Strength: A Growing List of What You Can Tolerate

If you or someone you know uses posture and back health as a moral high ground to avoid lifting heavy, I’ve got some thought provoking questions. When you answer them you may come to learn that strength training isn’t at odds with postural health.

Postural health is specifically demonstrated by lifting heavy weights. 

What if strength training isn’t about lifts and exercises? What if every lift from the back squat and the strict press and the single leg RDL and the barbell bent row are all different ways to challenge posture and position? 

What if the characteristic we call “being strong” is demonstrated by what loads you can maintain posture and position? Does your posture fail pulling a heavy deadlift? A stronger person wouldn’t. Do you lose balance and integrity of a stable foot during heavy single leg RDL? A stronger person wouldn’t.

I don’t say this to be patronizing. I say it to shift perspective about what being strong means. 

The first time I heard this perspective shared it did something to me. It placed my worldview about training on a different kilter. It highlighted the pursuit of robustness from training more so than the ego. The lifts became more human in my eyes because it put quality posture and position at center stage rather than the lift itself. Furthermore, this view integrated all the critiques and fear surrounding lifting heavy and the potential for injury. It felt empowering. Maybe it will feel empowering to you, too. 

Ever since, I’ve thought about the 500lbs squatter not as a person who can perform the squat exercise with 500lbs on his/her back, but rather a human who can tolerate 500lbs in ranges of motion that a 500lbs lifter couldn’t. Strength training, then, is growing the list of things that don’t break you. 

Keep going.