Matter

The millennial-driven fitness industry often positions exercise as a kind of second job, in which we should “optimize” our workouts and forever strive to go faster and harder while meticulously tracking the results.

The human animal now lives in a strange and unfamiliar world. Our bodies, sculpted by millions of years of evolution, are not just ancient. They are prehistorical. Our anatomy, physiology, and psychology are adapted to life in a wild, outdoor environment. At our core, we are hunters and gatherers, primed for life in natural habitat. But today we’re

Okay, so exercise is paradoxical: salubrious but abnormal, intrinsically free but highly commodified, a source of pleasure and health but a cause of discomfort, guilt, and opprobrium. Why did this realization motivate me to write this book? And why might you wish to read it?