Hey loves,

Today’s blog post is about why muscle is the organ of longevity. In this blog post, I go over what muscles are, what longevity is, how muscle is the organ of longevity, what ageing/sarcopenia is, how to build muscle and how much exercise to do for longevity.

What are muscles? 

Muscles are pieces of soft tissue throughout our body. The human body has 600 muscles. They are one of the four basic types of animal tissues.

The main muscle tissues are skeletal, smooth and cardiac.

Our brains, skeletons and nerves compose our neuromuscular systems. Our muscle tissues basically allow our skeletal muscles to contract and our neuromuscular systems allow our muscles to move.

Our muscles help us do everything from holding our body still, jumping to running a marathon.

Muscles move and support our internal organs. Our heart, for instance, is a muscle that beats thousands of times a day to keep us alive.

The more muscle mass one possesses, the lower our risk of all-cause mortality.

What is longevity?

Longevity is a medicinal field which teaches us to live longer and healthier. Its aim is to make sure that we live active, productive and healthy lives even as we age.

Longevity essentially describes the state when a person lives beyond their average life expectancy.

There are numerous ways to extend longevity, they are largely influenced by our genetics, lifestyle and environment.

General tips for extending our longevity include getting regular exercise in, eating healthy plant based foods, sleeping well and having a good social life.

How is muscle the organ of longevity?

Also, why is muscle referred to as our “metabolic currency”?

Muscle is referred to as our metabolic currency because the stronger and healthier our muscles are, the more carbohydrates and fat our bodies burn.

Muscle is the foundation of our metabolisms which means it helps regulate our blood sugar and lipids.

It also is an endocrine organ that secretes myokines which help regulate metabolism in all other tissues in our bodies.

“It functions beyond locomotion. Muscle is the foundation of your metabolism, helping regulate blood sugar and lipids. It’s also an endocrine organ that secretes myokines, proteins that help regulate metabolism in all other tissues in the body (salveolifestyle.com, 2024).”

Muscle is the organ of longevity for the following reasons:

1) It provides structure.

It allows the body and our joints to move and have mobility.

“Muscle mass is strongly related to things like how fast you walk, grip strength, and fracture risk. In fact, it appears that in very old adults, muscle mass is more strongly related to the risk of a hip fracture than is their bone density. If you think about it, in very old adults, bone density is low, but muscle mass is variable. We’ve shown that muscle mass is strongly related to mortality among older adults, in ways that lean body mass is not at all (Evans,2024).

2) It reduces systemic inflammation.

Increasing our muscle mass decreases our body’s inflammation. Because having visceral fat increases our body’s inflammation and insulin resistance, having muscle will decrease our chances of developing these ailments.

Instead, our blood sugar metabolism and hormonal function will be optimized.

“Muscles [also] help us control our glucose levels, use glucose as fuel, and have a role in insulin resistance (Evans, 2024).”

3) It regulates our metabolism.

Muscle is necessary for fat oxidation, glucose metabolism, and detoxification.

4) It improves our strength and ensurance

Naturally, building muscle allows our bodies to get stronger and can improve our endurance levels.

5) It improves our body composition and overall health

Muscle improves our body composition and result in an internally and externally healthier physique.

6) It gives us fuel during illness

Muscle is as a large storage site for amino acids that are used by the body during illness.

Low muscle mass and inadequate protein intake may lessen our body’s ability to respond to an injury or infection.

What is ageing? What is sarcopenia? 

According to Scott F. Gilbert, author of Developmental Biology, “ageing is the time-related deterioration of the physiological functions necessary for survival and reproduction (Gilbert, 2000).”

Sarcopenia is the loss of muscle mass. Low muscle mass is of the biggest predictors of poor recovery from falls as we get older.

The more muscle mass our bodies have, the higher likelihood of fighting against disease.

Due to the fact that our bodies naturally lose muscle, we need to work hard not just at creating the muscle but maintaining it as our body ages.

 “Studies have shown that for both men and women, our strength and muscle mass steadily increase from birth to around 30-35 years old. After which, “muscle power and performance decline slowly and linearly at first, and then faster after age 65 for women and 70 for men. (Baltimore Longitudinal Study of Aging).”

Sarcopenia makes everyday tasks difficult, limits our mobility and directly increases our risk of not recovering from falls, having chronic disease, entering a nursing home, and of course death.

What are the consequence of being “under-muscled”?

Low muscle mass can lead to fatigue, injuries, frailty, falls, and possibly death.

Having low muscle mass and consequently a low metabolism can also result in obesity, diabetes, heart disease, and many other chronic health problems.

How to build muscle?

[Increasing our longevity] comes down to four factors: skeletal muscle, cardiovascular health, a balanced diet, and an emphasis on protein intake. That’s it. That’s the “silver bullet (Doré,2023).”

Building muscle is what this blog is about! Check out any of my resources on female muscle building for tips on how to get started.

1) Consume high amounts of protein

Consume at least 30 grams of protein per meal for maximum muscle growth paired with heavy lifting.

2) Apply progressive overload at the gym

You want to keep getting stronger every week at strength training exercises like the squat, deadlift, pull-up, push up, etc.

You can do this by adding more weights, volume, increasing reps and sets or decreasing rest time.

3) Proper supplementation

Protein powders, BCAAs and creatine can be your friends for building muscles.

How much exercise to perform for longevity?

The exercise duration is not as important as the quality of exercise and the stimulus, in particular that is involved in this process.

Your exercise needs to keep getting more challenging over time through the process of progressive overload.

You can get stronger overtime by adding more intensity, weight, slowing down rest time, increasing tempo or adding more volume and overall sets/repetitions to your training routine.

I hope that you enjoyed this blog post on why muscle is the organ of longevity, please let me know what you thought about it in the comments section below!

Sources:

https://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/health/conditionsandtreatments/muscles

https://www.healthylongevity.clinic/blog/what-is-longevity-definition

https://www.insidetracker.com/a/articles/dr-william-evanswhy-muscle-mass-is-a-marker-of-longevity

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4035379

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3838468/

https://salveolifestyle.com/muscle-is-the-organ-of-longevity/

https://truenorthwellness.com.au/muscle-the-organ-of-longevity/

https://worth.com/muscle-is-the-cornerstone-of-longevity/