I’m thinking about working out to get more fit, but compared to my 20s, I feel my perspective has changed. As a younger man I was into getting big...looking swole, lifting more, more, more, etc. [insert typical misc bro/cool language].

But is working out to look different a form of mental illness like BDD? It seems tons of younger men (even some into their 60s or 70s like Stallone) are really into bodybuilding...many to the point of cramming in high amounts of calories for months or even years, tracking macros, cutting diets to look ripped, bulking diets to get larger, hitting the gym almost daily, risking injury and even manipulating hormone levels.

But what motivates this desire to look different...is it INSECURITY at the core?

Now don’t get me wrong, those who are overweight have a legit reason to change their body...because it’s unhealthy. Those participating in competitive sports may also work out to a degree where body changes give a competitive advantage. But what about those millions of regular Joes with perfectly healthy BMIs that are laser focused on achieving more prominent musculature/symmetry on every part of their body simply to look different...more attractive in their mind...more intimidating in their mind, etc?

Is it mentally healthy to dedicate so much time/money/energy to working out/dieting/supplementing simply to LOOK a different way as the main goal?

Mental illness is a scale not binary and relates to how adversely it affects your life and those of the people around you. Based on that information, it should be pretty easy to say that there are bb-ers who are mentally ill, and those who are not.

Yes getting healthier and stronger is mental illness.

Go lay on your couch and watch sports like a normal well adjusted male in clown world.

This is mental illness

Does making a decision to change one’s appearance via years of weight lifting, diet manipulation, supplementation move one in thedirectionof mental illness?

Vanity/narcissim is degen cope.

Working on your body for health and strength ain't.

no, but the bodybuilding/fitness world definitely attracts people that are a few screws short of a hardware store

I wouldn't say working out is... but obviously the guys who are 5'8 who are taking everything they can get their on hands on to be a bloated 250 lbs have some serious issue akin to women and anorexia. If your originally driving motivation is something to do with your looks but you keep going past the point of being optimal aesthetic then yes you probably have some mental health issues.

It would seem to me that desires related in any way to changing APPEARANCE (while having a normal/healthy body) have something to do with insecurity.

I wanna be 250lb bloated but its not due to insecurities or mental illness. I just like the look and the training that goes with it. I enjoy my life, i don't diet etc

So you have a hang up about not looking “right” until your arbitrary standard of perfection is met?

No it's like remodeling your house

I'm 100% happy with how I look and I don't see "250lb bloated" as perfection. I just said I enjoy the training and the look

It's interesting the correlation of people who say things like this to people that don't have avi's.

no, maintaining your health, cause life isn't stagnant.

but i guess it could be

I think the irony of it is that it rarely starts off that way but it can definitely mutate into something really unhealthy both mentally and physically. The thing is it can happen so slowly that the guys (and some girls) trapped in this viscous cycle of chasing an impossible moving target start to take increasingly extreme measures but aren't even aware of how out of hand it's gotten. Worst of all is that all of the effort, sacrifices and stupid risks have only resulted in them being LESS happy with themselves than before they started.

a good physique is a side effect of living healthily, i.e. good diet and regular exercise

when health is deliberately compromised to attain a certain look then i think it dips into a form self harm , like alcohol, drug abuse and smoking

I like lifting weight as a natural stress relief since I dont have sex frequently (LTR)

The body improvements are a side-effect but as a natty to be honest I'm not expecting to walk around looking like Arnold any time soon lmao. My goal in life is to be in the top percentiles in everything and with something like 75% of men being overweight and looking like chit its not as hard as it sounds. I think its pretty achievable to be top <5% physiques natty so thats what I focus on.

Fitness world seems to attract alot of people with severe insecurities and issues. I was a chubby kid, couldn't get laid in high school, and i gravitated towards that community as a means to an end...and it worked. Working out to change your appearance is great, so long as it isn't taken overboard. I owe at least of half of my success in life to the gym teaching me how to set goals and being relentless towards achieving said goals. It isn't mental illness but hopping on tech and getting absolutely cut out of your fuking gourd is. I think there is a fine like between self improvement and overboard that shouldn't be crossed.

Yes, to your average person a bodybuilder is mentally ill. To a bodybuilder, the average person is mentally ill.

Could one live healthily (healthy BMI) with a good diet/regular exercise while not caring at all about changing their appearance? Like no thoughts given to anything to change their look. It would seem like that would be the definition of being secure in who you are.

The person with the healthy BMI that becomes laser focused on lifting weights, learning bodybuilding, macros, bulk/cut diets, supplements, etc with a preoccupation for changing their appearance seems to reek of insecurity on some level.

I just need to get a little bigger...and bigger...and bigger....then people will respect me....then girls will like me...then I’ll get reassurance that I look good, etc.

In reality a normal/average/healthy body is probably looks far closer to say Adam Sandler after a few months of cardio than anything approaching say the The Rock.

In my younger years I was very obsessed.

Now I train 2x per week full body with 1 to 2 sets to failure or close to. Only thing I track is protein and my performance in the gym.

I'm super stoked with my physique and my strength levels and legit don't care that I won't be making any significant progress anytime soon.

It all just depends..

When I lived with my cousin and her family, her husband used to spit in my food and punch me in the face. I got into bodybuilding and got stronger to the point where I could overpower him and beat him up. For me, getting stronger was a means to an end.

Being attractive and strong fits in with our biological imperative to attract prime glow sloots to impregnate.

Injecting yourself with hormones that you know will negatively impact other parts of you life to impress other gay men is a mental illness though.

Are most bodybuilders (aside from those possibly doing it strictly for money/fame) insecure on some level?

I mean just think about it— a healthy/normal looking person decides for whatever reason their life will be better by looking a certain way and then proceeds to spend years slaving away in the gym (even going when they don’t really want to), untold hours reading/learning/discussing how to get bigger, manipulating their diet FAR beyond what it would otherwise be, etc.

It seems like most anyone who identifies body building as something they do is venturing in the direction of mental illness. Perhaps they don’t have it, but they are going in that direction.

On the other end of the spectrum you have just fat slobs that care nothing about appearance.

Somewhere in the middle are the people who work out to feel better/more limber without giving much thought to changing how their body looks.

Yes you are right and any other answer is cope..but then again this is BB.com. I am referring strictly to someone wanting to change the way they look / how they see themselves / how others see them etc. The chances of that being somebody's reason for bodybuilding, I'd wager, is much higher than they would admit

For you getting stronger was sorta the same deal as an NBA player getting their legs stronger so they can jump higher. In the situation you describe, you were seeking a distinct competitive advantage...not simply dedicating untold hours to changing your looks.

I guess I can only speak for myself. I started lifting weights to get a better body to get girls if I am being completely honest no other reason. I was 155 lbs at 5'10 and average looking or a little below average looking, probably peaked aesthetically at a lean 185-190 lbs... hung around there for a couple years and it worked but the addiction kicked in and did various cycles and got up to 240 lbs and it was harder to get girls again, definitely wasn't as aesthetic as I was at a lower weight and started having various issues sleeping and with my health (im sure drug related rather than weight related) it's like why was I doing it? I only stopped when I got injured, got away from the gym for a bit and had some time to reflect.

But if your goal from the start is to be massive and strong and just dominate everything physically then yeah going out there and achieving that can be great I'm sure.

I depends. Excessive vanity is a bad thing.

But working out to look and feel healthier, to push yourself mentally and physically, will ultimately be a great attribute.

Mental illness is when you think you need to take drugs to look good, become obsessed with little things to "look good," or never be positive about how you look despite making great progress.

Advanced humans want everything to be aesthetic, including themselves. Dumbass.