Making Exercise Easier (and More Productive)

It doesn't take a genius to make anything harder, more difficult, and more complicated -- but that is what the unintelligent, think makes one seem smarter.  That's because to them, everything seems harder, more difficult and more complicated than it is -- because of their lack of understanding.  Doing anything, without any understanding, or the proper understanding, will invariably make things worse -- and never better, and then they shrug their shoulders and proudly pronounce, that that is how the world is -- everything totally and hopelessly messed up -- no matter how much they do.  They don't seem to realize that everything is messed up because of what they do -- and not in spite of it.

So when everything in their body hurts, the first thing to ask, is what are they doing?  And from that, one has a fairly clear idea of what they are doing that got them that way.  It usually is not a big secret, and may be obvious to everyone else.  But accepting or getting used to the idea that everything should go wrong, is what their life is about -- and very few are capable of changing for the better.  They don't want to change for the better: they think there is nothing wrong with everything not working out very well -- and are convinced, that is how it is for everyone else as well -- except they are lying, or pretending to be something else.

So the dysfunctional view of the world, is very strong with such people -- but rather than change, they want to pull everyone else into that reality with them.  They will not get better -- but only worse, and time will bear them out.  You do the same things, you get the same results.  Unfailingly.  Some never catch on.

And that is increasingly true as time passes -- and those results accumulate; they don't just go away with a fresh slate each day -- not that it would make a difference.  They would still find a way to lose -- because that's what they think is the object of the game, or anything else -- to just get worse over time.  They proudly call that "aging," when time makes progress possible -- more often than not.   That's why there is progress and evolution -- over time.  However, that doesn't mean that everyone will progress and get better -- but the few who do, change the course of history and evolution.  They make the quantum leap where others have not gone before.

It is not effort and struggle that has gotten humanity to its present evolution -- but improvements in understanding, consciousness and insight.  If what we have been doing doesn't work, we just can't keep on insisting that it does -- and simply must try harder.  That's particularly true in what seems to work when one is young and healthy, but fails miserably when one is old and decrepit.  It may turn out that what one thought worked in the young, was not it at all -- and there were more powerful forces at work.

And the people who claimed to know -- actually don't -- or don't know what actually works, but simply repeat what doesn't, as though it is the truth, and the only thing they agree upon, is to stick together repeating the same articles of faith -- as their brotherhood, or profession.  Meanwhile, millions are sacrificed to their "knowledge" -- while they remain at the top of the priesthood.  That's a recurring theme throughout history (and ideology).  Those who "know" -- and the people who suffer because of it.  Meanwhile, such people are busy aggrandizing all the turf -- to speak as though they know, and are the only ones who can know these things.

So it is great to see when they overreach, and people break out questioning all authority -- that has paraded itself as "science," or the truth, but having no idea how they got to believing what they do.  In exercise, or the course of movement that one hopes to optimize their individual health, well-being and functioning, it is long assumed that simply making any movement more difficult and problematical, will result in making it eventually easier, more fluid, and productive to attaining optimal health -- when that is obviously not true when the former athletic champions prematurely have heart attacks, are crippled, and die of despair that their heyday is irreversibly gone -- and so they relive their youth as their prime, rather than their tortured present.

How did that happen?  It didn't just happen -- it was deliberate and intentional -- in the misguided understanding that to obtain a desired result, means doing the opposite of what is logical to do.  That would be too easy -- and logical, and their conditioning has made them to always do the opposite of that obvious wisdom.  So predictably, their whole lives fall apart following those infallible guiding principles.  Everything just seems to get harder, until one day, they become utterly impossible -- but not to worry, we can hire an army of caregivers to do all those things for us -- and we can continue to become as weakened as possible because technology will still keep us alive despite no effort on our own part.  And that is how many hope to live as long as they possible.

That is not the only future for humanity though.  There is the remote possibility that people can actually get better over time.  Of course, they have to be doing all the right things to do so -- and not just anything that doesn't get one there.  But the experts will rationalize that there is no difference -- because nothing they've tried works, and so they have stopped trying anything else -- and especially, those things that might work -- because they are "too old" to learn something new, and different.

