Embodiment vs. Simulation: Fitness in the Age of AI

📖 Episode Summary
In an age of artificial intelligence, digital simulation, and disembodied experiences, it’s easy to lose touch with what makes us truly human. We outsource more than ever—our thinking, our remembering, even our relationships.

But there is one practice that cannot be simulated: fitness. In this episode of the Faithful Fitness Podcast, Coach Alex VanHouten explores why exercise isn’t just about health metrics or biblical stewardship of your own body.

Fitness is an act of resistance against disembodiment. It is a bastion of reality, a practice that anchors you to your own flesh, reminds you of God’s design, and connects you with others in ways no algorithm can replicate. If you’ve ever wondered how faith, fitness, and the future collide, this is the conversation you don’t want to miss. 

🗝 Main Discussion Themes
-The cultural drift toward disembodiment in the “Age of AI”
-Why fitness is one of the last unmediated human experiences
-Exercise as a practice of resistance and remembrance of being alive
-How shared physical exertion strengthens connection and community
-The incarnational truth: God became flesh, and our embodiment matters

⏱ Timestamped Outline 
0:00 — Intro: The Most Counter-Cultural Thing You Can Do
1:45 — Reason 1: We Live in Disembodied Times 3:00 — Reason 2: Fitness Is Resistance Against Cultural Drift
4:10 — Reason 3: Fitness Is Always Real
5:25 — Reason 4: The Body Is Wired for Adaptation and Connection
7:10 — Reason 5: Stewardship – Your Body as a Temple
8:55 — Reason 6: Fitness Prepares You for the Future
9:55 — Reason 7: It’s Really Not That Hard
11:00 — Closing Encouragement: Don’t Outsource Your Humanity
12:15 — Outro: Train Hard, Pray Harder

🏃 Move Forward Today 
-Move Your Body: Do something physical today that reminds you you’re alive.
-Train With Others: Invite someone to walk, lift, or sweat with you.
-Reflect Spiritually: Thank God for the gift of your body — “fearfully and wonderfully made.”

🌐 Featured Resources
-Faithful Fitness Devotional (40-Day Guide): https://faithfulfitnessdevo.com
-Faith And Fitness Foundations: https://betterdaily.live/beginner

Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/faithful-fitness-by-better-daily--5150768/support.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to the Faithful Fitness Podcast. For my Dad, Coach
Alex Van Houghten helps you get stronger in mind, body,
and spirit. He believes that your body is a temple,
so taking good care of it is an actual worship.
I should know. I live with him. Every week. He
brings truth from the Bible, tool from science, and stories
that will set your heart on fire. May God bless

(00:23):
you to become everything He made you to be, just
one percent better every single day.

Speaker 2 (00:30):
What if I told you that, in the age of
artificial intelligence, disembodied experiences, and endless simulations, that one of
the most countercultural things you could do is sweat, breathe hard,
and lift heavy. Hey there, and welcome to the Faithful
Fitness Podcast. My name is Coach Alex Van Houghten, and
my mission is to help you make the most out

(00:51):
of the body God's given you. And right now, in
our age of technological advances and unprecedented things like artificial intelligence,
fitness is not just about health anymore. Fitness is about
remembering that you are alive, embodied, and created in the
image of God. In this episode, we're going to talk
about the seven reasons why fitness matters In an age

(01:12):
of simulation, and by the end of this episode, I
hope you'll double down on your faithful fitness journey with
myself and our community at Faithful Fitness. Before we dive in,
I'm going to invite you to go to faithfulfitnessdevo dot
com and pick up your copy of the Faithful Fitness
Devotional for support in your fitness journey with regard to
your faith. So let's get into these seven reasons. First,

(01:34):
from a cultural perspective, we are living in disembodied times.
What do I mean by that, Well, we're surrounded by
substitutes for lived experiences. Think about it. How many friends
do you have on Facebook or how many followers do
you have on social media. We live in a world
where we can have a conversation with a computer. We

(01:56):
can have virtual friendships and have algorithms fee us unlimited
visual feeds might be how you found this podcast actually,
and in that virtual space, our culture is losing the
experience of being embodied. John Chapter one, verse fourteen says,
and the word became flesh and dwelt among us. And

