How Exercise Works in Your Body, Explained Simply

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Have you guys ever wondered how your body actually moves?

Yo, you guys, what's up? Welcome to The WarriorBabe Show with Nikkiey Stott, co-founder of WarriorBabe. On this podcast, we talk about mindset, methodologies, and tactics that will help you lose body fat, build muscle, be strong, and feel insanely confident. I am your host, Nikkiey Stott, and welcome to episode number 85. I am personally so excited to unpack this episode with you guys. Today we're going to talk about the science of exercise, but I'm going to talk about it in a way that you guys will be able to understand it, right?

I was about to dive into all of these science terms, all of these big words, and I'm like, hold up. My community, my audience may not totally stay with me and be like a deer in headlights if I present it in that manner. So I reworked it, and I'm going to talk to you guys about the science of exercise, understanding the mechanics of movement, in a way that you guys will be able to understand it. And I'm going to use a lot of analogies throughout this podcast today, because that's one of my favorite ways to communicate hard concepts in an easy light.

So we're going to dive into, like I said, biomechanics, body movement, exercise physiology, and neurological aspects of exercise. And you guys can see, if I didn't break this down in a way that would be understood, you guys would be lost. So I'm really excited to present this podcast, you guys. Basically what we're doing throughout this podcast is going behind the scenes of the sweat and effort that you put into your workouts. And I want to start from the beginning. I want to first talk about what exactly exercise science is.

Exercise science is a study that explores how the human body moves and responds to physical activity. This includes everything from the mechanics of a single step that you take when you're walking outside all the way to how your muscles grow after lifting heavy weights. And this is a fascinating field because it involves all the things in the segments I talked about a second ago. We're going to break down how this combines all of these facets into exercise.

And I just want you guys to walk away realizing that exercise is so freaking good for the human body, for the human mind, for your joints, for longevity, for the way that your blood is pumping in your body, the way that your cells are responding, the way that oxygen is going in and out, all of these incredible things.

So first and foremost, let's talk about segment one: biomechanics and body movement. And I want to ask you guys, have you ever wondered how your body actually moves? How the muscles and the joints work together? When you understand the biomechanics of your body and how it can enhance performance and prevent injuries, it's just fascinating when you really unpack all of these things. So we're going to unpack it in five ways. We're going to talk about how your body moves, how the muscles and joints work together, what joints are and how they work, why understanding this all matters, and how it can all prevent injuries.

So these are things to look forward to just within this one segment. And again, there are going to be three segments when we're talking about overall physiology, biomechanics, psychology, and so much more.

All right. So first and foremost, how does your body move? Your body moves by your muscles pulling on your bones. I want you to think of your muscles like the strings on a puppet. When you want to move, the muscles, or the strings, pull, and the bones, or the puppet, move. Right? I told you I was going to talk to you guys in terms of analogies. So that's how your body moves.

Now, how do the muscles and the joints work together? Your muscles work by contracting. It's like squeezing a sponge. And when they do this, they pull your bones, and that makes your joints move like the hinges on a door, like you're opening and closing a door. And your muscles and your bones have to work together just right for everything to move smoothly. Okay?

Now, let me backstep a second. What are joints and how do they work? Joints are where two bones come together, like where your knee and your elbow bend. Some of those joints move a lot, like your shoulder, and others don't move at all, like the ones in your skull. So think of joints like the knots on the puppet strings. They let things bend and twist in the right places.

Just to unpack those three things I talked through really quick: first of all, think of your muscles like strings on a puppet. When you want to move, the muscles, or the strings, pull, and the bones, or the puppet, move. Then, for how these all work together, think of your muscles working by contracting, like squeezing a sponge, and they pull on your bones. That makes your joints move like hinges on a door. And then think about how some joints move and some joints don't, but think of these joints like the knots on the puppet strings. They let things bend and twist in the right places.

So this is kind of how everything works together. And I want you guys to understand why this matters. This matters because knowing how your body moves helps you to use it better. Again, we're on the segment of biomechanics and body movement. If you know how your muscles and joints work, you can train them to be stronger and more flexible. It's like knowing how to drive a car. If you know how it works, you can make it go faster and handle it better. So I hope this is all making sense so far.

