The Correlation Between Physical Fitness and Finding Your Flow

The benefits of exercise on your brain and quick tips for improving work-life balance by working out.

by Jason Haller

When are you at your best? Is it when you’re exhausted, dehydrated, or when your back hurts from sitting all day? I doubt most people will find peak performance or flow under those conditions. Unfortunately, that seems to be the scenario that many of us find ourselves in most of the time.

But people don’t usually associate sacrificing your physical health with lowered productivity. In fact, your physical health is integrally linked with your cognitive performance and quality of life, yet in the U.S. only 1 in 8 adults have optimal metabolic health and that number is only getting worse.

If you want to maximize how well you can perform almost any task, being properly rested, properly fed, and properly hydrated are all commonly accepted as being part of that equation. What about being physically prepared? Is there any room in the conversation about peak mental performance to examine the role of physical fitness or at least physical activity? Health has remained a popular term over time, but exercise has become something associated with vanity and self-indulgence in recent years. There are, however, many benefits to our cognitive performance that we can access through moving our bodies intentionally. Never has this been more relevant, as more work is being done while sitting down and staring at a computer screen, at the same time that societal markers of metabolic health are declining.

Many people may think they feel “fine”, and that the state of their health isn’t affecting them negatively. In my experience as a health coach, I’ve seen dozens of clients remark that they had no idea how much better they could feel after addressing their diet, their sleep, and adding in regular exercise.

Better energy, with fewer ups and downs and less reliance on the manic adrenaline-based energy throughout the day, as well as better ability to handle stress and better mood in general, were some of the most common highlights from these clients. The gym was less of an obligation as time went on, and became more of a required element for peak performance as well as the quality of life.

“Everything you do inside the gym makes everything you do outside the gym better” - Gunnar Peterson

Your brain is the most energy-demanding organ we have at rest. Therefore, your body’s ability to manage energy effectively has consequences on how your brain performs. With flow being a very energy-intensive state on top of the already high demands during normal circumstances, you can see how low energy levels and someone with poor metabolic health may struggle to find peak performance regularly.

Even if flow isn’t your primary concern, a depleted body leads to a depleted mind, and the first thing to go once you’re in this depleted state is your executive function. Things like your ability to pay attention, manage time, initiate actions, organize, remember details or handle frustration are all affected. This makes you more easily distracted, more reactive and impulsive, less self-aware, and worsens the quality of your decision-making. This diminished executive function makes everything you do feel harder and more taxing than it needs to be, thus perpetuating the cycle of exhaustion and reduced performance.

“Exercise is also strongly associated with a reduced risk of dementia late in life. People who exercise regularly in middle age are one-third as likely to get Alzheimer’s disease in their 70s as those who did not exercise. Even people who begin exercising in their 60s have their risk reduced by half.” – New York Times Op-Ed titled “Exercise on the Brain”

The three areas that generate the biggest return on investment for people’s metabolic health and performance are sleep, diet, and exercise. If the benefits of regular exercise, a clean diet, and proper sleep could be put into a pill, that would be the most sought-after pharmaceutical ever created. Unfortunately, no such pill exists. Today, however, we will focus mainly on the benefits of exercise.

Jobs that support employee health are few and far between. By support, I don’t mean having a gym in the building that employees have access to. I mean support by having schedules that actually allow them to use that gym or adhering to standard work hours. Checking your work email or returning messages at night before bed is a great way to compromise the quality of your sleep and create negative downstream effects. Clients of mine frequently receive an alert from work on their smartwatch mid-workout and get completely derailed and flustered, undermining the benefits of getting to the gym to relieve stress and feel better.

The good news about the benefits of exercise is that it doesn’t take much to begin to see the effects. Many studies have found that as little as a 30-minute walk done three times per week is enough to see measurable improvements in cognition and markers of health. This is just the baseline, however, and many people will find even more benefits by building up to a moderate level of exercise daily for about 30-45 minutes. There is obviously an inflection point with exercise though, and too much can put us back in that exhausted/depleted state and sap our energy and undermine productivity. So, if boosting cognition is part of your goal when hitting the gym, aim to feel energized and in good spirits by the time you’re done.