That would be, that the smallest change, makes the biggest difference -- and not the greatest expenditure of energy, for little or no results -- leading to the characteristic despair of those who have done so all their lives -- and have no idea things can be different.  They think that more of the same is the only difference -- even if it doesn't work, and makes them worse.  Still, they will persist at it until they entirely can't.  A large part of their conditioning, is to believe that there is no other way -- and so they have to do it that way -- even if it doesn't work, or make any sense at all.  Their lives are just rote repetition of what they were programmed by others to do.

So it requires that realization to break free from the tyranny of that conditioning -- but obviously requires, doing something different.  Otherwise, the trajectory is inescapable.  Even those who teach exercise to the elderly and frail begin by demonstrating and demanding them to do movements that are difficult or impossible -- rather than beginning with what they can do -- but like most people, simply don't think to do.  And that is to move at the joints that are ideally designed to move -- at the neck, wrists and ankles -- which if they can be maintained, imply the rest.  Larger muscles are not meant to move intricately, but are designed to provide stability and support -- while the important movements take place at the extremities of our vital and critical senses.

Those are the movements and faculties important to sustain and hone -- and not the biceps, pecs and lats -- for what reason?  Yet that is the only bodyparts aging bodybuilders focus on -- as they barely hobble onstage -- with their obviously atrophied necks, forearms and calves.  That's where the failure begins -- and works its way back to the origin of all the muscular structures at the center (heart) of the body, and all the other organs that work to keep the entirety in top running condition.  All the traditional and conventional exercises ignore that importance -- and that is why they don't work -- because the accumulated toxins never returns to the cleansing organs -- and in that process, making room for the new.

That is what productive exercise and movements do -- pump the blood (fluids) back to the heart.  The heart pumps blood into whatever space (vacuum) is available to it -- and simply making the heart pump harder and faster does not achieve that effect -- but prematurely enlarges and weakens the heart.  Productive circulation is not dependent on how hard the heart works -- but how much the skeletal muscles pump blood back towards the heart.  That is what optimizes the circulatory effect -- and keeps one healthy and vibrant in those areas exercised in that manner, and understanding.

Otherwise, there is the frequent frustration and exasperation that no matter how much they exercise with the conventional understanding -- it doesn't work as one ages.  That is the accumulative effect of not doing things properly and not that it has to be that way -- for everybody, no matter what they do, and how hard they try.   If you're not doing the right thing, it doesn't work -- and it doesn't matter how much of it you do.

The Key to UNDERSTANDING Exercise

The bottleneck in the circulatory system is not that the heart is not pumping -- but that it is pumping into the resistance of the fluids remaining at the extremities -- and so merely pumps the blood back into the heart -- rather than to the extremities, which as he points out, has no flow. However, the alternating contraction and relaxation of the muscles does create a pump -- but the obvious effective design, is to create a pump at the extremities -- which one can do when one realizes this obvious problem, which explains the deterioration of the human body -- beginning at the head, hands and feet -- embodied by the swelling and inflammation, as well as lack of articulation of the joints/muscles at the extremities, where people start to show this aging first, and most obviously. That deterioration is noted as a lack of movement as well as functioning at the critical extremities of the body -- resulting in the common problem of the turkey neck as well as cognitive decline (dementia) at the head, weakness of grip, and absence of sensation and balance in the feet -- because those organs have degenerated from the lack of optimal flow that removes waste products and creates room for nourishment. My observation has been to dispute the erroneous notion that exercise is done mainly for the benefit of the heart -- when the heart may be the only consistently working muscle in the body -- and just making it work harder, doesn't optimize the flow any better -- but as noted in many athletes, merely enlarges their heart -- because it is pumping harder into that resistance. What does make a difference and optimizes the flow, is to initiate a muscle contraction at the furthest extremity -- realizing that in every case, the insertion of each muscle, must move towards the origin -- which is towards the heart, and contraction (making a volume smaller) is also compressing fluids towards the heart. As I pointed out to Arthur Jones, the creator of the Nautilus machines, and the founder of "high-intensity exercise," you don't need to create a machine to work every, or even most of the muscles -- because initiating a muscular contraction from the furthest extremity, triggers a contraction in the supporting muscle (proximal) -- until they all go back to the origin at the heart. That is the most productive thing one can do -- because that action pumps the blood back towards the heart -- creating space for the heart to pump blood into, rather than just short-circuiting back towards the heart. This insight came into focus for me around the time Nautilus was at its height of popularity but I noted then that few were achieving the results his machines promised -- despite how hard (high-intensity) one was willing to train -- but noted that many were even beginning to die of heart problems, including notable bodybuilders and professional wrestlers. I didn't think that was the objective. Meanwhile, I was giving presentations on an easier approach to exercise -- that could be done in any setting because it simply required this better understanding of the human body and functioning -- that really eluded most exercisers, and so it becomes entirely ineffective in their later years -- although the spirit is still willing. The most important movements are the movements of the head, hands and feet. Running, jumping, dancing is fundamentally moving the foot as a lever; but those end movements, imply the rest. It is impossible to contract a more distal muscle as fully possible -- without the supporting muscle (proximal) being engaged (anchoring) -- and with that understanding to optimize that flow -- that left unaffected, results in the accumulation of toxins and allowing for no new nourishment -- no matter how hard the heart is pumping. Because it is pumping into the resistance of the fluids already remaining there. That fluid just remains there -- and is not the blood re-entering the heart but the blood that has no where to go because the fluid (blood) in the extremities are not being evacuated by the proper understanding of this optimization of the circulation. You have to create a pump at the extremities -- and with the proper observation, one realizes that beginning at the extremity, is the only way to do it -- and not working the heart harder until it fails. In this way, the critical faculties of the head, hands and feet become the leading indicators of this continuing vibrancy -- rather than just being in good shape for a person who looks like they should be dead.

