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Learning to be mindful, meditation, and stress reduction programs motivate people to exercise more. Just as much as a structured training program. Strength training once again appears to reduce symptoms of depression. These are a few findings from new research led by Iowa State University.
The First Steps Are the Hardest
It often goes wrong with those first steps to get moving. Especially in people with sedentary jobs who are not used to exercising, those first steps can seem enormous. Learning a lifestyle, or simply a habit, is always a matter of getting through such a first phase. That phase where everything must come from motivation and discipline while there is still no habit.
In that respect, the first steps are often the hardest. Especially in that first phase, you may need some support. For example, in the form of an eight-week cardiovascular training program, as in the recent research led by Iowa State University [1]. The participants in that program were found to be physically active on average 75 minutes longer per week after those eight weeks than a control group that had not participated in the training program.
But what if you dread those first few weeks so much that you would never start such a program? If you envision images of hell week from the Marine Corps training program while the stairs to your bedroom already seem like a challenge? Fear not, there are less intimidating methods to increase your motivation to exercise. I don’t think anything less intimidating than a meditation training. With a meditation training, you probably envision more of a Pickwick moment.
More Mindfulness, More Motivation
To the surprise of the American researchers, meditation training proved to be just as effective in increasing activity as the structured training program. The expectation was that the training program would lead to better results than mindful meditation.
Actually, I should say that both programs were equally effective in preventing a decrease in activity. This did not increase. The research was conducted at the end of autumn, beginning of winter. In the control group, they saw a sharp decrease in activity, likely due to the changing weather. However, this decrease in activity was not seen in the groups that were trained for eight weeks in the heart or in the head. As a result, participants in both intervention groups moved on average 75 minutes per week more than the control group. According to Jacob Meyer, that is enough to increase life expectancy by two years.
Structured exercise training is something as a field we have used for decades to improve physical activity and physical health. To see a similar effect on physical activity from an intervention that focuses on the way someone thinks or perceives the world, was completely unexpected.
Jacob Meyer, assistant professor Iowa State University
The mindfulness program aimed to relieve stress through meditation, self-awareness, and ‘being present in the moment’. Don’t worry! Such airy-fairy terms are no longer a guilty pleasure these days. Just your mobile phone can be reason enough to have to purify your mind daily from emails from your annoying colleague, videos of farting cats, and vacation photos from vague acquaintances.
Participants took part in weekly sessions of two and a half hours. In these sessions, they learned to ‘be mindful’ in various meditation and breathing exercises. Exercises that could be incorporated into daily life.
More Strength Training, Less Depressed
A healthy mind, a healthy body then. But conversely, we see similar correlations.
In April, we wrote about depressive symptoms that can arise when you stop exercising. Last year, we wrote about reducing depressive symptoms by paying more attention to exercise.
In a separate study, Meyer collaborated with researchers in Ireland and Sweden. The aim was to investigate the effects of specific strength training on depression symptoms [2]. The researchers conducted a meta-analysis comparing the outcomes of 33 randomized controlled trials involving more than 1800 participants. Training with weights and other exercises aimed at muscle strength were found to significantly reduce depressive symptoms.
Strength training was found to reduce symptoms regardless of health status and amount of training, and regardless of whether muscle strength had increased.
Working on Yourself
That last fact is quite interesting in itself. Earlier studies had already shown positive effects of cardio on depressive symptoms. You can wonder whether it’s about the result of the training or the fact that you know you’re doing well. If your muscle strength does not increase, you might think that the training was ‘ineffective’. However, you were active and therefore feel good. That’s worth something too.
So, if you’re not into all that airy-fairy stuff at all, just keep training and trust that you’re also training your noggin.
Allergic to exercise (figuratively, not a real allergy to training)? Grab a cup of tea and meditate on the meaning of existence. You’ll naturally start moving more, even if it’s just out of boredom.
Namaste
Sources
- Benefits of 8-Week MBSR or Aerobic Training on Seasonal Declines in Physical Activity
Meyer, Jacob et al.Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise: April 9, 2018 – Volume Publish Ahead of Print – Issue – p doi: 10.1249/MSS.0000000000001636Original Investigation: PDF Only
- Brett R. Gordon, Cillian P. McDowell, Mats Hallgren, Jacob D. Meyer, Mark Lyons, Matthew P. Herring. Association of Efficacy of Resistance Exercise Training With Depressive Symptoms. JAMA Psychiatry, 2018;
- https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/2680311
