July 1, 2025 • 29 mins
Should men and women work out differently? Are rest days really necessary? And how did a group of 19th century German gymnastics enthusiasts transform America? Casey Johnston, author of the She’s a Beast newsletter and the new book A Physical Education, stops by to share some fitness facts that will really pump you up. Plus: The importance of strength training for cat owners.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
You're listening to Part Time Genius, the production of Kaleidoscope
and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
Guess what, Mango? What's that will? Are we going to
do a history lesson? I know you love going back
in time. We're going to nineteen sixty. We're talking about
John F. Kennedy. Now, this was just weeks before his inauguration.
He actually wrote an article for Sports Illustrated and the
headline was the soft American. Now. In this article, he
called physical vigor one of the country's most important resources,
(00:46):
and he actually lamented the decline of physical fitness among
all of America's youth.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
First of all, I didn't know he wrote for magazines
that I didn't previously say. But I mean, what was
this like a splashy way of introducing new health policy
or was he just trying to check in on how
many chin ups every kid could do?
Speaker 2 (01:04):
I mean it kind of was like he did talk
about plans to expand new physical education programs in schools,
which he later did, and that was through the President's
Council on Physical Fitness. I don't know if you remember
these tests. It was always the pull ups that just
killed me. I just I couldn't do it. And so
ultimately couldn't get whatever that ultimate star was when you
(01:25):
passed the test. But what JFK was really talking about
was the Cold War. He actually argued that in order
to take on the threat of communism, Americans needed to
get stronger.
Speaker 3 (01:36):
I love it.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
I did doing more push ups to save democracy.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
I mean, that's what they're there for. And it is
funny in retrospect to to look at all this, but
it's also interesting to see how things like politics and
cultural attitudes, even media and celebrities, these can all influence
the way we think about physical strength, and believe it
or not, that's been the case of the United States
for hundreds of years. So today on the show, Maria
(02:00):
is speaking with author Casey Johnston got a new book
called A Physical Education. Now it's this blend of science,
reporting and memoir, you know, the kind of thing we
love around here, and I can't wait to hear what
she has to say about the history of strength training
and how to get stronger and how getting stronger changed
her life. So let's die down.
Speaker 4 (02:41):
So Casey, thank you so much for coming on. We're
very excited to have you on part time genius. I've
been reading your work for a long time. I am
an amateur jym goer, I would say, And at the
end of this interview, I think I'd like to do
a little bit of pep talking to people who don't
know or feel like they don't know what to do
in a gym. But I want to get started at
(03:04):
the beginning. And I'm talking chronologically because one of the
most fascinating parts of your book to me was how
weightlifting and gyms became a thing.
Speaker 3 (03:13):
And I'd never even thought about this, but it actually.
Speaker 4 (03:16):
Came from some very specific fields of thought that had
a lot of political and religious context. So let's go
back to the nineteenth century. Tell me about the Turner movement.
Speaker 5 (03:26):
I mean, we can trace physical training in one form
another all the way back like humans have maybe always
done it, and a common starting point for our modern
training is like Greeks and Romans, you know. So it's
like it goes back. But the place that we can
situate the modern conception of a gym as a sort
(03:47):
of community center for exercise and physical fitness began with
the Turners, which were a sort of cultural group in
Germany in the early eighteen hundreds, started by one man
who ran a center. It's an outdoor plaza called it turnplots,
this turn terminology sort of referring broadly to gymnastics, but
(04:08):
they also use dumbells and weights to train with. And
some of the Turners immigrated to the United States and
they brought that with them. They started what were called
Turner halls or turnbarne and they pursued physical fitness, not
as like this sort of competitive elitist thing, but they
saw it as a public health contribution to sort of
(04:31):
help raise the floor of physical capability for their community.
They didn't like the sort of American conception of competition.
This was about this. It had a much more socialist approach.
Speaker 4 (04:43):
But of course here in the United States, we don't
like socialism, but we do like Protestant work ethic. So
then it seems like once the Turners came here there
was this other kind of field of thought about why
working out and gaining strength was act actually sort of
in line with Christian values, right, So how did that
(05:05):
get involved?
Speaker 5 (05:06):
There was the YMCA associations. Young Men's Christian Association was
a concept that existed relatively early in the eighteen hundreds.
It did not initially have a gym component at all.
It was just sort of a gathering place for young
Christian men and they saw what the turners were doing
and were like, we want that. We literally want this
(05:28):
concept of like a physical training center because there was
this growing assertion that Christians were not physically robust enough,
especially the men, so they wanted to buff them up
quote unquote in service to God. I mean, this all
becomes like a way of keeping them focused on their
physical perfectibility, keeping them at work in service of God.
(05:51):
So they were like, this is a type of pressure
we can put on them to be physically fit. So
that became the muscular Christianity movement, and.
Speaker 4 (05:59):
That's an actual term. That was an actual term, was
muscular Christianity.
Speaker 5 (06:03):
Yeah, it doesn't have it's I mean, there's not a
lot of really formal study about a lot of this stuff,
but it's like a it's conceptually doesn't have a strong
beginning or end or like a very particular leader. But
it became a sort of dovetail of these two cultures
and that sort of snowballed into Eventually we had physical
(06:24):
fitness tests and exams for military organizations, then paramilitary organizations,
fascists adopted these physical training programs that made them really
fall out of favor among socialists and that crowd, or
it became distasteful, sort of in the way it is
now where people maybe assume a conservatism or a fixation
(06:47):
on aesthetics if you participate in this thing. In a
similar way, they kind of assumed you were a fascist
of you if you trained physically in this way back
during the World Wars, because the Italian Army was doing it,
the German Army was doing it. I've started to say
these things are these are tools, neutral tools, but they
develop these associations based on who's using them and how
(07:09):
they're using them.
Speaker 4 (07:10):
So when you step into a gym and pick up
a barbelle, you're actually engaging with this incredible history and
social political context that I think most people just don't
even think about.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
We take it for granted.
Speaker 4 (07:23):
But I guess my other question is, you know, there's
this idea of bodybuilding. We think about someone like Arnold Schwarzenegger,
who became such a cultural icon.
Speaker 3 (07:32):
Where did bodybuilding come from?
