If you're going to understand one concept about how to train your body this year, I want you learn this one: the difference between external and internal training.
Hey--it's Coach Will, and this is one of those nerd-tastic topics that I feel very strongly about.
I so want you to learn this difference because knowing it will set you free: free from the unhelpful pressures of media, free from the down-right dangerous bro-science that thrives at most gyms, and free from the many, many myths that get internalized about what we "should" be doing when we work out.
These two broad categories--of internal and external training are defined by what you are trying to change when you train.
For external training, you are trying to change something outside--how much weight you can lift, how high you can jump, how far you can run, etc. The key here is that these are ways that you (and other people!) can see.
For internal training, you are aiming to change something inside--the quality of some specific tissues, how much room a certain joint has to work, how strong you are at a specific position, etc.
Now, at first glance, most people think that training is the use of external training in order to change internal variables (eg: "I'm going to squat to increase my leg muscles"). Most people think that's just what training is.
But that's not quite right. And there is another way (which I'll get to).
To some extent, it's true that you are having an effect on your internal environment (the world of muscles, bones, blood, etc) when you use external training. BUT (and it's a big but ), very often the internal variable that's actually being prompted to change with that external training is not the internal variable that you are intending to change.
In the world of external training, the tissues of your body are nobly trying to accomplish whatever task your brain is aiming at; the function of the inside stuff is all secondary to the external, brain-directed goal. That means that the squat, which you have chosen because of how it affects your leg muscles, actually drives a much more significant change to your nervous system ("Learn how to do this movement!!") then to those leg muscles.
Trying to improve the function of your leg "stuff" with a squat is sort of like trying to paint an intricate sculpture with a paint roller; sure, you'll get paint on the thing, but only on the parts that stick out. All the little crevices, the hard-to-reach spots, won't get any paint at all.
And if--as is the case for almost every single person I've ever worked with--some of those tissues that should be involved when you squat (some of your leg "stuff") are not up to the task (because they don't contract well, or they aren't controlled well by your brain, etc), your body subconsciously and automatically tries to make-up for them, to work around them, by over-burdening the neighboring tissue that is up to the task. That's what's going on for most over-use injuries, everywhere on your body.
And it's that "making-up-for" that leads to the all-too-common story of external training causing more pain/damage than benefit. What a bummer: that squat didn't ma
While you may have picked that squat because of how it's theoretically a whole-body exercise, the actual squat is just more training for the part of your body that already know how to work. The other parts of your leg, the parts that desperately need to be trained so that they can be part of your movement abilities, stay dormant.
If, on the other hand, we focus explicitly on the internal variable (the internal changes you're after), we will usually end up with an exercise that looks very different from a squat--different from any 'named' exercise, in fact.
We'd end up with an exercise that is as unique as your leg. We'd end up with an exercise perfectly tailored to the goal of getting the muscle tissue in your leg to WAKE UP and get to it's work of creating and resisting force.
And with that tissue added to the whole complex that makes up your active leg "stuff", you get better at squatting (or anything else you might want to do). The loads and demands of complex movement are spread out to more tissue, lowering the chance of injury and increasing the total output.
Yes, I'm basically saying the opposite of what so many of us have been led to believe: by letting go of the external training measure (eg squat) so that we can focus on actually training the internal capability, you get better at the external measure. Said a different way, if the parts that make up the whole are improved, you can't help but improve the whole.
Which begs one more question: why do any external training at all? It's a good question. If you're a pro athlete who's sport involves an external variable--like how much you squat (powerlifting), or high you jump (track/field)--then you should definitely practice that specific skill.
Or if you get a social or competitive need met by really going after a certain skill or skill-set (playing a team-sport, competing in a martial art, entering races), then you should probably practice those skills.
On the other hand, if you're just doing those movements because that's all you know, or you saw some muscley human doing them, or some other reason that does NOT relate to your actual needs, then consider hitting the pause button (on those movements).
If your purposes are "general fitness" aka "get healthy" aka "I feel better when I'm active", then you need to spend time and effort on changing those variables, and not some external measure. If you want to train to make your insides better, focus on improving those components specifically--your leg stuff, your shoulder range-of-motion, your cardiorespiratory system--and don't just practice skills.
This is part of why I'm so passionate about changing the fitness narrative. For all that I hear about how little time people have to train, I want to make sure that what does get trained is going to be impactful and intentional.
So now that you're armed with this knowledge, I'd encourage you to use this lense on your current training… what are you training when you work out? Are you explicitly working on affecting your insides, or are you sweating after external goals? And if you are, why?
Go be your own hero,
Coach Will