+1: #440 Exercise vs. Zoloft

You're listening to the Optymyze with Brian Johnson podcast. Unlock the full Optimize experience and join over 10,000 premium members at Optimize Me. Hi, this is Brian. Welcome back to another Optimize plus one. We've talked about how exercise is kind of like taking a little bit of Ritalin and a little bit of Prozac. But somehow we've gotten this far into our plus one series without talking about the fact that exercise is as effective as Zoloft in reducing depression. Get this in the how of Happiness. Sony Lyubomirsky walks us through a little experiment. Bring clinically depressed individuals into a lab. Split them into three groups. The first group is assigned to four months of aerobic exercise, while the second group gets an antidepressant medication, in this case zoloft, and the third group gets both. The exercise group does three 45 minute sessions per week of cycling or walking, jogging at a moderate to high intensity. Fast forward four months. As Sonia says, remarkably, by the end of the four month intervention period, all three groups had experienced their depression's lift and reported fewer dysfunctional attitudes and increased happiness and self esteem. Aerobic exercise, she says, was just as effective at treating depression as was Zoloft or a combination of exercise and Zoloft. Yet exercise is a lot less expensive, usually with no side effects apart from soreness. Perhaps even more remarkably, six months later, participants who had remitted or recovered from their depressions were less likely to relapse if they had been in the exercise group six months ago than if they had been in the medication group. She continues by saying, no one in our society needs to be told that exercise is good for us. Whether you are overweight or have a chronic illness or are a slim couch potato, you've probably heard or read this dictum countless times throughout your life. But she says, has anyone told you, indeed guaranteed you that regular physical activity will make you happier? I swear by it. So anytime one of the leading conservative scientists in the field guarantees anything, I sit up straight and pay attention. And in this case, I put on my shoes and hit the trail. So today's plus one. How's your exercise looking these days? What's your favorite form of exercise today? A good day to have fun. Rocking that. See you on the trail. Hey, this is Brian with a quick question for you. Do you know what the word optimize literally means? It's from the Latin optimus, which means the best. In our case, we're talking about helping you create the best version of you. So another quick question. What's the best version of you look like? How does that version of you show up in the world? Helping you be that version of yourself all day, every day is what our Optimize membership program is all about. Now we obviously give away a ton of content for free and we give our 10,000 plus premium members a ton more members get hundreds of Philosopher's Notes which are 20 minute book summaries that help you apply the best big ideas from the best optimal living books to your life today. Plus members get dozens of hour long optimal living 101 masterclasses, more wisdom in less time for your busy life on everything from the science of setting and achieving goals, how to optimize your energy via the fundamentals of nutrition, movement, sleep and meditation, and how to be super productive day in and day out. While of course enjoying the whole process. Every facet of your life optimized equals you at your absolute best.