Speaker 5 (07:33):
Yeah, I mean an interesting thing is that bodybuilding the
YMCA sort of coined that term. They brought that into
the picture of physical training. But there's like a more
modern route of bodybuilding as like a pure esthetic pursuit.
The aesthetic version is the seventies. There are bodybuilders in
the fifties who are maybe a little bit more oriented
around these like feats of gymnastic might, throwing each other
(07:56):
in the air, tumbling and stuff. But they also had
a particular esthetic that was documented in magazines, and then
eventually it became more about just the look of these people.
I think that it's sort of ebbed and flowed over
the years. But if you go to a certain very
intense corner of TikTok, there are people who are intensely
pursuing bodybuilding.
Speaker 4 (08:18):
Of course, of course, but it's so interesting to think
that over the years people have gone into this for
all of these different reasons and with all of these
different goals, whether it's esthetic or military. And yet here
we are trying to figure out, well, should I pick
up those dumbbells or not? And we'll talk more about that,
but first we have to take a quick break. We'll
be back with Casey Johnston in just a moment. Welcome
(08:57):
back to Part Time Genius. We're talking with Casey Johnston,
author of a physical education and.
Speaker 3 (09:02):
I want to talk a little bit, Casey.
Speaker 4 (09:04):
You did such a great job in the book of
breaking down some of the myths around the science of
weight training and muscle, and a lot of this is
stuff that I have seen perpetuated in the media for
years and years and years. Especially as a female bodied person,
we are fed all of this. One of the main
myths that you broke down is that women cannot build
(09:27):
muscle in the same way as men and therefore should
maybe not exercise in the same way. And that's not
actually true, So tell us about that, right.
Speaker 5 (09:37):
The sort of pseudoscience around this that I believed that
was circulated and popular magazines and media was that women
have more of this type of muscle fibers Type one
they're called, that are quote unquote more suited to cardioactivity.
They're long and lean, and so women should focus on
(09:58):
that stuff, whereas men have more type two fibers, which
are used for more powerful, strength oriented movements. So men
should focus on lifting weights and never the twain shall meet.
In actual fact, it's not anywhere near as divided as
what I just said would make you think. On average,
women have I believe the number was seven to twelve
(10:21):
percent more type one muscle fibers than men by proportion,
So that's like a very small difference. I think I
compared it to a jar of jelly beans in the book,
where it's like, if you have one hundred jelly beans
and I have one hundred and seven jelly beans, I
have seven percent more jelly beans than you, But like
our two jars of jelly beans are probably virtually identical.
That is not anywhere near enough of a difference to
(10:44):
suggest that these two groups should train completely differently. And
then there's lots of science around the fact that women
who train the same as men might not gain as
much muscle in the absolute, but they will gain twenty
five percent just as men gain twenty five percent. So
they are not maybe ending up as big as men are,
(11:04):
but it's because their bodies are smaller. They might be
starting with smaller muscles. But that doesn't mean that they
shouldn't train for strength just because they can't end up
as strong as a man. Just because a man can
lift six hundred pounds and a woman can lift four
hundred pounds at their absolute top of their ability, that
doesn't mean that it's meaningless by any stretch. For a
woman to learn to lift that weight. Because we still
(11:26):
get the same type of growth and building those relationship
with our bodies, building up her neurological responses to the stimulus,
we get all of the same type of great results.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
So to speak out of it.
Speaker 4 (11:39):
Tell me a little bit more about this. You mentioned
it just now briefly the neurological benefits as well. And
I think this is again something that I have never
really thought about. When I go to the gym, I'm
dragging my muscles and my bones around and then I
haul them out again. But my brain is actually doing
something too. What is it doing?
Speaker 3 (11:56):
Why is it good for me? Yeah?
Speaker 5 (11:58):
I think that we have really underestimated the potential for this.
In all kinds of exercise, we sort of think almost
as one directional, where it's like your brain sends a
signal to your muscles, and your muscles do what your
brain says, but there is a response. There's sort of
a back and forth between your body and your muscles.
You're not just training this physical might of your muscles,
(12:19):
You're training them neurologically to work together. There's more communication
happening between your brain and your body in ways that
we don't even fully understand yet. We're so focused on
maintaining our brain function in the last maybe like twenty
years or so with pseudoku, crosswords, all of these things.
But it's like the stimulus of working out has a
(12:42):
similar effect. Your brain is getting used, your neurological system
is getting used when you exercise, and it's like a
contrasting kind of stimulus too to like the pure brain
activity of say doing a Pseudoka puzzle.
Speaker 4 (12:54):
That's really fascinating. I did also learn from your book
recovery is important. Why shouldn't we just push to the max.
Why shouldn't we be lifting as much as we can
every single day?
Speaker 5 (13:04):
This is something I was completely unaware of going into lifting,
And when I was exercising for so long as a
runner and my focus was entirely on doing as much
exercise as I could, my understanding at that time was
if I then ate too much food, I had just
spent all this time running, burning all these calories, and
(13:24):
it would be quote unquote wasting that workout in order
to go then eat food. In learning about lifting, I
learned it's sort of the opposite, is true, And especially
in lifting, your muscles are actually built when you're resting,
when you work out, you're doing all of this. We
referred to it as muscle damage. You're shredding up the
fibers in your muscles, so to speak. And then when
(13:46):
you are not lifting, when you give yourself time to
rest and you give yourself food, especially protein, but also
you need carbs and fats, your body is repairing those
muscles to be a little bit stronger than they were before.
It's re fueling you and sort of restocking your muscles
with energy, and that's what allows you to lift a
(14:07):
little more weight the next time. And that's how you
create progress. That's how you build muscle and especially build
it back if you've lost it from say, dieting too
much or too little activity for too long, that sort
of thing.
Speaker 4 (14:19):
It makes so much sense when you say it right
the science. It's very logical, but it's also kind of
radical when you think about the messaging that especially women
and girls are given. It's kind of a way to
change how you see all of that and to question
some of that messaging.
Speaker 3 (14:35):
Right.