(02:18):
your fitness practice teaches you that you do have a body,
that it's real and good in part of your lived
experience every day, and that brings us to number two.
Fitness is so important to this age of simulation because
it's resistance against cultural drift. When I say resistance, I'm
not just talking about the weights. I'm talking about the
way culture will pull you unless you make a stand

(02:42):
and fight for what matters in your life. And fitness
disciplines like fasting, weight training, and cardiovascular exercise embody that
resistance to fight for the things that matter. The apostle
Paul says in One Corinthians nine twenty seven, I discipline
my body. I keep it under control. After preaching to others,
I myself am disqualified. Paul saw that training his body

(03:05):
was integral to discipleship. Your fitness practice resists disembodiment. It
says to you and the whole world, I'm more than
just a brain in a jar, scrolling endlessly on a screen.
The third reason fitness matters in an age of simulation
is that fitness practice is always real. Have you been
on social media lately? Almost everything you read, almost everything

(03:28):
you watch, you have to ask the question, is this real?
Or did somebody generate this with an AI prompt? Well,
guess what it turns out you can't fake running a mile.
You can't fake a push up or deadlifts. Those are real,
no questions asked in this age of disembodiment. Fitness teaches
us cause and effect. That's truth without shortcuts, reality, unmediated,

(03:52):
and unquestionable. I've always said to my clients things get
really real when you're running up a hill and there's
no way out but to keep going. Galatians six seven
teaches us do not be deceived. God is not mocked
whatsoever a man sows, so shall he also reap. Your
fitness practice embodies that. So in reap quality of the

(04:16):
world that God made. It turns out that the way
He made things work produces growth, but neglect produces weakness,
Which brings me to another truth of the way God
made our bodies, and that's number four. We are wired
for connection and adaptation through the body. When you undergo exercise,
you create an adaptive stressor in the body that sends

(04:37):
a message, not an AI chat, but a real chemical
message that teaches your body how to come back stronger,
more endurable, better at using fat as a fuel source,
more resilient, more vivacious. And those actual signals are mitigated
by the body. There's no way you can think your
way into those adaptations. Similarly, when we pursue our fitness

(04:58):
experience with other individuals, there's a whole cascade of mind
body processes that help us to feel connected as well,
things like an increase of oxytocin when you get to
walk side by side with your walking partner, or the
activation of mirror neurons when somebody you're working out with
does a move you don't quite know and you have

(05:19):
to learn it by watching. Turns out, mirror neurons don't
activate when you're looking at a screen in the same
way that when you're looking at a person who's really
there with you. And if you have to do something
difficult with another person like run a five k or
complete an obstacle course race, or ride a bike for
a really long way, that shared experience forges a connection

(05:40):
because of the embodied nature of the activity that can't
be replicated online. First, Thessalonians five eleven says, therefore, let
us encourage one another and build one another up. Training
not only builds your muscles and the strength of your heart,
but in community, it reminds us that we were created
for embodied encouragement. The fifth reason why fitness is so

(06:02):
important in this disembodied age is the biblical responsibility of stewardship.
Stewardship is a very powerful idea echoed throughout scripture, and
the idea is this that God gives us things and
he expects us to take responsibility for those things and
to take good care of them. God gave me this body.
God gave me my body, and he gave you yours.

(06:24):
And even in this age of simulation, we have a
responsibility to care for our bodies. Well, that's stewardship. But
because I have a body and you have a body,
we also have a bigger responsibility, and that is to
steward embodiment. Well, this embodiment is a privilege and a gift,
as lived out by Jesus who took on flesh himself.

