{"id":86684,"date":"2025-08-16T07:23:11","date_gmt":"2025-08-16T07:23:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/86684\/"},"modified":"2025-08-16T07:23:11","modified_gmt":"2025-08-16T07:23:11","slug":"scared-to-start-strength-training-i-was-too","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/86684\/","title":{"rendered":"Scared to Start Strength Training? I Was Too"},"content":{"rendered":"

I had arrived late and was scrambling. Where were the weights, and how many did I need? Was I feeling confident enough to grab the 10-pounders or should I risk silent ridicule from my fellow Body Sculpt<\/a> attendees and retrieve a 4-pound set? \u201cThat\u2019s my spot,\u201d another student\u2014short, impressive muscles\u2014snapped. It was my first class, and I needed help. After more than three decades, I wanted my body to do something new<\/a> and hard, but my anxious mind was not cooperating.<\/p>\n

I had started to see it everywhere, the message that women need to be stronger. In May, the writer Casey Johnston released a memoir called A Physical Education<\/a>, about trading constant diets for weight lifting and discovering herself in the process, a real-life counterpart to Miranda July\u2019s fictional narrator in All Fours<\/a>, whose journey of self-actualization includes extramarital affairs and kettlebells. This summer, longtime Wall Street Journal reporter turned professional bodybuilder Anne Marie Chaker<\/a> published Lift: How Women Can Reclaim Their Physical Power and Transform Their Lives, chronicling how a weight training habit pulled her out of a punishing rut. \u201cPsychologists who study sports behavior,\u201d she writes, \u201csay that the intensity of lifting weights actually fuels a rewiring of the brain\u201d\u2014apparently, my mind was going to reap the benefits as well. (Working out with weights has been linked to an improved nervous system in one study and a slowdown in cognitive decline in another.)<\/p>\n

Widely different parts of the cultural conversation\u2014from chatter on the morning shows to techy brain-science podcasts\u2014are homing in on the benefits. I saw one amusing video where a male bystander\u2019s smirk turned to bewilderment as a woman picked up dumbbells and started shadowboxing. There are legions of viral videos of this variety. Almost three quarters of adults are trying to eat more protein<\/a>\u2014many seemingly upping their egg consumption in order to build muscle. Khlo\u00e9 Kardashian just released protein-dusted popcorn. (Protein supports muscle repair and growth after workouts.)<\/p>\n

And yet, like every other millennial woman whose preferred mode of exercise is Pilates and a walk through the park, I had only just begun to wonder about those intimidating objects\u2014hand weights, dumbbells, barbells, all the bells\u2014in the corners of the rooms where my low-impact exercise classes took place. I had long thought weight training had nothing to do with me\u2014my goal was to become lean and flexible, not muscular and strong. And for years I had been a runner, a pastime that only felt good after I had finished, filled with endorphins and superiority. But not long ago, I gave it up, facing an awareness of my body\u2019s weak spots. Perhaps I did need to face the bells. New York is my home<\/a>, but I began training in London, where I was temporarily living\u2014it seemed I didn\u2019t have a moment to lose.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I had arrived late and was scrambling. Where were the weights, and how many did I need? Was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":86685,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[62],"tags":[59745,337,97,1766,11105,25254,673],"class_list":["post-86684","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fitness","tag-affiliate-disclaimer-disable","tag-fitness","tag-health","tag-magazine","tag-splitscreenimagerightinset","tag-storytypenews-trending","tag-wellness"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86684","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=86684"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/86684\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/86685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=86684"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=86684"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=86684"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}