Speaker 5 (14:35):
I hadn't been aware when I was a runner how
destructive that cycle was of like exercising and then not
eating and trying to rest as little as possible. Those
are all things that are all fighting each other in
that circle where it's like the less you eat, the
less prepared you are to work out, the more you
work out, the less you're resting, the worse you're going
(14:56):
to work out. And then I'm left trying to fight
even more to try and keep doing what I think
I'm supposed to be doing. In lifting, all of those
things are oriented in a constructive cycle where the more
you eat the better, the more way you can lift,
the harder you can train. For me, with an adequate
dose of training, I sleep better, for instance, and all
(15:20):
of those things sort of feed off of each other
and become a virtuous cycle. I think in the book
I called it a reward reward reward, sort of like
there's no punishment reward system. It felt like it was
just all good stuff going in a circle.
Speaker 4 (15:34):
I was so compelled by your personal story that unfolded
through this book. There was so much that I could
relate to. I think there's a lot that a lot
of people can relate to, And one of the things
that I found most relatable was simply stepping into a
gym and feeling.
Speaker 3 (15:46):
A little bit out of place and overwhelmed.
Speaker 4 (15:49):
I like that you actually let us go along with
you as you made a fool of yourself frankly a
few times, and had to learn the how to use
equipment and how to interact with people. You struggled, you
had a hard time. I think a lot of people do.
What do you say to someone who wants to try lifting,
wants to start going to the gym, but maybe feel
(16:09):
self conscious or anxious about it.
Speaker 5 (16:12):
We're sort of encouraged to think of as, oh, it's simple,
like you just start going to the gym, But the
gym for somebody who is not great at dealing with
new environments or hasn't been sort of socialized in a
gym crowd in their whole life, it's a foreign environment
which takes some time getting used to. A lot of
times I find myself saying to people that when you
(16:33):
started a new job or a new school, or we've
had those experiences where it's not necessarily comfortable right away.
You don't know anybody and you're like, where is everything?
I don't know. You have to kind of allow yourself
to situate it in your mind like that, I think,
and give yourself time, and I like to say separate
the task of accomplishing a workout from getting used to
(16:56):
a new place. You are allowed to get your feet
wet first and just familiarize yourself. One of the pieces
of advice I give people is to give yourself a
session or two or as many as you want where
you just sort of go to the gym and post
up on a low stakes cardio machine where you can
see the rest of the gym and just sort of
observe see how people use the equipment, how do they
(17:18):
ask each other for things, where do they stand when
they do X, Y Z. That's not going to be
the total cure all, but it's good to let yourself
get familiar with, like where's the locker room? How do
you check in and feel like you know it a
little before you're trying to jump in and also complete
a workout.
Speaker 3 (17:34):
You're allowed to take it a little.
Speaker 5 (17:35):
Slowly, And we don't really think of it that way,
but I encourage thinking of it that way a little
bit more.
Speaker 4 (17:40):
Yeah, I love that you don't have to do everything
at once. That is really wonderful advice. Well, we have
to take one more quick break, but we have so
much more to talk about with Casey Johnston Don't Go Anywhere.
(18:05):
Welcome back to Part time Genius Now, Casey. Before the break,
we were talking about how people can kind of ease
their way into lifting, ease their way into going to
a gym because new environments can be intimidating. I think
the other thing that a lot of people hesitate about
is this fear of being judged or not being perceived
as worthy of being there.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
And it's funny.
Speaker 4 (18:25):
I was at the gym last month and I was
standing there doing dumbell curls using fifteen pound dumbbells, which
for me was a lot.
Speaker 3 (18:32):
I was struggling.
Speaker 4 (18:34):
I got to like four reps and I could not
keep going, and I looked to my left and there
is a guy easily twice my size, super ripped. He's
got these like, I think, forty forty five pound dumbells
and he is just flipping them up and down like
their toothpicks while carrying on a conversation with someone next
to him. And I'm practically on the floor after doing
my four reps with the fifteens, and in that moment,
(18:56):
I felt so scrawny and weak and discouraged, and it
was while reading your book that it kind of hit me.
First of all, I was actually working hard that guy
was not. He was not pushing himself. I was pushing
myself to the breaking point. So who's tough now. But
also it's this idea that everybody is on their own
(19:17):
pathway you should not expect someone else's results.
Speaker 3 (19:20):
Is that sort of what you found in your own
journey through all.
Speaker 5 (19:23):
Of this, yeah, one hundred percent. I mean you have
to keep in mind that often who you're seeing at
the gym are people who love going to the gym
and go all of the time. You only live in
that sort of beginner phase where you feel like you
don't know what you're doing and you feel like you
stick out like a sore thumb. Like that doesn't last
very long. Eventually you're going to be one of those
people where it's like your second living room. So that's
(19:44):
important to keep in mind. But there is also this
element of we're all working on what we need to
work on. I mean, even as somebody who has a
lot of experience, if you're going back after a long
time or you're rehabbing an injury, the ways you use
are going to be different than what you are capable
of at your strongest. This is true of everybody, so
(20:06):
it's very important to not compare yourself on just a
sort of numbers point. There's also this element of when
you are experienced at the gym, when you're one of
these guys, you know, you can tell when somebody is
working hard, and they respect the working hard. I think
only jerks would really judge you based on how much
weight you're lifting relative to how much they can lift.
Obviously those people exist, but I found there are way
(20:28):
more people at the gym who just loved the gym
and wanted to share that, especially with somebody who they
could tell was motivated and excited about it in my
own sort of reserved way, but also uncomfortable. They wanted
to help me feel comfortable, and that was really a
nice experience to have.
Speaker 3 (20:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (20:46):
I absolutely loved the scenes in the book at Richie's
the gym in Brooklyn, where you found this camaraderie with
some older guys, you know, people you probably didn't encounter
as much in your everyday life.
Speaker 5 (20:57):
Yeah, it's so great, and I feel like while I
did have these people who I ultimately felt were friendly
to me and looking out for me, they would sort of,
you know, if I asked to use the squat rack next,
they would unload their weights and be so into it.
Really helpful because there's a cliche of guy who leaves
all his weights loaded on there, so you as somebody
(21:19):
who can't lift one forty five pound plate or like
trying to unload.
Speaker 3 (21:22):
All these plays yourself.