(06:47):
I don't know how many robot movies you've seen, but
it's a recurring theme that being embodied is a privilege.
And even the most super intelligent artificial intelligences look at
the human body and go wow, it'd be really cool
not to just simulate feelings, but to feel them. And
we have that gift and responsibility, right, now so, in
this age of simulation, our fitness practice is so important

(07:11):
for stewarding our own body and stewarding this privilege of embodiment.
We've been given a gift. Let's make the most of it.
One Corinthians sixteen nine through twenty says this, do you
not know that your body is a temple of the
Holy Spirit. You are not your own. You were bought
with a price. Therefore, honor God with your body. It

(07:34):
turns out that embodiment is not optional in faith. It's
central to your discipleship and God's presence in you. Okay, coach,
I'm almost convinced. Awesome, but I'm not done with you yet.
Reason number six has us looking at the future. With
technology going the way it's going, Imagine with me how
things could turn out. What happens to a civilization that's

(07:54):
not comfortable in its own skin, that's so plugged into
simulations that there's no wind on the face, no rain
on your hands. You forget what it's like to push
yourself to feel alive in the realist sense and to
be healthy in your own body. Our fitness practice might
truly be the last bastion of unmediated reality. Preparing us

(08:17):
to stay human in an age that's rapidly advancing in
simulations and virtual reality. I'm not saying it's all terrible.
I believe a lot of great things can come out
of it as long as we stay connected to our
own bodies. In One Timothy four seven and eight, it says,
this train yourself to be godly. Physical training is of

(08:39):
some value, but Godliness has value for all things, holding
promises for the present life and the life to come.
Paul acknowledges that physical training is valuable, not ultimate, but
essential for our present resilience and eternal orientation. Your fitness
will help you keep your humanity in a future where

(09:00):
it's questionable whether or not that'll be easy to do.
And the seventh reason that your fitness practice matters so
much in an age of simulation is that it's just
not that hard. We as people and we as humanity
have a lot of difficult decisions to make in the
future as technology ramps up so quickly and so many
changes are on the horizon. But when it comes to

(09:21):
your fitness journey, that's an easy choice. Is it better
to be embodied, connected, healthy, and human? Regardless of what
choices we make in the future. The answer is yes.
And while I know there's a lot of fitness information
in the world that makes fitness sound very complicated, it's
really not. In fact, if you're not already practicing your
fitness two hours a week, you can make a huge

(09:43):
difference with the proper exercise, nutrition, and mindset understanding. If
you don't currently have those, I invite you to check
out our Faith and Fitness Foundation series the links in
the show notes. There's never been a better time to
prioritize your fitness journey than right now, and with our
work here at Faithful Fitness, you don't have to pursue

(10:03):
it with vanity. Faith and fitness are powerfully connected, and
we'll show you how. Regardless, though, don't outsource your humanity.
Make sure you take one step every day to remind
yourself that your body's real and that's worth taking care of. Lift, walk, stretch, run, play,
and better yet, invite somebody to be a part of

(10:24):
those things with you, because in an age of simulations,
your body, like it or not, is one of the
last bastions of truth and reality. Steward it, honor God
with it, and let it tether you to the truth
that you are fearfully and wonderfully made. Psalms one, p.
Thirty nine fourteen says this, I praise you because I

(10:45):
am fearfully and wonderfully made. Your works are wonderful, and
I know that full will. In the Old Testament, in
the Book of Joshua, one of the original spies named
Caleb comes back to Joshua in his later years in life.
In their conversation, he reaches down and picks up his
sword and says, here, in my old age, I still

(11:05):
have the same strength in my hand that I had
in our youth when we took this land hashtag goals right.
And it's in that same spirit that I hope after
this show you'll double down on your fitness journey in
this age of simulation. My commitment to you as your
coach is that no matter how fake things get, and
no matter how technologically advanced things get, I'm committed to

(11:28):
stewarding my body well and keeping my humanity. This has
been coach Alex van Houten on The Faithful Fitness Podcast.
Until next time, guys, train hard, but pray harder.

Speaker 1 (11:41):
Hey, if this episode helped you, jare it with someone
who needs to hear it and don't forget to subscribe
and move us a raving review so more people can
find faithful fitness. Oh and my dad's new devotional is
almost out now. You can grab a copy for you
and then join our free community at Better Daily by

(12:04):
clicking on the links in the show notes below. We
all have a cross to carry, but it's lighter when
we do it together, so check out both links and
the show notes. Don't be a big well bob, just
do it until next time. Don't forget. Train hard and
pray even harder.