Now, how can you use all of these things that I just said, and how can it prevent injuries? Understanding how your body works can help you avoid hurting yourself. If you know how things are supposed to move, like I just shared with you, and how they all work together, you're less likely to do something wrong and get hurt. This is where we can use it in terms of proper form when you're working out, making sure that you have good form and knowing when you have bad form, because you might feel something that you shouldn't be feeling, and it may pinch something or it may cause you to hurt something, right?

But if you know how your body moves and you're using the joints, the muscles, all of the things together, then you're less likely to injure yourself. So think of it like following the rules of the road. If you know what to do, you're less likely to crash, right? So if you know how all of these things work together, you're less likely to injure yourself.

So that is the segment of biomechanics and body movement, right? How does your body move? Your muscles pull on your bones. How do the muscles and joints work together? I told you the muscle contracts like squeezing a sponge, and then it pulls on your bones and makes the joints move like the hinges on a door. And your muscles and bones have to work together just right for everything to move smoothly. Then I spoke to what joints are and how they work, right? Think of them as the knots on the puppet strings, and they let everything bend and twist in the right places. And all of this is so important for you to understand how your body moves, because when you understand it, you just understand your body better and how the muscles, the bones, the joints all work, right? You can train them to be stronger and more flexible. And in turn, it helps you prevent injuries when you understand your body. So that was segment number one.

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Segment number two: exercise physiology. I want to talk about what's happening inside your body when you exercise. What's happening is your muscles are contracting, your blood is pumping, and your cells are working overtime to give you energy. And I want to unpack each one of those specific things. I'm going to talk about how muscles work during exercise, what's going on with your blood, how your cells are working extra hard, what's happening with your breathing, how your body keeps cool, what's going on with your feelings and your hormones, and then how your body, with all of this, changes over time.

So let's unpack each of those things. Again, this is segment number two, exercise physiology. How do muscles work during exercise? When you exercise, your muscles tighten and relax. It's like squeezing and releasing a rubber ball. Your muscles use energy that's stored in your body, and it's kind of like using gas in a car, right? So that's what your muscles are doing when you're exercising.

Second to that, what is going on with your blood? Because we all know the blood moves throughout the whole body when you're exercising. When you start moving, your heart pumps more blood to give your muscles the fuel they need. It's like stepping on the gas pedal in a car. The more you press, the faster your car will go, right? The more intense your workout is, the more blood is going to be pumped through your body. The heavier the weight that you're using, the more you're pressing the gas in that arena, the more your body's blood is going to pump to give your muscles the fuel that they need.

I hope this is all making sense. I'm trying not to go too fast. But again, I was like, I can't bring this to you guys in the way that I was originally going to bring it to you, which was totally science-based. So this is the layman's version of all of the things from the scientific side, talked about in a way that I know you guys will understand.

So that's what muscles are doing during exercise and what's going on with the blood during exercise. Now, when you're working out, your cells are working extra hard, right? How are your cells working extra hard? Your cells are like tiny factories working to give you energy. If you guys don't know what mitochondria are, that is what's going on while you're working out. They're the powerhouse of your cells. So think of it like that: your cells are like tiny factories, the mitochondria working to give you energy. They break down food into fuel, and it's kind of like turning wood into a bonfire, right?

That's why it's so important to eat, because, and I love to say this, you can't outwork a bad diet. You have to be eating right for everything to work together, from your nutrition to your workouts and from your workouts to your nutrition. They go together. But nutrition is so important because with all of this going on, these tiny little factories are breaking down food into fuel. Like I said, it's like turning wood into a bonfire. And they do this with or without oxygen, but with oxygen, it's more efficient, like using dry wood instead of wet.

So next, to unpack what I just said there, I want to talk about what's happening with your breathing. You breathe faster to get more oxygen into your muscles, right? So the more intense your exercise is, the more intensely you're lifting, the faster you're breathing to get more oxygen to your muscles. And it's like turning on a fan to keep a fire going, right? You're turning this wood into a bonfire, and then you're turning the fan on to keep the fire going. At this point, you guys, you're also getting rid of waste, like smoke from a fire.