Speaker 5 (21:25):
But also what was important to me was that after
having gone there for a few years and having some
conversations with guys just sort of in passing where they're like,
you have you been coming here for a few years,
Like you look strong, You've changed, Like I can see
that you've made a lot of progress. And I had
the feeling at that point of one of the things
(21:46):
that I really needed as somebody who felt really sort
of hyper vigilant over people who are just waiting for
me to make a mistake and like Russian and make
me feel like I didn't know what I was doing.
Speaker 3 (21:58):
This gym was sort of.
Speaker 5 (21:59):
Correc to that in a very healing way where I
could sense at that point that there were people there
who did recognize that I was new, that I didn't
know that I was doing, but they trusted me to
have my own experience to find my way without needing
to be like either coddled or have a lot of
pressure on me, or that they needed to force me
(22:20):
to have things happen a certain way. They ultimately gave
me room to like do my own thing. And that's
what I needed, was some room to find my own
way and find my own relationship with this thing. And
that was just an incredible gift to that. I don't
even know if they were giving me or did it
on purpose, but that was how it happened.
Speaker 4 (22:38):
I want to ask one last thing, which is injury. Right,
People are fragile in some ways, people are fallible. What
are some things people can do if they're afraid of
getting hurt or injured? I mean, there's something a little
more daunting about picking up a heavy piece of metal
versus just hanging out on the StairMaster.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
For a while.
Speaker 5 (22:56):
I think the main thing that people don't know, and
what I didn't know about lifting when I started, is
that by design, the way that it is all structured
is that you are doing what is an appropriate challenge
for you where you are at right now. And as
we were just saying, that can go up and down
depending on did you take a long time off and
you're coming back, are you injured? If you've never done
(23:18):
it before, you start where you're comfortable and you build
up from there, and that pace can go as slow
as you want to. It can go pretty quickly if
you're interested in progress, which I got really invested in
that like feedback loop where I was like, I can't
wait to get stronger. I can't believe that in like
a couple of weeks I was able to add forty
(23:38):
pounds to my squat or whatever like that was so
interesting to me. But if what's interesting to you is
that you add, you know, five pounds a week or
five pounds a month, that's completely a fine way of
pursuing it. You are allowed to have your own pace
and your own relationship with it. We don't really say
that enough, I don't think. And you can make there's
(24:00):
a lot of low hanging fruit. It's almost like the
less strong you are coming in, the more you stand
to gain quickly. But yeah, I think fear of fear
of injuries. You know, we get injured doing all kinds
of things. I mean there's a sort of aphorism in
lifting that it goes along the lines of If you
think getting strong is dangerous, try being weak. Being weak
(24:23):
is dangerous. And by that they mean when you are
calcified from sitting all day and all of your muscles
are atrophied and you're not used to moving around, you
can get hurt just bending down to pick something up.
Like injury happens all around us. It's not reserved for
the gym. The gym can be very help Lifting weight specifically,
can be very helpful in preventing injury from all of
(24:46):
these little tasks that we have to do day in
and day out. And I think, I say in the book,
I had underestimated how very much physical labor it is
being an adult in the world, like carrying big boxes
of cat litter or dog food, like all these kinds
of things that we have to do, picking up laundry
from the floor. Even just a modest amount of strength training,
(25:10):
not just in the sense of building strength, but building
that physical capability of moving your body in the safest
possible way, can be so helpful for preventing injury in
all of these other aspects of life.
Speaker 4 (25:24):
Yeah, that forty pound bag of cat litter that you
wrote about, I that was.
Speaker 3 (25:28):
One of the things that I related to.
Speaker 4 (25:29):
Oh yeah, it really is motivating when you are trying
to haul that bag of litter back from the store,
or even just carrying it out of the closet down
the hall to the litter box. One of my many
million dollar ideas is a super lightweight cat litter for
older people or people with disabilities, because it just seems
crazy to me that we have like artificial intelligence and
(25:50):
we don't have hat litter.
Speaker 5 (25:51):
See, there is like a light a light cat litter.
I forget what brand it is. Yeah, but it's sort
of like aerated in some way that it is lighter,
but so much more expensive, which was my problem. I
wanted the economy box of regular litter. I was never
going to spend like ten dollars for fifteen pounds of
write this fancy litter. I could not do that. I
(26:11):
had to do the heavy stuff.
Speaker 4 (26:13):
So you had to go to the gym and get
super buffs so you could take care of your cats.
That you did it all for your cats. All right, Casey,
thank you so much for this conversation. Can you tell
folks where they can find you on the internet if
they'd like to learn more about your work and buy
your fantastic book.
Speaker 5 (26:29):
Sure, my book is available from all the booksellers you
can possibly think of. My newsletter is called She's a
Beast at She'sobeast dot Co. That is a nominally strength
themed newsletter, although it covers lots of health tech different
topics like that. I'm Casey Johnston on Blue Sky and
(26:49):
swoll Woman swol Woman on Instagram.
Speaker 4 (26:54):
Fantastic and we'll have links to all of that in
the show notes so everyone can keep up with you
and begin or continue their own strength training journey.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
Casey, thank you so much. I really really enjoyed this.
Speaker 5 (27:05):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (27:10):
Casey is so fascinating, even for someone like me who
hates going to the gym.
Speaker 2 (27:16):
I know, I know, I remember in college every time
you pretended you were going to work out and then
you played basketball instead, and you'd always say you were
going to start lifting on Monday, but it was never Monday,
and so so I don't think you ever had to.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
I know, but you hearing Casey talk actually, you know,
makes me inspired. So look on gym on Monday.
Speaker 2 (27:37):
Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
Well that does it for today's episode, A very big
thank you to Casey Johnston. You can find her new book,
a Physical Education at your local bookstores, library, or wherever
else you get books. And you can find us on
Instagram at parton Genius and right here in your podcast feeds,
so be sure to subscribe. We will be back next
week with the brand new episode and in the me
(28:00):
time from Will, Dylan, Gabe, Mary and myself, thank you
so much for listening. Part Time Genius is a production
of Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio. This show is hosted by Will
(28:23):
Pearson and Me Mongas Chatikler and research by our good
pal Mary Philip Sandy. Today's episode was engineered and produced
by the wonderful Dylan Fagan with support from Tyler Klang.
