Fatigue. Sweat. Soreness. Tired. Repeat. Does this typical workout program sound like a program you need to be healthy and fit?
Nope.
The truth is, it's a great way to accelerate the aging process; to look older, to feel older, and to be less healthy.
Who wants that?
No one.
Research on the life energy theory by Roland Prinzinger shows that each of us begins life with a calorie and energy account. We draw on this account over the years to come, and depending on our lifestyle choices this life energy account will be depleted sooner or later.
In other words, you can age slower or faster. You can be thrifty with your life energy or burn through it wastefully.
Although chronological aging will continue no matter what we do, metabolically we can actually age in reverse. Yes, you can make your metabolic age go back in time as the candles on your birthday cake get more and more crowded each year.
How?
Here's a story about Brenda that was documented in my book, STOP TRYING TO LOSE WEIGHT YOU'RE MAKING YOURSELF FATTER. When I first began tracking Brenda's body composition she was 52 years old with a metabolic age of 50. Every quarter for the next 4 years I took a body composition reading. At that point she was 56 years old with a metabolic age of...
42!
Wow! Her metabolic age went backwards 8 years and the gap between her chronological and metabolic age widened by 14 years over the course of 4 years. Now that's aging in reverse. And for Brenda it was obvious. She had the energy to outwork 25 year old men and she looked great too.
Did she make any conscious targeted lifestyle changes to make this happen? No. She just lived her life as she always had day by day.
The one constant? Once a week she gave it everything she had for a few seconds isometrically and kept getting stronger. Over time her body composition changed to resemble that of a younger person.
That's the key.
The most important factor used to determine metabolic age is your body composition -- the amount of fat mass vs. the amount of fat-free mass you have on your body. The extent to which you change this ratio can have a large impact on how old you really look and feel inside and out.
But if you do want large changes in your metabolic age quickly here is a great example of what can happen when you focus on your diet and losing body fat:
Several years back Ellen went through my 6 week fat loss program. At the start she was 52 years old with a body weight of 130.0 LBS, FAT MASS 41.1 LBS, FAT-FREE MASS 88.9 LBS and a METABOLIC AGE of 39. After 6 weeks her body weight was 119 LBS, FAT MASS 31.1 LBS, FAT-FREE MASS 87.9 and a METABOLIC AGE of 26!
In just 6 weeks she lost 10 pounds of FAT MASS and her metabolic age decreased by 13 years to half of her chronological age. She achieved the body composition typically seen in a 26 year old female. And her exercise consisted of 3 stations, 5 seconds of all-out isometric effort, 15 seconds a week. That's it! And I have the pictures to prove it.
But the most dramatic change I ever saw was by Laura Owen. In fact, I devoted an entire chapter to Laura's story. She was also a participant in my 6 week fat loss program and her changes were nothing short of amazing.
At the start she was 46 years old and began with a body weight of 152.8 LBS, 44.5 LBS of FAT MASS, 108.2 LBS FAT-FREE MASS and a metabolic age of 35. After 6 weeks her body weight was 148.4 LBS with 30.0 LBS FAT MASS, 118.4 LBS FAT-FREE MASS and a metabolic age of 17!
In just 6 weeks Laura lost 14.5 LBS of FAT MASS, gained 10.2 LBS of FAT-FREE MASS and reduced her METABOLIC AGE to that seen in a female teenager! She did this with as little as 2 exercises and a few seconds of her best isometric effort each week. The pictures don't lie.
Who wouldn't want to do that?
Most people over 45 years old want the most efficient and comfortable way to stay young, vibrant, capable, and independent. They don't want to move weights up and down anymore.
Measured isometrics are the perfect tool for aging in reverse because you can become ridiculously strong in just a few seconds without any movement, and have the proof to back it up.