Milo Bryant is a performance coach as well as an experienced journalist. He is also 50 years old, and his book Unstoppable after 40 gives you the roadmap to do more than just stay active as you “mature.” Milo trains hard and recovers even better so he can do what he wants, when he wants. Get ready to use his methods to become unstoppable. This is not your father’s middle age.
The following is an excerpt from Unstoppable After 40.
You are not the same person at 40 as you were at 20. Be grateful! For the vast majority of us, that’s a good thing.
Sure, after 40, it may hurt a little more, and you may never bank as much as you did two decades ago, but you’ve also gained half the knowledge and memories of a lifetime.
In my opinion, the biggest impact of turning 40 is mental. It forces us to take a hard look at ourselves and ask ourselves: Am I the person I always wanted to be? Have I achieved everything I set out to do?
Those can be tricky questions, to be sure. So here’s a simpler one. Ask yourself, “Am I running out of time or is this the best time?” Your answer reveals a lot about your way of thinking. Why does your mindset matter? Because turning 40 hits us all differently. And before we talk about how to build physical strength, we need to talk about how to build mental strength.
Having a positive outlook will help you deal with obstacles as you age and will be more beneficial to your overall health. Research shows that compared to pessimists, optimists live 11 to 15 percent longer, sleep better, and are more likely to have better cardiovascular health.
Just like building muscle—that is, tearing down muscle fibers, repairing them, and making them stronger again—building a truly strong mindset only comes after setbacks. And folks, I’ve had plenty of those.
There was a time when I lied directly to myself. I thought I had everything under control. He worked too much and slept too little. I had recently divorced. There was child support, alimony, college tuition. He had overdue rent payments, both in San Diego and in Los Angeles. My social life was practically non-existent. But I was making it, so I thought everything was fine.
For years, I told myself I was fine. But the cracks were beginning to show, even if it took me a while to notice them. I gained weight. I had a shingles attack. I started having panic attacks when I got on planes, and I was a world traveler! It wasn’t until a good friend made me realize my real problem (I wasn’t good at dealing with stress) that I finally began to cultivate a stronger, more resilient mindset.
That mindset helped me when, in December 2020, I had a serious stroke on my mountain bike. I had just sped down a dirt trail and was driving around a fence (okay, I could have gone faster than I should have been) when suddenly my handlebars and pedal hit the fence post. The bike stopped, but I flew over the handlebars and landed on my chest. The backpack I was wearing flew off my back and into the air. At first, I thought my team had gotten the worst of the crash (I broke my heart rate monitor and then discovered I had attached my computer and a hard drive), so I got up and flew home.
Later, I realized that my injuries were more extensive than I thought. Sure, he could still exercise (squats, deadlifts, plyometrics), but even nine months later, he still couldn’t do what he loved most: running.
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Despite my limitations, I focused on activities that I could enjoy and focused on my recovery plan. Yes, I was frustrated that I couldn’t run, but I was never down or depressed.
Look, I know my body doesn’t strengthen my mind. It is my mind that strengthens my body. And I know that mindset is what got me through that setback.
It is the same for everyone.
If you want to exercise but can’t get motivated, you need to work on your mental game. If you rule out back lifting, you should remain optimistic if you ever want to get back in the gym.
This may sound strange coming from a physical trainer, but it’s the truth: the strongest part of your body is not a muscle, it’s your mind. But don’t fool him. Some of you may see the word “mindset” or “mental focus” and instantly think of “mental health.”
Taking care of your mental health is a good thing. But that’s not what I’m talking about here. I’m talking about the mindset and approach you need to take to get fit as a man over 40. If you don’t have a plan for how he’s going to approach the next half of his life, you’re in for some tough times. Throughout this book, I’ll give you the tools you need to tackle it all with ease.
Your body after 40
by the numbers
1-3%
▲How much muscle strength and size you lose each decade (starting at age 50).
one%
▲The rate at which your cardiovascular endurance declines each year.
5%
▲The rate at which your metabolism slows down each decade after age 40.
Let’s talk about what 40 really is. Because we’re not even 40 and all of a sudden we have a lot of problems that we didn’t have yesterday. Let’s divide aging into two categories: chronological age and biological age.
Our chronological age is the number of years, months, days, hours and seconds that we have been alive. Unless we turn on the flux capacitor in our DeLorean and get that 1.21 gigawatts, it’s impossible to change our chronological age, no matter how active and healthy we are.
However, we can slow down our biological age: the measure of how much we have aged that is largely influenced by lifestyle habits. There is no simple formula that can calculate your biological age, but you can start by asking yourself a few questions: Do you exercise? Eat a healthy diet? Get enough sleep? If so, you may be biologically younger than someone who shares the same birthday with you, but doesn’t have the same healthy lifestyle.
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This book will help you turn back the clock on your biological age. Simply put, it’s about getting old, but staying young.
If you want to avoid injury, supercharge your energy, and never slow down, you’ll need to focus on more than just building muscle. Don’t get me wrong, strength is important. But before you can build strength properly, you’ll need to perfect two things you’re probably overlooking: mobility and stability.
This is why.
Our fitness declines with age
There is no way around it: we will all lose some muscle as we age. But not as much as you might think. Age-related muscle loss, known as sarcopenia, doesn’t really start for most people until they’re 50. Even then, we only tend to lose about 1% of our muscle mass and 3% of our strength each year, according to a study by researchers at McMaster University.
In my opinion, the biggest thing keeping men over 40 from staying in shape is their lifestyle. Specifically, his sedentary lifestyle. I blame computers and smartphones a lot. Don’t get me wrong: electronic media is great. But it has also given us the stooped, kyphotic posture of a Neanderthal. It’s as if we evolved to walk upright only to descend back to our stooped ancestors.
Of course, life also gets in the way. When we were younger, we might have had more time to play sports or go to the gym. Now, too many of us juggle one (or two, or three) jobs and family responsibilities, as well as cooking, cleaning, and other chores. But that doesn’t mean your health should be last on your priority list, something I see all too often.
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When your car makes a rattling noise, what do you do? Take it to a mechanic. When your sink leaks, what do you do? Call a plumber. Now what do you do when you hurt your lower back? Most people I know ignore the pain and either avoid it (trainers call this “compensating” by the way) or stop exercising altogether.
I can’t tell you how many times someone called me and said they couldn’t come to work out. They’ll say, “Coach, I sprained my ankle. I can’t exercise today.” I tell them, “Okay, today is an upper body day.”
Friends, there is never a reason to stop exercising. And it’s never too late to start. The more muscle you build now, the less you have to lose. The more you take care of your body today, the more energy you will have tomorrow. The fitter you are now, the healthier you will be in the future.
In other words, you can be over 40 years old, but if you take care of your body, you will feel much younger. And isn’t that the point, really?
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