The show is executive produced for iHeart by Katrina Norvell
and Ali Perry, with social media support from Sasha Gay,
Trustee Dara Potts and Viney Shoory. For more podcasts from
(28:46):
Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
You're listening to Part Time Genius, the production of Kaleidoscope
and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
Guess what, Mango? What's that will? Are we going to
do a history lesson? I know you love going back
in time. We're going to nineteen sixty. We're talking about
John F. Kennedy. Now, this was just weeks before his inauguration.
He actually wrote an article for Sports Illustrated and the
headline was the soft American. Now. In this article, he
called physical vigor one of the country's most important resources,
(00:46):
and he actually lamented the decline of physical fitness among
all of America's youth.
Speaker 1 (00:51):
First of all, I didn't know he wrote for magazines
that I didn't previously say. But I mean, what was
this like a splashy way of introducing new health policy
or was he just trying to check in on how
many chin ups every kid could do?
Speaker 2 (01:04):
I mean it kind of was like he did talk
about plans to expand new physical education programs in schools,
which he later did, and that was through the President's
Council on Physical Fitness. I don't know if you remember
these tests. It was always the pull ups that just
killed me. I just I couldn't do it. And so
ultimately couldn't get whatever that ultimate star was when you
(01:25):
passed the test. But what JFK was really talking about
was the Cold War. He actually argued that in order
to take on the threat of communism, Americans needed to
get stronger.
Speaker 3 (01:36):
I love it.
Speaker 1 (01:36):
I did doing more push ups to save democracy.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
I mean, that's what they're there for. And it is
funny in retrospect to to look at all this, but
it's also interesting to see how things like politics and
cultural attitudes, even media and celebrities, these can all influence
the way we think about physical strength, and believe it
or not, that's been the case of the United States
for hundreds of years. So today on the show, Maria
(02:00):
is speaking with author Casey Johnston got a new book
called A Physical Education. Now it's this blend of science,
reporting and memoir, you know, the kind of thing we
love around here, and I can't wait to hear what
she has to say about the history of strength training
and how to get stronger and how getting stronger changed
her life. So let's die down.
Speaker 4 (02:41):
So Casey, thank you so much for coming on. We're
very excited to have you on part time genius. I've
been reading your work for a long time. I am
an amateur jym goer, I would say, And at the
end of this interview, I think I'd like to do
a little bit of pep talking to people who don't
know or feel like they don't know what to do
in a gym. But I want to get started at
(03:04):
the beginning. And I'm talking chronologically because one of the
most fascinating parts of your book to me was how
weightlifting and gyms became a thing.
Speaker 3 (03:13):
And I'd never even thought about this, but it actually.
Speaker 4 (03:16):
Came from some very specific fields of thought that had
a lot of political and religious context. So let's go
back to the nineteenth century. Tell me about the Turner movement.
Speaker 5 (03:26):
I mean, we can trace physical training in one form
another all the way back like humans have maybe always
done it, and a common starting point for our modern
training is like Greeks and Romans, you know. So it's
like it goes back. But the place that we can
situate the modern conception of a gym as a sort
(03:47):
of community center for exercise and physical fitness began with
the Turners, which were a sort of cultural group in
Germany in the early eighteen hundreds, started by one man
who ran a center. It's an outdoor plaza called it turnplots,
this turn terminology sort of referring broadly to gymnastics, but
(04:08):
they also use dumbells and weights to train with. And
some of the Turners immigrated to the United States and
they brought that with them. They started what were called
Turner halls or turnbarne and they pursued physical fitness, not
as like this sort of competitive elitist thing, but they
saw it as a public health contribution to sort of
(04:31):
help raise the floor of physical capability for their community.
They didn't like the sort of American conception of competition.
This was about this. It had a much more socialist approach.
Speaker 4 (04:43):
But of course here in the United States, we don't
like socialism, but we do like Protestant work ethic. So
then it seems like once the Turners came here there
was this other kind of field of thought about why
working out and gaining strength was act actually sort of
in line with Christian values, right, So how did that
(05:05):
get involved?
Speaker 5 (05:06):
There was the YMCA associations. Young Men's Christian Association was
a concept that existed relatively early in the eighteen hundreds.
It did not initially have a gym component at all.
It was just sort of a gathering place for young
Christian men and they saw what the turners were doing
and were like, we want that. We literally want this
(05:28):
concept of like a physical training center because there was
this growing assertion that Christians were not physically robust enough,
especially the men, so they wanted to buff them up
quote unquote in service to God. I mean, this all
becomes like a way of keeping them focused on their
physical perfectibility, keeping them at work in service of God.
(05:51):
So they were like, this is a type of pressure
we can put on them to be physically fit. So
that became the muscular Christianity movement, and.
Speaker 4 (05:59):
That's an actual term. That was an actual term, was
muscular Christianity.
Speaker 5 (06:03):
Yeah, it doesn't have it's I mean, there's not a
lot of really formal study about a lot of this stuff,
but it's like a it's conceptually doesn't have a strong
beginning or end or like a very particular leader. But
it became a sort of dovetail of these two cultures
and that sort of snowballed into Eventually we had physical
(06:24):
fitness tests and exams for military organizations, then paramilitary organizations,
fascists adopted these physical training programs that made them really
fall out of favor among socialists and that crowd, or
it became distasteful, sort of in the way it is
now where people maybe assume a conservatism or a fixation
(06:47):
on aesthetics if you participate in this thing. In a
similar way, they kind of assumed you were a fascist
of you if you trained physically in this way back
during the World Wars, because the Italian Army was doing it,
the German Army was doing it. I've started to say
these things are these are tools, neutral tools, but they
develop these associations based on who's using them and how
(07:09):
they're using them.
Speaker 4 (07:10):
So when you step into a gym and pick up
a barbelle, you're actually engaging with this incredible history and
social political context that I think most people just don't
even think about.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
We take it for granted.
Speaker 4 (07:23):
But I guess my other question is, you know, there's
this idea of bodybuilding. We think about someone like Arnold Schwarzenegger,
who became such a cultural icon.
Speaker 3 (07:32):
Where did bodybuilding come from?
Speaker 5 (07:33):
Yeah, I mean an interesting thing is that bodybuilding the
YMCA sort of coined that term. They brought that into
the picture of physical training. But there's like a more
modern route of bodybuilding as like a pure esthetic pursuit.
