Why is physically exerting yourself to the point of exhaustion at the gym good for you but various jobs involving manual labor seem to cause permanent damage in the long term?
In: Biology
Unless you’re a professional athlete, chances are even if you consider yourself a “gym rat,” you’re spending no more than 2-3 hours in the gym, and not going every single day. Even if you don’t have a trainer telling you what to do, while you’re in the gym, the common exercises you end up doing have evolved over decades by people finding out for themselves what ends up injuring them and what doesn’t. You’re doing a variety of different exercises that work a variety of different parts of your body. Despite chatting with friends or checking out the cardio girls, you’re primarily concentrating on working out, so you’re less likely to make mistakes. Also, if something starts to feel funny while you’re on the gym floor, you can simply call it a day, let it recover and come back.
Let’s compare this to a typical manual labor job. You’re working 8+ hour days, and even if you aren’t actually exerting yourself for all of that, you’re still going to exceed the 2-3 hours most serious gym-goers are going to top out at. This means that your body has less time to recover, meaning that damage can compound from day to day. You are going to be doing mostly the same thing all day. Whether it’s shoveling, hammering, stacking boxes, or anything else, you’re mostly going to be using the same joints and the same muscles, further hampering your body’s ability to recover from damage. Making all this worse, while you’re on the job, you’ve probably got a lot more on your mind than simply the physical activity you’re performing. If you’re moving boxes, you aren’t thinking about lifting each box as well as you can. You’re thinking about how your boss only gave you one day for a two day job, how annoying the clients are, or any number of other little things that will be on anybody’s mind at work. If your back starts to feel funny, you don’t want to tell your boss, because he might see it as a sign of weakness and start giving you fewer hours when you need money.
So, it’s a combination of duration, variety, and concentration that make the difference between a manual labor job and hitting the gym. Also it’s important to note that if you do enough of anything, even if you do it “right,” you can damage your body. Professional athletes still get injuries related to repeated strain even with the world’s leading experts on sports medicine trying to prevent it. There’s a reason why pitchers don’t usually pitch an entire game, and why even roided-up no test bodybuilders still usually take at least some rest days.
Gyms and other sports can also be damaging. If one’s form isn’t correct, or even repeating various movements ad nausea can really fuck you up.
Physically exhausting yourself to the point of exhaustion at the gym is also not very good for you.
ELI5 – exercise is designed from the ground up to control the stress of your muscles and allow you to recover, that’s why stretching is emphasized. Jobs that require lots of manual labor may not have anything other than a few government regulations protecting you – regulations that came about because some poor sod died or was crippled in a workplace accident.
Choice, and time.
You choose to put yourself under a strain for a limited amount of time. You are usually aware of your limits and will usually have some indication prompting you to stop before the point of injury.
You don’t have the choice to stop when your ability to feed your family means you have to perform certain functions that are taxing for periods of time that are longer than what your body can take.
Exercise is a vaccine for your muscles..all of them including the really important ones like your heart.
A vaccine tricks your body into thinking the real virus is attacking, and beefs up your immune system. Exercise does the same thing with your musculoskeletal system.
If you get too much of the real thing (for example if you suddenly have to run 5 mi) you can hurt yourself. So it’s best to taper it and build up gradually.
It’s as simple as this…..in the gym you work your own pace and finish with a goal in mind. When it’s your job, it isn’t up to you when you’re done, no matter how much you’ve pushed yourself. It adds up over time.
Currently working as a lumber stacker at a lumber mill. 10 hour days with one 10 minute break in the morning and a 1/2 hour lunch. At 54, I am losing grip due to over use without adequate recovery time. Been at this for just over 60 days. I’m not sure how much longer I can continue this line of work.
Gym…two hours several times per week
Work…all damn day…all week long…all your working life.
According to Lifehacker physical exhaustion not required for a workout
https://vitals.lifehacker.com/exercise-shouldnt-feel-horrible-1844763622
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