Benefits of exercise for cognition:

The hippocampus, a part of the brain concerned with learning and memory, grows in size with regular exercise over time.
Increased ability to focus
Improved capacity for learning
Better memory
Neurogenesis or new growth of brain cells (at any age) thanks to the release of BDNF (brain-derived neurotrophic factor)
Improved sleep
Enhanced mood due to the release of serotonin
Better insulin sensitivity, creating more stable energy throughout the day as well as protection against chronic degenerative diseases.
Improved personal empowerment or internal locus of control
Helps to neutralize hormones released during stress, which is necessary before getting into a flow state
Releases endorphins, contributing to feelings of well-being and reduced stress

One of the ways exercise has such a profound effect on us mentally is through the release of the same neurochemicals we see during flow. Anandamide is a powerful “feel good” neurochemical, in part because it helps us lower cognitive load (distracting thoughts) and plays a role in modulating dopamine, and is sometimes referred to as the bliss molecule. Dopamine, endorphins, serotonin, and norepinephrine are also released during exercise, giving us the five neurochemicals present during flow states. This combination helps make us less susceptible to stress, agitation, and fear responses as well as helps boost our cognition and overall performance which is why we see so much flow in high-level athletes and extreme sports.

It’s also been found in several studies that participants who went for a five to ten-minute walk before a creativity test came up with twice as many creative ideas as the participants who did not perform the walk ahead of time. So, even in small doses, it clearly seems like movement is linked with cognitive performance or at least creative thinking.

“Exercise should be thought of as a supplement that is immensely powerful for state regulation, soothing the central nervous system, elevating mood, and priming your cognition for optimal performance.” -Flow Research Collective

I should also briefly mention there are ways to undermine the cognitive benefits of your exercise. Working out while listening to music or a podcast, texting back and forth, checking email, scrolling social media or news outlets, and leaving notifications and alerts on will likely negate many of the cognitive benefits. Exercise is a perfect opportunity to step away from those “distractions” and temptations to multitask and just focus on what you’re trying to accomplish in the workout. A familiar playlist or possibly a podcast, with notifications off, will be a great middle-ground for many people to start with, but for the full zen experience, try challenging yourself to no phone at all on your walk or workout and see how you feel after.

If your schedule allows, working out in the morning is a great way to set yourself up with the benefits of exercise all day long. That’s my favorite strategy and I find it really does give me a boost in energy, focus, mood, motivation, and above all a certain calmness that makes it easy to handle stress and brush aside distractions. Sacrificing sleep for extreme early morning workouts, however, is likely a net loss, as adequate sleep is going to be more important for an optimally functioning body and mind than a 4 am zombie workout.

Many executives or people working in the corporate world have and will find success with a midday workout or walk which helps break up the day by working off some of the stress from the morning and re-energizing for a productive afternoon. Something is always better than nothing and even a 10-15 minute routine can make a big difference when done regularly.

My message to you is that exercise shouldn’t feel like a burden or a luxury, it should feel just as important as anything else you do to improve your quality of life and quality of work. If you normally drink coffee and find you perform and feel your best with two cups every morning, you wouldn’t find yourself saying “I just don’t have time to make/buy coffee today”, right? Because you understand the relationship between the time spent getting the coffee and how much more productive you will be and how much better you’ll feel with the coffee versus without. Exercise is the same. We are better with it than without it. And as we’ve already discussed, this can be as little as a 30-minute walk a few times per week.

Exercise is only one piece of the puzzle, but for many people, it can be the gateway to many lifestyle changes that drive better quality of life, better work-life balance, and much better access to flow. In my opinion, if more people, and companies, understood the relationship between exercise, health, and the ability to perform at a high level, sustain that performance, and not pay as big a price in the stress and exhaustion department long-term, I think they’d find the time to take better care of themselves.

Quick Tips:

Walk. Walking is almost always an option as it requires no equipment and no preparation. 30-minute walks, hikes, or bike rides throughout the week are great ways to take care of your brain. Shorter walks of 5-15 minutes can be useful throughout the day to boost creativity or reduce stress between meetings or work on projects.
Resistance training. Unlike walking, there may be a few more barriers to entry here, but the reward is worth the price of admission. Two to three workouts per week with the goal of either building or maintaining strength will help boost performance and self-empowerment.
Challenge yourself. This doesn’t have to be all the time, but occasionally challenging yourself to push past the limits of comfort and convenience can boost your sense of grit and determination, which can help you in other areas of your life. Our brains like solving problems and overcoming challenges. Giving yourself new things to overcome physically is one of the easiest ways to stimulate your brain and raise the bar for what you consider stress.
Limit distractions. Multitasking and interruptions will negate many of the benefits we’ve talked about with regard to cognition. Single-tasking and flow go hand in hand. The more we practice focusing our attention on one thing at a time and performing to the best of our ability, the better we’ll be at getting into flow.
Use exercise as a tool. Think of exercise as a tool you can use to clear your head, create an aha moment, get a boost in energy for the afternoon, or reduce stress and anxiety. Learn to associate exercise with the things it can provide you, rather than the time it costs you.

If you are interested in learning more about how Five to Flow can improve the five core elements of your organization, contact us today. For more information on flow concepts and how they improve business health, visit the Collective Voices blog for more articles.