If you’re a fitness enthusiast, you’ve likely heard some fitness experts and even medical doctors telling you to stay away from the following exercises – Here are a list of just a few exercises and the most popular wrong reasons for avoiding them:

Sit-Ups – Bad for your lower back

Squats – Bad for your lower back & knees

Dead-Lifts – Too intense and bad for the lower back

Pull-Ups – Too tough on the shoulders

Dips – Rough on the shoulders & elbows

Let me begin by explaining why these exercises are not only safe when performed correctly, but why they’re essential Real Life Exercises, that should be included in your fitness routine.

Think about the list of exercises above and think about where they would have real life application.

Here’s the list of exercises again, but now I'll reveal just how much you utlize their movements in your daily life:

Sit-Up – Have you ever “crunched” to get up off the floor? Maybe if you’re a magician or contortionist you have, otherwise you sit-up all the time and it’s a Real Life Exercise!

Squat – I don’t want to embarrass you, but when you’re on the toilet, do you have someone assist you on or off of the toilet bowl? If you do, that’s fine, but for most people, that’s not reality. In most cases you must both Squat down and back up to most efficiently get on and back off the toilet.

Dead-Lift – When you move your luggage from the house to car or help a friend with moving that old refrigerator, do you rely on a dolly or a moving crew? No, you make the best use of your body by properly bending at the knees and over at the hips and Dead-Lift whatever it is up and out!

Pull-Ups – If you were (God Forbid) stuck on the floor or even worse, hanging from a ledge, would you wait for someone to pull you up? You might be in far worse shape if you had to rely on help outside yourself. You would muster up as much energy as possible and pull yourself up and out of harms way!

Dips – When you're down on your knees, building that office desk or your kids new toy, do you depend on your mate to help you back to your feet? Maybe, but wouldn’t you rather plant your hands up on a sturdy table and effortlessly push (dip) yourself back up to your feet? That’s a loaded question. Of course you would!

So hopefully I’ve made more than just a solid case for what you may have thought were dangerous exercises and even more, I hope you see why the last thing you should ever do, is avoid or stay away from these incredibly life benefiting Real Life Exercises! 

If you’d like me to expand the list, by investigating other black listed exercises, please let me know and I’ll move on it.

Keep Going and please remember to always question authority, even if it’s mine! ;)

All Best,

James Villepigue CSCS