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Your breathing and good oxygen consumption to your body and to your muscles is also helping you get rid of toxins from your body. So with all of this going on, this is everything that's happening when you're working out. This is what your body is doing, what your muscles are doing, what your blood is doing, what your cells are doing, what your breathing is doing.

And then what I love to unpack is how your body keeps cool, right? I really want to break this myth. People think that in order to have a really strong, effective, intense workout, they have to be sweating. That's not entirely true. The way that your body keeps cool is by you sweating. So whether or not you're sweating doesn't grade you on the type of workout that you're having.

The way your body keeps cool is that you sweat to cool down. It's like spraying water on something hot, right? Blood vessels come close to your skin and they get bigger to help get rid of heat. It's kind of like opening windows to let air out, right? So that's what's happening with your body. The sweat is just your body trying to cool itself down. So again, it doesn't grade you on the type of workout that you're having. I personally barely sweat, but I'm still having an effective freaking workout. That's what's happening inside your body: the blood vessels come close to your skin, they get bigger, and they help get rid of heat.

Now, the feel-good hormones, right? What's going on with these feel-good hormones? You've all heard people say that exercise releases X, Y, and Z. Exercise makes your body release these feel-good hormones, these feel-good chemicals that make you happy, like listening to your favorite song. Think about that. You're jamming out in your car, listening to Unstoppable by Sia, and you're releasing these feel-good hormones, right? But at the same time, exercise also releases stress hormones to help your body handle the workout.

Think of this like having a strong cup of coffee to wake up, right? Your body here is releasing stress hormones to help it handle the intensity that you're putting it under through the exercise you're doing. If you've ever sipped coffee first thing in the morning, it just, bam, shot you wide awake, right? That's what's happening here. So think about these hormones in that respect. The feel-good hormones are like listening to your favorite song, and the stress hormones that get released are like having a sip of coffee and waking up so drastically fast.

And then, with exercise and with all of this going on in your body over time, how does your body change and adapt? Obviously, if you keep exercising, your muscles get bigger, and it's like inflating a balloon, right? But your heart also gets better at pumping blood, and your body gets better at using oxygen. So all of these things are encompassing. It's such a better atmosphere inside your body when you move your body and do some type of exercise that you enjoy doing, right? Whether it's strength training, whether it's going for a run, all of these things are adapting your body to be more resilient, to have bigger muscles, to have better cardiovascular endurance, to have better circulation through your body.

That's just unpacking what is going on in your body during exercise. I hope this hits home, because it's just so important to understand the why. All of these things are happening on the inside of your body: your muscles contracting, your blood pumping, and your cells working overtime to give you energy. These are all adapting for the longevity of your life, to build resilience, for your body to be able to handle things in a way that it wouldn't really be able to if you weren't exercising, right?

Your body gets stagnant. Internal things get stagnant. Blood flows slower. The oxygen flows slower. Your muscle mass decreases. So it's just vitally important, in terms of the physiology of exercise, to move your body and to make sure you're getting good, efficient exercise.

Let's move into closing it down, which is segment number three. This is the neurological aspects of exercise, right? I was talking more about the blood, the cells, the muscles, how your body changes over time, the hormones, all of these things when you're going through exercise. But there is such an incredible neurological aspect of exercise that really needs to be understood and unpacked here.

So this is segment number three. The brain plays an essential role in exercise. It's not just about moving your muscles. It's not just about, you know, I've got to go get my exercise in because I want to build more muscle. It's about the mind-muscle connection that you are creating. And I'm so big on this. When you have a mind-muscle connection, it is a next-level type of feeling when you're working out and you can feel the muscles working.

So the question is, how does your nervous system control your strength and your movement? I want to explore these answers: how does the nervous system make you strong? What is the mind-muscle connection? And how does your brain control movement when you have alignment between your brain and the muscle?

So let's start with how the nervous system makes you strong. First and foremost, your brain sends signals to your muscles through nerves. More signals mean more strength. Let me say that again. Your brain sends signals to your muscles through nerves. More signals mean more strength. Think of it like turning up the volume on your stereo. The louder it gets, the more powerful the sound, right? So the more signals your brain sends through nerves, the more strength you have in your body, the more powerful you are.

