Keeping Fit All the Way | Page 3

begins to
become round-shouldered; his chest falls in as the shoulders come
forward and the chest cavity is reduced. This means a gradual cramping
of lungs, heart, and stomach.

By way of compensation he lets out a hole or two in his belt and starts
in to carry more weight there. In other words, he exchanges muscle for
fat, and as the fat increases he has less and less muscular strength to
carry it. It is as though in a motor-car one added hundreds of pounds of
weight to the body and reduced the horse-power of the engine. Pretty
soon the man becomes so heavy around the waist that he notices his
discomfort, and it produces exhaustion; now he becomes more and
more averse to exercise, and the facia, or fat, having the better of the
battle, begins to penetrate even the fiber of the muscles.
THE REMEDY
The heart is a muscle, like all the others in the body, and fat may
accumulate there. When this condition comes about the man is perforce
obliged to be careful, for the heart muscle has lost its strength. As
stated, the situation becomes a vicious circle: as the man adds fat he
becomes more and more averse to exercise, and the less he exercises
the fatter he gets. And yet all this can be prevented; nor is it necessary
to take up any violent system of training, or to engage in tremendous
gymnastic exercise. If the patient is willing to take reasonable physical
training along scientific lines, a few hours a week will keep him in
respectable shape, so that he may preserve not only his figure, but also
his activity.
It should be remembered that all the members of the body partake of
the slackness that is apparent externally. Thus organs that should be
active in changing fat into energy lose their tone, and with that goes
their ability to carry on their proper functions. The best work of the
man himself is co-ordinated with the proper performance of the bodily
activities. Growth and strength depend upon and react upon the tissues,
and while this process is less active as age comes on, it can be
stimulated to the great advantage of both mind and body.
WHAT WORRY DOES
Every man who has reached a high place in his community or who has
become a leader of note knows that executive work has a tremendous
effect upon the nerves and body. If the man becomes run-down the

smallest decision gives him difficulty; it seems weighted with
enormous possibilities of disaster. A problem, which under normal
conditions he would turn over with equanimity to his assistant, takes on,
in his nervous state, a seriousness that leads to hours of worry. And yet
if he goes away on a vacation he returns to find that nine-tenths of these
troublesome things have been well taken care of during his absence.
Moreover, now that he has come back in a state of physical health and
with nerves that are normal, he sees that these awful problems were
simply exaggerated in his own mind by his overwrought physical
condition.
Few people realize the effect of worry upon the digestion.
An experiment was once tried upon a cat, which was fed a dish of milk,
stroked until it purred, and played with for half an hour. The animal
was then killed and the stomach examined; the milk was perfectly
digested. Another cat was taken and given a similar saucer of milk;
then its fur was rubbed the wrong way and it was teased and annoyed
as much as possible for half an hour. Upon examining the stomach of
the second cat it was found that not a step in the process of digestion
had taken place.
AMERICANITIS
It is wise to study the condition that we might almost call
"Americanitis." The American youth, as shown in the Olympic games,
is not only a match in speed, strength, and stamina for the youth of
other nations, but when it comes to the individual specialist even then
the American-trained boy is his superior. We smash records regularly.
We have been doing this for a decade with hardly a break. Even those
who criticize our tendency to develop individuals are obliged to admit
that this continual advance in athletic prowess fosters the spirit of
emulation among the masses. Moreover, we are improving in the way
of distributing our efforts, and more and more men in schools and
colleges come out for physical training and development. We have not
by any means perfected the system, but it is on the way. Supplementing
this general athletic development comes now the introduction into the
curriculum of military drill.

Finally compulsory military education or at least the compulsory
physical part of it, throughout the country will set