The Benefits of Holistic Weight Training: Focusing on the Body as a Whole

04 November, 2021

Holistic strength training is a holistic approach to weight training. It focuses on the interconnectedness of each muscle group and how they all work together to create movement or stability in your body. This type of holistic thinking can be applied to many aspects of life, not just fitness. In this blog post, we will explore holistic strength training benefits as well as misconceptions about holistic strength training and debunk those myths!

In holistic exercise, the focus is not on isolating a specific muscle or body part. Instead, holistic strength training focuses on strengthening all of the muscles in your body together to create balance and stability. This technique has been gaining popularity over recent years for many good reasons. One of these benefits is that holistic weight training can help you overcome disconnects between different muscles in your body. These disconnects happen when one group of muscles becomes stronger than another group and they don't work together properly anymore.

For example, a chest machine at the gym, such as the "pec deck" will build strength and muscle specifically in your chest (pectoral) muscles only. A more holistic exercise however would be to do push ups which work a variety of muscles even though still focusing in on the chest, including your lower back, your core and even your legs. When you build your muscle in this way you will achieve a more balanced and physically attractive look, whilst also giving you overall strength which will come useful in real life situations, such as pushing something heavy like a broken down car.

This holistic approach to weight training will also help you learn muscle group coordination, which is crucial for bodybuilding. This means that holistic strength training can lead into building a much desired physique. You need to use all of your muscles together in order to make them visible and really stand out on stage or at the beach! It's no good having that perfect body if you can't show it off!

Using A Swim Spa For Holistic Training

Another great example is while you're swimming. We all know that swimming builds strength in the arms and legs as they are the most obvious muscle groups used when we swim. However, if you ever paid close attention to the Olympics swimmers, you'll notice that all top swimmers have powerful and back muscles and broad shoulders, since they're utilized and required in every swimming stroke. Simply having strong arms or legs alone will not make you a superb swimmer, you need the complete package.

This is where having a swim spa can be useful. Swim spas, as opposed to spa pools, are longer in length and allow you to do full body, holistic strength training with the benefit of the extra room and use of the powerful jets. The jets are so powerful that you may effectively swim in the same location as though you were in a swimming pool or the ocean, and the jets strength provides genuine resistance. This resistance works all muscles around the body with some variation depending on the exercise you are doing.

From backyard splash pools to elite endurance training, there is a swim spa to suit everybody and every purpose. Let us guide you through all the different types and arm you with the information you need to make an educated decision on which Sapphire swim spa is right for you. Our information is our no-nonsense guide to buying something energy efficient, practical and relevant to your family’s needs.

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In addition to this type of holistic strength training, swim spas have many other benefits. This is because your body isn't the only thing that gets a workout with holistic weight training. The hydrotherapy provided by swimming in a hot tub can provide relief from arthritis and carpal tunnel syndrome pain while also improving circulation and reducing stress. There are even holistic weight training benefits for pregnant women and people with diabetes, which can greatly improve their quality of life.

Such free weight exercise as this provides a more natural way to train your muscles without the need for extra equipment or weights. The resistance provided by water is similar to being in an outdoor location like on top of a mountain or swimming against the currents in a river. As resistance training focuses on the whole muscle cell, this means that lactic acid builds up much slower than usual. You will find yourself completing more reps with each set and lifting larger weights for longer periods of time. This all helps to improve your strength, endurance and coordination;

Misconceptions About Holistic Strength Training

Some people say that because it's "whole" or holistic, you're training weaknesses as well as strengths. This isn't true - strengthening muscles at the weakest percentile of activity is best done with isolation exercises, not whole-body strength trainings.

You see when you use more holistic training exercises, the weaker muscles in the group of muscles become a limiting factor, and are forced to grow faster to keep up with the other muscle groups. For example, when doing the 'lat pull down' exercise to train your back, you'll find that your forearms always get sore because you must use their strength to hold the the bar. Therefore, if your forearms are weak the strength of your back is limited by how much weight your forearms can hold. They will be hit first and hardest, and need to grow in order for you to hold more weight so you can then grow your back. Do you see how this works?

Another misconception about holistic strength training is that it has to be done slowly and steadily because it targets all the fitness components. While some skillful trainers prefer to do this, whole body movements are more likely to be fast and explosive if the purpose is weight loss. I could go into all the aspects of this intently, but that would be a lot to digest for now.

Let me mention one final misconception, however. That is that there's no telling what kind of shape you may end up in. The thing about holistic training is if you use the right methods, it will sculpt your muscles without having them bulk up or lose flexibility. This may not line up with what people expect from weight lifting but because long-term balance and health are more important than short-term gains, I think it's worth keeping an open mind about that detail. If you over-train one muscle group you'll end up looking strange as demonstrated by guy with enormous biceps or a huge upper body with chicken legs. Nobody wants that.

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Conclusion

So we hope you found this information useful. If you're interested in holistic weight training we would love for you to continue reading through our our blog and browse through the free resources we provide. We have more information on free weight, holistic exercises that can be done on your swim spa or spa pool at home.