Now, let's talk about the mind-muscle connection. This is really all about focusing on the muscle that you're working. And this is something that I've loved to preach since I first started my fitness journey and began helping women understand how to engage their lats. Because ladies, I personally never worked out my back before I got into fitness. I had no understanding of what the latissimus dorsi was, what that muscle did, how big it was, or how to create a connection to it mentally. I want to get this across, because the mind-muscle connection, when you really focus on the muscle that you're working, is an absolute game changer, okay?

So imagine you're doing a lat pulldown. I always used to think of having a rubber band from your elbow to the side of your body. You were tightening it when you brought your elbow really close to your body, and then you were letting it expand when you went back up for another rep. That really helped me focus, like, okay, these are the lats back here, and that's the actual motion, the way that I'm pulling the weight down.

Or second, you can imagine flexing your bicep and really concentrating on it, right? You might feel it working harder when you actually pay attention. You have to pay close attention to that actual physical movement and not anything else in the room, right? This is another thing I like to use: if your mind is going, what am I going to have for dinner? Or, oh my God, did the kids get picked up from soccer practice? Or you're thinking about all of the things that went down at work that day, or the fight that you're having with your husband, I don't know.

But if your mind is on a million other things, it sure as hell isn't focusing on the actual weight, the movement, and the mind-muscle connection that you're supposed to be creating with the muscle you're actually trying to work. And it's really hard sometimes to just tune into your body, right? To actually be in the moment of what you're doing with your workout, really focusing on the muscle that you are contracting and trying to make stronger. When you really focus on, say, the bicep again, and really focus on contracting it, you're going to feel it working harder. It's like paying close attention to one voice in a noisy room. You are focused solely on the muscle that you are working, really focusing on that muscle working. And that right there, my friend, is the mind-muscle connection.

Now, let's unpack how your brain controls movement. Your body senses things like stretch and temperature and sends that information to your brain. Your brain then figures out what to do and tells your muscles to move. Think about it like this: it's like having a conversation where you listen, think, and then respond. How many times does that actually happen? Listen, think, and then respond, right? A lot of people just listen and then respond.

But in this essence, your body senses things like stretch and temperature, and it sends that information. It's sensing the stretch of the muscle. It's sensing the blood pumping into the muscle to give it fuel. It senses the temperature. Have you ever touched your muscle after you've done a couple of reps and a couple of sets, and it feels super warm? That's the blood rushing in to fuel and supply that muscle with the energy that it needs. It's super freaking cool. Next time you go into a workout, touch your muscle and feel that heat. Then your body sends the information to your brain, your brain figures out what to do, and it tells your muscle to move, okay? So again, it's like having a conversation: listen, think, and then respond. Your body is sensing this thing, listening to this thing. Your brain is figuring out what to do and tells your muscle. And then your muscles respond.

I had so much fun being able to conversate about these things with you guys in a way that I'm hoping you will be able to understand, breaking it down into layman's terms in each of those specific segments. Again, this is unpacking the science of exercise and understanding the mechanics of movement, from biomechanics and body movement to exercise physiology to the neurological aspects, how your brain makes everything work when you're exercising, and how they all work together.

It's like going behind the scenes of the sweat and effort that you put into your workouts on a daily basis. And I hope understanding these things gives you a new, profound respect for exercise and for working out. Your body is adapting in this sense: your brain connecting with your muscle, your cells working, your blood flowing, your oxygen moving, your joints, your muscles, and your bones all working together. This is your body adapting with resilience to the resistance from exercise and being able to be stronger, internally and externally, against anything that may come its way later in life, down the road. It's really building a strong-ass foundation for the longevity of life: you, your body, your muscles, your bones, all of the things, oxygen, cells, brain, neurological development, X, Y, and Z. It's incredible. It's incredible.

So I really hope that you guys enjoyed this podcast. And if you did, please, I ask that you rate and review this show. That's the only way this show grows. We don't run any ads to it. It's up to you guys whether we are in the top 20 or top 10, by you rating and reviewing it and taking a few seconds out of this podcast right now to go and do it. I appreciate you guys so much if you do it. See you next time.

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