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Is ‘No Pain, No Gain’ Good or Bad When It Comes to Exercise?
By: Eric Ellul Falzon, BS, Appied Biomedical Science
We’ve all heard the old adage, ‘no pain, no gain’, when it comes to exercise but could this phrase be doing more harm than good?
I doubt anyone would argue with me if I were to say that exercise is one of the most beneficial things you can do to improve your overall quality of life. Not only does it give you more energy and a stronger, healthier body, it also helps with your mental state.
Together, these positive influences can go a long way in affecting other aspects of your life, such as your social interactions. To put it simply, there’s an abundance of reasons why you should start exercising if you’re not already, and really, there’s no reason not to.
Now that we’ve got that established, it’s important to understand the risks of exercise. More specifically, the significant risk of a specific phrase which we’ve all heard before, and that is, ‘no pain, no gain.’
Although it’s not inherently wrong-in fact, it has an element of truth to it-the issue with this statement is that most people, especially those starting out in fitness, don’t really know what the ‘pain’ part is referring to.