No, I'm not saying that simply doing (more) of the conventional exercises -- like yoga, tai chi, and deep breathing will work any better than it has over the centuries. However, a better understanding of the process -- will work wonders, rather than just sell more heart rate monitors and courses promoting the wrong effort -- which is the primary reason that business model was so commercially successful -- as well as promoting all the so-called "heart-healthy products." In most people, the heart is not the weakness of their muscular (nervous/circulatory) system but is obviously the strength -- since it is always working, and usually infallibly. It is doing its part -- but it can't do it alone. When one asks, "What is the best exercise one can be doing?" -- without preconceived notions of what it must be -- the usual answers are such things as walking, running, swimming, etc. -- rather than the much more productive answer of what optimizes the circulation (health) throughout the body -- and particularly to those parts that have the poorest circulation, and so those parts fail first -- at the extremities. But simply making the heart beat faster is not the solution if there is no space for the heart to pump the blood into -- and will simply return to the heart. As the doctor points out, that flow is fine -- but the flow in the capillaries are non-existent, and remains that way. It is only a presumption that the blood in the capillaries (at the extremities) is the blood returning to the heart -- by some convoluted explanation. But as the doctor also notes, if one were to design a circulatory system ideally, it would be at the top of the head -- so it flows down. But since you have a closed hydraulic system, flow is not so much dictated by gravity as it is by pressure difference. So if the blood in the capillaries don't move, the flow cannot obviously go into it. One has to create a vacuum (space) which readily draws blood into it. The way to do that is to create a heart-like pump at the extremities -- by mimicking the action of the heart -- in contracting and relaxing at the furthest extremity from the heart -- that contraction squeezing the blood back towards the heart, and upon relaxation, the heart has plenty of vacuum to allow the blood from the heart in. Bruce Lee as well as Jason Fung essentially said the same thing -- "That in order to fill your cup, you must first empty it." Similarly, philosophers and other wise individuals advised that in order to gain wisdom, one must let go of all the junk in their minds first -- that leave no room for anything new. Likewise, the computer model in which one must first clear memory -- in order to use it. It all sounds very metaphysical -- but is actually the simple and obvious -- but people can't accept it, because they want to hold on to what doesn't work, and all their fanciful ideas -- that don't work, often because they think that knowledge in itself is valuable because that is what everybody else is saying. The head (face and neck), hands, and feet are the first places to display the effectiveness of the circulation -- and not the core -- which is the usual extent of one's movements -- while the much more important functions at the head, hands and feet deteriorate. Increasingly, that is the problem -- that while people's heart may continue to beat tirelessly, their brains have died, their grip is weak, and their balance (feet) is so weak it cannot hold them up properly -- even among the lifelong exercisers. They're not specifically addressing the real problem -- but are doing something else instead. No amount of doing the wrong thing, will get one the right results.