The aesthetic version is the seventies. There are bodybuilders in
the fifties who are maybe a little bit more oriented
around these like feats of gymnastic might, throwing each other
(07:56):
in the air, tumbling and stuff. But they also had
a particular esthetic that was documented in magazines, and then
eventually it became more about just the look of these people.
I think that it's sort of ebbed and flowed over
the years. But if you go to a certain very
intense corner of TikTok, there are people who are intensely
pursuing bodybuilding.
Speaker 4 (08:18):
Of course, of course, but it's so interesting to think
that over the years people have gone into this for
all of these different reasons and with all of these
different goals, whether it's esthetic or military. And yet here
we are trying to figure out, well, should I pick
up those dumbbells or not? And we'll talk more about that,
but first we have to take a quick break. We'll
be back with Casey Johnston in just a moment. Welcome
(08:57):
back to Part Time Genius. We're talking with Casey Johnston,
author of a physical education and.
Speaker 3 (09:02):
I want to talk a little bit, Casey.
Speaker 4 (09:04):
You did such a great job in the book of
breaking down some of the myths around the science of
weight training and muscle, and a lot of this is
stuff that I have seen perpetuated in the media for
years and years and years. Especially as a female bodied person,
we are fed all of this. One of the main
myths that you broke down is that women cannot build
(09:27):
muscle in the same way as men and therefore should
maybe not exercise in the same way. And that's not
actually true, So tell us about that, right.
Speaker 5 (09:37):
The sort of pseudoscience around this that I believed that
was circulated and popular magazines and media was that women
have more of this type of muscle fibers Type one
they're called, that are quote unquote more suited to cardioactivity.
They're long and lean, and so women should focus on
(09:58):
that stuff, whereas men have more type two fibers, which
are used for more powerful, strength oriented movements. So men
should focus on lifting weights and never the twain shall meet.
In actual fact, it's not anywhere near as divided as
what I just said would make you think. On average,
women have I believe the number was seven to twelve
(10:21):
percent more type one muscle fibers than men by proportion,
So that's like a very small difference. I think I
compared it to a jar of jelly beans in the book,
where it's like, if you have one hundred jelly beans
and I have one hundred and seven jelly beans, I
have seven percent more jelly beans than you, But like
our two jars of jelly beans are probably virtually identical.
That is not anywhere near enough of a difference to
(10:44):
suggest that these two groups should train completely differently. And
then there's lots of science around the fact that women
who train the same as men might not gain as
much muscle in the absolute, but they will gain twenty
five percent just as men gain twenty five percent. So
they are not maybe ending up as big as men are,
(11:04):
but it's because their bodies are smaller. They might be
starting with smaller muscles. But that doesn't mean that they
shouldn't train for strength just because they can't end up
as strong as a man. Just because a man can
lift six hundred pounds and a woman can lift four
hundred pounds at their absolute top of their ability, that
doesn't mean that it's meaningless by any stretch. For a
woman to learn to lift that weight. Because we still
(11:26):
get the same type of growth and building those relationship
with our bodies, building up her neurological responses to the stimulus,
we get all of the same type of great results.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
So to speak out of it.
Speaker 4 (11:39):
Tell me a little bit more about this. You mentioned
it just now briefly the neurological benefits as well. And
I think this is again something that I have never
really thought about. When I go to the gym, I'm
dragging my muscles and my bones around and then I
haul them out again. But my brain is actually doing
something too. What is it doing?
Speaker 3 (11:56):
Why is it good for me? Yeah?
Speaker 5 (11:58):
I think that we have really underestimated the potential for this.
In all kinds of exercise, we sort of think almost
as one directional, where it's like your brain sends a
signal to your muscles, and your muscles do what your
brain says, but there is a response. There's sort of
a back and forth between your body and your muscles.
You're not just training this physical might of your muscles,
(12:19):
You're training them neurologically to work together. There's more communication
happening between your brain and your body in ways that
we don't even fully understand yet. We're so focused on
maintaining our brain function in the last maybe like twenty
years or so with pseudoku, crosswords, all of these things.
But it's like the stimulus of working out has a
(12:42):
similar effect. Your brain is getting used, your neurological system
is getting used when you exercise, and it's like a
contrasting kind of stimulus too to like the pure brain
activity of say doing a Pseudoka puzzle.
Speaker 4 (12:54):
That's really fascinating. I did also learn from your book
recovery is important. Why shouldn't we just push to the max.
Why shouldn't we be lifting as much as we can
every single day?
Speaker 5 (13:04):
This is something I was completely unaware of going into lifting,
And when I was exercising for so long as a
runner and my focus was entirely on doing as much
exercise as I could, my understanding at that time was
if I then ate too much food, I had just
spent all this time running, burning all these calories, and
(13:24):
it would be quote unquote wasting that workout in order
to go then eat food. In learning about lifting, I
learned it's sort of the opposite, is true, And especially
in lifting, your muscles are actually built when you're resting,
when you work out, you're doing all of this. We
referred to it as muscle damage. You're shredding up the
fibers in your muscles, so to speak. And then when
(13:46):
you are not lifting, when you give yourself time to
rest and you give yourself food, especially protein, but also
you need carbs and fats, your body is repairing those
muscles to be a little bit stronger than they were before.
It's re fueling you and sort of restocking your muscles
with energy, and that's what allows you to lift a
(14:07):
little more weight the next time. And that's how you
create progress. That's how you build muscle and especially build
it back if you've lost it from say, dieting too
much or too little activity for too long, that sort
of thing.
Speaker 4 (14:19):
It makes so much sense when you say it right
the science. It's very logical, but it's also kind of
radical when you think about the messaging that especially women
and girls are given. It's kind of a way to
change how you see all of that and to question
some of that messaging.
Speaker 3 (14:35):
Right.
Speaker 5 (14:35):
I hadn't been aware when I was a runner how
destructive that cycle was of like exercising and then not
eating and trying to rest as little as possible. Those
are all things that are all fighting each other in
that circle where it's like the less you eat, the
less prepared you are to work out, the more you
work out, the less you're resting, the worse you're going
(14:56):
to work out. And then I'm left trying to fight
even more to try and keep doing what I think
I'm supposed to be doing. In lifting, all of those
things are oriented in a constructive cycle where the more
you eat the better, the more way you can lift,
the harder you can train. For me, with an adequate
dose of training, I sleep better, for instance, and all
(15:20):
of those things sort of feed off of each other
and become a virtuous cycle. I think in the book
I called it a reward reward reward, sort of like
there's no punishment reward system. It felt like it was
just all good stuff going in a circle.
