“I garden,” I often hear readers and clients say when I ask them the question “do you exercise?” And then I feel like a jerk for bursting their bubble and explaining why gardening is not exercise.
Original source: here.
In order to proactively address this so that it happens less often, I am writing this article, with a detailed explanation of because gardening is not exercise. Movement – yes. Exercise – not even close.
Why people think gardening is exercise
There are a few reasons why people think – or want to think – that gardening is exercise. In no particular order:
- You’re sweating. Sweating, however, is not a criterion for exercise. If you sit in a sauna, you will also sweat. But you don’t exercise. You can exercise and sweat, or you can exercise and not sweat.
- You are outside. While being outdoors is generally a good thing, it is also not a criterion for exercise.
- You might hurt. You know what pain isn’t? Exercise criterion. Try scratching a spot on your back that’s really hard to reach while using only your hands (no cheating by rubbing against a door frame or using a tool). You may also be sore the next day. But it’s not exercise.
- The it takes time and energy.
- My inner cynic also wants to say this sometimes you just want it to be exerciseto avoid real exercise, because real exercise is hard work (harder than gardening). On the surface, you really, really want to think you’re exercising. And kids really, really want to believe in Santa (if you still believe in Santa, don’t tell me otherwise). But deep down, you know that if you’re not reaching your fitness goals, gardening sure isn’t getting the job done. Sometimes, delusion is not the answer.
What is Exercise?
Another reason people think gardening is exercise is because they don’t understand what exercise really is. So let’s define it.
Exercise is a deliberate effort to improve the quality of physical fitness. Let’s break it down:
- Intentional: means that on purpose – not by accident or as a side effect – you make progress on something.
- Improve: you try to get better at it. There is progress. You’ll be a little better at it the next time you do it.
- Fitness quality: there are 3 basic attributes of fitness – strength, cardiovascular endurance and flexibility. There are also other secondary fitness attributes such as speed, agility, muscular endurance, balance and more.
If you compare the definition of exercise with gardening, you will see that there are no similarities.
Gardening is not intentional. The purpose of gardening is to… garden. Not to improve your fitness.
Gardening is not progressive. You don’t count the number of weeds you pull and try to beat him next time. You also don’t lift a bag of dirt, aiming to lift a slightly heavier bag of dirt the next time.
Gardening does not improve strength, endurance or flexibility. Why? Because it’s not strength, endurance or flexibility training.
What is Cardiovascular Exercise? It is a 2 part definition. The two parts are:
- Intensity: you should be working above 65% of your maximum heart rate.
- Duration: you need to maintain this heart rate for at least 20 minutes (as a beginner. More if you’re past the beginner stage).
While gardening usually meets the duration limit (most people garden for more than 20 minutes), does not meet the volume limit. Most gardening happens at heart rates that are just above resting.
So no, it’s not cardio.
It’s also not strength training for reasons I cover in my article on what strength training is.
Finally, it is not flexibility training. For it to be flexibility training, you need to identify a target muscle, drive it to the end of its range of motion, and hold it for 30+ seconds. You would do it again with a bunch of muscle. You don’t do that when you’re gardening.
Do you now see why gardening is not exercise? Not to say it’s not good for you – it is. But it’s not exercise. Don’t confuse movement with exercise.
Because it matters
Why do I make this distinction? Because as much as we want to live in la-la land and think gardening is exercise, health and fitness indicators don’t lie. You could be gardening a lot, but if your cholesterol, blood sugar, blood pressure, or liver enzymes are elevated, then it’s clear that gardening isn’t doing the job you hope it’s doing. It will give you a nice garden – but not good fitness levels.
Additionally, you could be active but still unfit by any measure of fitness – strength, endurance and flexibility. Active is not the same as fit. Active just means you’re moving. Fitness means this you are intentionally trying to improve the quality of your fitness. You could be an inappropriately active person. That’s why things like gardening, playing with your kids/grandkids, and taking 10,000 steps a day aren’t comfortable for you. Is being active better than being sedentary? Absolutely. But it is even better if you are active and fit as opposed to active and unfit.
Another reason why this distinction matters is because if someone really, truly believes that they are fit as a result of being active, they have false sense of accomplishment. Your sense of gardening success should be based on having a nice garden – not a high level of fitness. You could garden all day but still wonder why you climb the stairs or struggle to carry your groceries and move the furniture.
This false sense of accomplishment makes you think you are exercising. Gardening shouldn’t be a way to avoid exercise. Remember what exercise is – a deliberate effort to improve the quality of physical fitness.
It doesn’t have to be gardening OR exercise. It really should be gardening AND exercise.
For some people, gardening is their raison d’être. Some of our customers are deliberately looking to improve their fitness so they can do more gardening and can do it better. Gardening is their ‘sport’ and they train for it. If this is you and you want to improve your gardening fitness, just reply to this email with the words “fitness for gardening“, and we’ll chat. You’re under no obligation to do so. You’ll just set up a quick chat where we’ll talk about your situation and see if our services are for you. There’s no pressure and no sales pitching.
