Even though a wealth of research shows how working out—even just doing mild physical activity for older people—has endless positive effects on our brain and mental state, I would argue that a large majority of doctors and therapists still don’t make an effort to use this to their patients’ or clients’ advantage.
Even though we have been told for ages to exercise because it’s good for us, only recently have researchers finally begun to focus on the specific ways exercise helps our mood and mind.
For this reason, we have never really been told exactly how it helps us feel better mentally and emotionally and so it’s logical that most people—therapists and everyone else in general—don’t know the answer to this.
While there is research on exercise and biological mechanisms related to psychology like stress, neurotransmitter release, and blood pressure, there are actually amazing structural parallels between therapy and organized exercise. As far as I know, there isn’t even a theory to describe these parallels as the reason for “workout well-being.”
Naturally, someone as vocal as I am has a theory and I will use this month’s blog to outline some of the ways your are treating your brain to therapy when you workout.
A regular, organized exercise routine—especially one with a qualified fitness professional as a guide—provides the opportunity for psychological growth in large part because of its similarities to therapy (i.e., providing structure, stability, and common goals). In the case that a person is led through a workout by a fitness professional—whether in a group fitness or one-on-one setting—the person is provided with goal-oriented structure, organization, reinforcement, social support, and understanding, all of which are central to successful therapy.
A quality fitness professional creates an environment very similar to therapy even in the most literal sense: a professional relationship in which reaching the client’s goals is the shared end point.
The relationship a person has with his or her therapist is also similar to what it’s like with a fitness guide because they both address how someone may feel deficient (including issues with self-esteem and social image) by setting goals, scheduling regular appointments and creating accountability, helping that person make changes to their behaviors, problem-solving when something is not going according to plan, encouraging commitment to change, and gradually addressing challenges. Exercisers are also able to find good role models and social support in the fitness professional and other gym-goers, which is therapeutic too.
Working out and making life changes also requires a lot of commitment, accountability, openness, a willingness to change, and effort.
Similar to therapy, a person has to commit to a workout plan, arrive at workout appointments when they are scheduled, demonstrate a willingness to discuss personal issues including parts they hate most about themselves, try new and uncomfortable experiences, and give their best effort to the process.
As a result of all this character-building, exercise routines naturally breed independence and self-empowerment, and make the exerciser the central decider in what they choose to achieve.
Overall, the demands of a workout routine yield a stable, predictable, manageable, encouraging, self-empowering experience (very similar to therapy) with the exerciser assuming the most active role in his or her own achievement.
Even without a fitness professional to act as a guide, someone who independently undertakes an exercise program benefits from the similar processes and social support of other exercisers.
The experience of working out also increases life structure, self-efficacy (the feeling of being able to achieve something), and self-esteem.
Still, it’s important to remember that some kind of social aspect is crucial, whether through an exercise professional or workout buddies, in order to achieve some of the therapeutic benefits. This means that although running may ease your mind and make you feel great, running with a group of friends or one friend repetitively can be even better.
In a sense, adopting a lifestyle of healthy diet and habitual exercise acts as a kind of “subculture” that bands people together by connecting those of similar values and perspectives.
This lifestyle subculture helps to our brain’s well-being by building up the our identity and validating the health-lens through which we experience the rest of the world.
Ultimately, I am suggesting to you that the same healing and helpful aspects of therapy are similar to those of a healthy lifestyle subculture, where our habits, social image, life outlook, and self-esteem are continually lifted up and encouraged by other people around us.
With that said, let me be clear—I am in no way saying you should ditch your therapist and go on a crazy workout binge. What I am saying, and what I have said before, is that while you are treating your mind in therapy, start to establish a therapeutic lifestyle outside of the therapy office too by treating your brain (and body) to some social sweat.
-Katie Rosenberry is a Fellow and Research Coordinator at KISI