The Correlation Between Physical And Mental Fitness

Understand and leverage the tight coupling between your body and your mind

How many great scientists can you think of? How about famous CEOs of mega-companies? What about chess champions? Take a moment to recall a few of each. I’ll wait. Have you thought about it? Now, how many of the people you named are overweight? I’m gonna go out on a limb and say the number is probably zero, even though none of these jobs require physical fitness. Why is that?

The answer comes from an unlikely field of study: engineering. That answer is: a positive feedback loop. In a positive feedback loop, the input is amplified by the system, creating a higher output. The output is then fed back into the system, increasing the input, which in turn amplifies again, and so on. An example of a positive feedback loop is a stock portfolio which produces dividends. Dividends are then re-invested into the portfolio, increasing the value of future dividends. A positive feedback loop is also what happens in a runaway chemical reaction that leads to an explosion.

So, what does all this have to do with fitness and productivity? Well, in this case, the “system” is your mind. When the system receives an input in the form of physical difficulty, it responds first by releasing endorphins to help…