why, in the NYT?!

in his way, my father was trying to tell us that muscles deserve more consideration than we give them. We often think about muscle as existing separately from intellect — and maybe even oppositional to it, one taking resources from the other. I’ve spent the past few years writing a book about muscle, and this is what I have learned: The truth is that our brain and muscles are in constant conversation with each other, sending electrochemical signals back and forth; our long-term brain health depends on muscles — and moving them — especially when it comes to aging bodies.

"Exercise was fun in our house, because our father was a perpetual kid, wonderful at playing."

As far back as memory serves, my brother and I were drafted to join our father in training sessions. A recently unearthed Polaroid shows us, impossibly tiny in diapers and barely a year apart, standing alongside our father — who was indeed impressively fit in his swim trunks — all of us proudly grinning, arms akimbo in a superhero pose

"At the most basic level, muscle is the stuff that powers and animates our existence. We move our bodies through the world, and our minds follow"

The idea that robust physical health enables strength in other arenas of your life dates to the ancients: Seneca and other Stoic philosophers wrote about the interconnectedness of sound body and mind

• ...but none of that matters next to institutionalised racism,
• ...but you're fatshaming those who can't/won't work out
• ...but going to the gym is right-wing fanaticism, and anyway fat is beautiful
• ...buuuuut, your worth comes from your humanity and not how many pull-ups you can do... (#855317)

"Show me you’re in good form. Show me you’re a person of action. Character that’s grounded in something you can feel. It’s a way to assert presence. To say: I am here — conscious, corporeal, alive."