In our workings years, it is recommended you put aside some percent of your paycheck toward a 401k or IRA retirement account. The money would be there for use in your retirement when you are no longer earning an income working. Just as we prepare for retirement financially, we should also similarly “save” or build up muscle for use later on in life. In our latter years if you wish to pickup and lift your grandkids or put carryon onto airplane compartment using your own power or do the regular things you enjoy doing now, you will need muscle. As we age its get harder for the body build muscle. Compounding the problem, muscle mass begins to drop as we age. For this reason you will need to have more muscle and strength than what you currently need so that as muscle mass decline, you will still have enough muscle to maintain your current activities. For example if you can lift a 20 lb of groceries now and want to maintain this ability, you need to able to lift 40 lbs so that when the inevitable muscle mass decline hits, you can still lift 20lbs.
How to build muscle mass
Exercise is the best way to build and maintain muscle mass. The human body is very energy and resource efficient. It keeps only what is actively used. When something is not active, the body makes less of it. This is true of bones, muscle and cognitive skill. Someone who is inactive begins to lose muscle mass. NASA astronauts who spend time in outer space with microgravity experience bone density and muscle mass loss. Without having to overcome gravity, movement and other activities use very little muscle and the body makes less of it. Astronauts need to perform exercises with resistance machines to counter this. https://www.nasa.gov/missions/station/iss-research/counteracting-bone-and-muscle-loss-in-microgravity/. Astronauts run on space treadmills and lift resistance machines. What works great for astronauts works for us mere mortals on Earth too. Walking, hiking, climbing, yard work, running, swimming, playing a sport like basketball, baseball, football, and tennis are just a few examples of activities that make use of the heart and other muscles. By mixing one or more types of exercises more of the different muscle groups are activated.
Why exercise build more muscles
When muscles perform work they tell the body to make more of it. Muscle do that by generating cytokines. Body responds to cytokines by building more muscles and bones1. In addition, it boost the immune system.
How muscle improves health and Quality of life
Muscle enables freedom to maintain activities you enjoy and extend health span. That in turn improves quality of life. Muscle is the guardian that wraps your skeleton. It helps maintain balance and prevents falls which is a leading cause of disability for the elderly. A serious accidental falls can lead to death. CDC cites over 3 million older people are hospitalize due to falls. Its webpage on fall recommends leg strength exercise as one of the preventative measures.
Exercise activates muscles’s mitochondria cellular organelles. Mitochondria produces energy for a cell, consuming glucose and fat. More muscle promotes metabolic health by consuming more energy.
- Peter Attia, Outlive, p224-225