Speaker 4 (15:34):
I was so compelled by your personal story that unfolded
through this book. There was so much that I could
relate to. I think there's a lot that a lot
of people can relate to, And one of the things
that I found most relatable was simply stepping into a
gym and feeling.
Speaker 3 (15:46):
A little bit out of place and overwhelmed.
Speaker 4 (15:49):
I like that you actually let us go along with
you as you made a fool of yourself frankly a
few times, and had to learn the how to use
equipment and how to interact with people. You struggled, you
had a hard time. I think a lot of people do.
What do you say to someone who wants to try lifting,
wants to start going to the gym, but maybe feel
(16:09):
self conscious or anxious about it.
Speaker 5 (16:12):
We're sort of encouraged to think of as, oh, it's simple,
like you just start going to the gym, But the
gym for somebody who is not great at dealing with
new environments or hasn't been sort of socialized in a
gym crowd in their whole life, it's a foreign environment
which takes some time getting used to. A lot of
times I find myself saying to people that when you
(16:33):
started a new job or a new school, or we've
had those experiences where it's not necessarily comfortable right away.
You don't know anybody and you're like, where is everything?
I don't know. You have to kind of allow yourself
to situate it in your mind like that, I think,
and give yourself time, and I like to say separate
the task of accomplishing a workout from getting used to
(16:56):
a new place. You are allowed to get your feet
wet first and just familiarize yourself. One of the pieces
of advice I give people is to give yourself a
session or two or as many as you want where
you just sort of go to the gym and post
up on a low stakes cardio machine where you can
see the rest of the gym and just sort of
observe see how people use the equipment, how do they
(17:18):
ask each other for things, where do they stand when
they do X, Y Z. That's not going to be
the total cure all, but it's good to let yourself
get familiar with, like where's the locker room? How do
you check in and feel like you know it a
little before you're trying to jump in and also complete
a workout.
Speaker 3 (17:34):
You're allowed to take it a little.
Speaker 5 (17:35):
Slowly, And we don't really think of it that way,
but I encourage thinking of it that way a little
bit more.
Speaker 4 (17:40):
Yeah, I love that you don't have to do everything
at once. That is really wonderful advice. Well, we have
to take one more quick break, but we have so
much more to talk about with Casey Johnston Don't Go Anywhere.
(18:05):
Welcome back to Part time Genius Now, Casey. Before the break,
we were talking about how people can kind of ease
their way into lifting, ease their way into going to
a gym because new environments can be intimidating. I think
the other thing that a lot of people hesitate about
is this fear of being judged or not being perceived
as worthy of being there.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
And it's funny.
Speaker 4 (18:25):
I was at the gym last month and I was
standing there doing dumbell curls using fifteen pound dumbbells, which
for me was a lot.
Speaker 3 (18:32):
I was struggling.
Speaker 4 (18:34):
I got to like four reps and I could not
keep going, and I looked to my left and there
is a guy easily twice my size, super ripped. He's
got these like, I think, forty forty five pound dumbells
and he is just flipping them up and down like
their toothpicks while carrying on a conversation with someone next
to him. And I'm practically on the floor after doing
my four reps with the fifteens, and in that moment,
(18:56):
I felt so scrawny and weak and discouraged, and it
was while reading your book that it kind of hit me.
First of all, I was actually working hard that guy
was not. He was not pushing himself. I was pushing
myself to the breaking point. So who's tough now. But
also it's this idea that everybody is on their own
(19:17):
pathway you should not expect someone else's results.
Speaker 3 (19:20):
Is that sort of what you found in your own
journey through all.
Speaker 5 (19:23):
Of this, yeah, one hundred percent. I mean you have
to keep in mind that often who you're seeing at
the gym are people who love going to the gym
and go all of the time. You only live in
that sort of beginner phase where you feel like you
don't know what you're doing and you feel like you
stick out like a sore thumb. Like that doesn't last
very long. Eventually you're going to be one of those
people where it's like your second living room. So that's
(19:44):
important to keep in mind. But there is also this
element of we're all working on what we need to
work on. I mean, even as somebody who has a
lot of experience, if you're going back after a long
time or you're rehabbing an injury, the ways you use
are going to be different than what you are capable
of at your strongest. This is true of everybody, so
(20:06):
it's very important to not compare yourself on just a
sort of numbers point. There's also this element of when
you are experienced at the gym, when you're one of
these guys, you know, you can tell when somebody is
working hard, and they respect the working hard. I think
only jerks would really judge you based on how much
weight you're lifting relative to how much they can lift.
Obviously those people exist, but I found there are way
(20:28):
more people at the gym who just loved the gym
and wanted to share that, especially with somebody who they
could tell was motivated and excited about it in my
own sort of reserved way, but also uncomfortable. They wanted
to help me feel comfortable, and that was really a
nice experience to have.
Speaker 3 (20:46):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (20:46):
I absolutely loved the scenes in the book at Richie's
the gym in Brooklyn, where you found this camaraderie with
some older guys, you know, people you probably didn't encounter
as much in your everyday life.
Speaker 5 (20:57):
Yeah, it's so great, and I feel like while I
did have these people who I ultimately felt were friendly
to me and looking out for me, they would sort of,
you know, if I asked to use the squat rack next,
they would unload their weights and be so into it.
Really helpful because there's a cliche of guy who leaves
all his weights loaded on there, so you as somebody
(21:19):
who can't lift one forty five pound plate or like
trying to unload.
Speaker 3 (21:22):
All these plays yourself.
Speaker 5 (21:25):
But also what was important to me was that after
having gone there for a few years and having some
conversations with guys just sort of in passing where they're like,
you have you been coming here for a few years,
Like you look strong, You've changed, Like I can see
that you've made a lot of progress. And I had
the feeling at that point of one of the things
(21:46):
that I really needed as somebody who felt really sort
of hyper vigilant over people who are just waiting for
me to make a mistake and like Russian and make
me feel like I didn't know what I was doing.
