a rapidly emerging field.

Unfortunately, many are still unaware of nutritional typing and how it can completely revolutionize your overall health, and help you achieve and maintain a healthy weight.

Myth: Sweating on a treadmill is just as good as sweating outside. Mythbuster: Alwyn Cosgrove

In the past people moved more and their exercise programs were well rounded, but recently more people have switched to doing treadmill-only workouts for their cardio. Whether they think it’s better for their joints or because they’re closet vampires who can’t…stand…the light! and never want to venture outside, I’m not sure.

What I am sure of is that steady-state cardio on the treadmill is just ****ing stupid. And, no, I’m not going to rehash the old argument about how intervals burn more calories. You already know that. Instead I’m going to do some math. Walking a mile is about two thousand reps in the sagittal plane at about one and a half to two times your bodyweight.

Jogging would be around fifteen hundred total reps at about two to three times your bodyweight. And since the treadmill switches your hamstring and glutes off — your foot hits the belt and the belt pulls you through — it’s mainly a quad exercise. So let’s say a client does three miles three times per week for one year (and I’m being conservative). That’s 6000 reps x 3 days per week x 52 weeks, which equals 936,000 reps of knee extension work. Or 468,000 reps per leg.

Let’s say the load going through with the knee was a measly 100 pounds. That’s 4.6 million pounds of work for the quad with absolutely no hamstring work. Think of it this way: if you did 400,000 reps of triceps extensions with 100 pounds you’d get four million pounds of volume.

If you didn’t balance that out with biceps curls you’d expect the elbow joint to hurt, right? You’re damn straight it would! So long term walking or running on the treadmill is almost guaranteeing knee pain. And that’s not even the worst part. Since the hamstring is switched off you’re actually burning even less calories than you would if you were to walk on the ground! This study showed that hip flexion angle increases on the treadmill as opposed to the ground and that stance time was reduced.

Basically, the whole hip extensor mechanism is affected; hip and knee flexion angles have to increase to bring the hip through on the stride. So hip flexor fatigue plus substitution patterns equals severe knee pain. Ten or twenty years ago we’d get away with this because our clients ran outside and did other activities. The contribution of treadmill time to total exercise time was much lower.

It’s hardly the case today. One of the problems with low intensity steady-state aerobics for fat loss in the deconditioned population is the sheer amount of reps needed. I can do a bodyweight circuit and spread the "reps" over the whole body and get a similar metabolic effect. At my gym we’ve always done interval training as we felt the results were superior, but over time we’ve moved to a "metabolic resistance training" model.

For example, one mile on the treadmill would be 1500 reps and burn around 100 calories. If you did a circuit of kettlebell swings, undulating ropes, inverted rows, sled pushes, and burpees for four rounds with 10 to 15 reps each, you’d burn 100 calories in less time with less load, and the reps would be spread over the entire body instead of on the ankles, knees, and hips. It’s just a superior model.