I am currently reading an excellent book that I picked up at the Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture called “Cultivating an Ecological Conscience”, by Frederick L. Kirschenmann. The book is a great read about sustainable farming and I recommend it to anyone interested in understanding more about food and agriculture in our society. Interestingly, in one of the chapter’s Kirschenmann refers to Niccolo Machiavelli as a source of guidance for sustainable agriculture. He writes: “even though Machiavelli’s political philosophy may be disagreeable, he provides some pearls of wisdom on how to make things work.” (p.37) As Kirschenmann made his case, it got me thinking about how these same “pearls of wisdom” might apply to fitness. It’s an unlikely leap, yet I think it works, so here we go.
In a word, the armour of others is too wide, or too strait for us; it falls off us; or it weighs us down. – Machiavelli, The Prince
In this passage Machiavelli is talking about the army of course, not bicep curls. Nevertheless, his point is simply that the best weapon is the one that works for you, and not for someone else. We can draw two parallels to fitness with this. First, one should be wary of jumping on board with anyone’s special method or groundbreaking program. The reality is that everyone is an individual, with individual needs. There are no secrets to be found that will unlock the key to your success. What matters is having an understanding of what you need and how to most efficiently go about getting that. This is one reason I am not a fan of any large, group fitness programs or DVD’s as stand alone exercise. They might be fine for the occasional fun workout, but they should not take the place of targeted, individualized training.
Second, this is another reason why weight machines are less than ideal. Weight machines are designed for an average body that follows some basic rules. There is a lot that falls outside of averages when it comes to human beings. You can certainly make use of machines from time to time if you see a specific need, but most of the time you should think about utilizing free weights. As I have mentioned often, a great deal of the benefit of weight training (with free weights) is that you can reteach your body to move properly. Free weights make this possible because you can manipulate almost every variable. Machines have you pretty much locked in to one variation.
I wonder if Niccolo would be my client…