Speaker 3 (21:58):
This gym was sort of.
Speaker 5 (21:59):
Correc to that in a very healing way where I
could sense at that point that there were people there
who did recognize that I was new, that I didn't
know that I was doing, but they trusted me to
have my own experience to find my way without needing
to be like either coddled or have a lot of
pressure on me, or that they needed to force me
(22:20):
to have things happen a certain way. They ultimately gave
me room to like do my own thing. And that's
what I needed, was some room to find my own
way and find my own relationship with this thing. And
that was just an incredible gift to that. I don't
even know if they were giving me or did it
on purpose, but that was how it happened.
Speaker 4 (22:38):
I want to ask one last thing, which is injury. Right,
People are fragile in some ways, people are fallible. What
are some things people can do if they're afraid of
getting hurt or injured? I mean, there's something a little
more daunting about picking up a heavy piece of metal
versus just hanging out on the StairMaster.
Speaker 3 (22:55):
For a while.
Speaker 5 (22:56):
I think the main thing that people don't know, and
what I didn't know about lifting when I started, is
that by design, the way that it is all structured
is that you are doing what is an appropriate challenge
for you where you are at right now. And as
we were just saying, that can go up and down
depending on did you take a long time off and
you're coming back, are you injured? If you've never done
(23:18):
it before, you start where you're comfortable and you build
up from there, and that pace can go as slow
as you want to. It can go pretty quickly if
you're interested in progress, which I got really invested in
that like feedback loop where I was like, I can't
wait to get stronger. I can't believe that in like
a couple of weeks I was able to add forty
(23:38):
pounds to my squat or whatever like that was so
interesting to me. But if what's interesting to you is
that you add, you know, five pounds a week or
five pounds a month, that's completely a fine way of
pursuing it. You are allowed to have your own pace
and your own relationship with it. We don't really say
that enough, I don't think. And you can make there's
(24:00):
a lot of low hanging fruit. It's almost like the
less strong you are coming in, the more you stand
to gain quickly. But yeah, I think fear of fear
of injuries. You know, we get injured doing all kinds
of things. I mean there's a sort of aphorism in
lifting that it goes along the lines of If you
think getting strong is dangerous, try being weak. Being weak
(24:23):
is dangerous. And by that they mean when you are
calcified from sitting all day and all of your muscles
are atrophied and you're not used to moving around, you
can get hurt just bending down to pick something up.
Like injury happens all around us. It's not reserved for
the gym. The gym can be very help Lifting weight specifically,
can be very helpful in preventing injury from all of
(24:46):
these little tasks that we have to do day in
and day out. And I think, I say in the book,
I had underestimated how very much physical labor it is
being an adult in the world, like carrying big boxes
of cat litter or dog food, like all these kinds
of things that we have to do, picking up laundry
from the floor. Even just a modest amount of strength training,
(25:10):
not just in the sense of building strength, but building
that physical capability of moving your body in the safest
possible way, can be so helpful for preventing injury in
all of these other aspects of life.
Speaker 4 (25:24):
Yeah, that forty pound bag of cat litter that you
wrote about, I that was.
Speaker 3 (25:28):
One of the things that I related to.
Speaker 4 (25:29):
Oh yeah, it really is motivating when you are trying
to haul that bag of litter back from the store,
or even just carrying it out of the closet down
the hall to the litter box. One of my many
million dollar ideas is a super lightweight cat litter for
older people or people with disabilities, because it just seems
crazy to me that we have like artificial intelligence and
(25:50):
we don't have hat litter.
Speaker 5 (25:51):
See, there is like a light a light cat litter.
I forget what brand it is. Yeah, but it's sort
of like aerated in some way that it is lighter,
but so much more expensive, which was my problem. I
wanted the economy box of regular litter. I was never
going to spend like ten dollars for fifteen pounds of
write this fancy litter. I could not do that. I
(26:11):
had to do the heavy stuff.
Speaker 4 (26:13):
So you had to go to the gym and get
super buffs so you could take care of your cats.
That you did it all for your cats. All right, Casey,
thank you so much for this conversation. Can you tell
folks where they can find you on the internet if
they'd like to learn more about your work and buy
your fantastic book.
Speaker 5 (26:29):
Sure, my book is available from all the booksellers you
can possibly think of. My newsletter is called She's a
Beast at She'sobeast dot Co. That is a nominally strength
themed newsletter, although it covers lots of health tech different
topics like that. I'm Casey Johnston on Blue Sky and
(26:49):
swoll Woman swol Woman on Instagram.
Speaker 4 (26:54):
Fantastic and we'll have links to all of that in
the show notes so everyone can keep up with you
and begin or continue their own strength training journey.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
Casey, thank you so much. I really really enjoyed this.
Speaker 5 (27:05):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (27:10):
Casey is so fascinating, even for someone like me who
hates going to the gym.
Speaker 2 (27:16):
I know, I know, I remember in college every time
you pretended you were going to work out and then
you played basketball instead, and you'd always say you were
going to start lifting on Monday, but it was never Monday,
and so so I don't think you ever had to.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
I know, but you hearing Casey talk actually, you know,
makes me inspired. So look on gym on Monday.
Speaker 2 (27:37):
Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1 (27:39):
Well that does it for today's episode, A very big
thank you to Casey Johnston. You can find her new book,
a Physical Education at your local bookstores, library, or wherever
else you get books. And you can find us on
Instagram at parton Genius and right here in your podcast feeds,
so be sure to subscribe. We will be back next
week with the brand new episode and in the me
(28:00):
time from Will, Dylan, Gabe, Mary and myself, thank you
so much for listening. Part Time Genius is a production
of Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio. This show is hosted by Will
(28:23):
Pearson and Me Mongas Chatikler and research by our good
pal Mary Philip Sandy. Today's episode was engineered and produced
by the wonderful Dylan Fagan with support from Tyler Klang.
The show is executive produced for iHeart by Katrina Norvell
and Ali Perry, with social media support from Sasha Gay,
Trustee Dara Potts and Viney Shoory. For more podcasts from
(28:46):
Kaleidoscope and iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Part-Time Genius News
Hosts And Creators
Will Pearson
Mangesh Hattikudur
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