No pain, no gain
Oxford Food & Fitness Dictionary:
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'no pain, no gain'
A phrase which encapsulates the idea that an exerciser must work hard and feel discomfort in order to improve physical fitness. In moderation, this exhortation might be a useful motivation since, for any training benefit to occur, the effort exerted during exercise must be greater than that used during normal, daily activities (see overload principle). However, the concept is sometimes taken to extremes, and a person may be encouraged to exercise beyond normal limits of tolerance, producing new injuries or aggravating pre-existing ones. A wise exerciser will listen to his or her body, and learn to distinguish between the symptoms indicating harmful overtraining and those which are the natural result of beneficial exertion. See also stretch stress.
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No pain, no gain
Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs:
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No pain, no gain
They must take pain that look for any gayn.
[1577 N. Breton Works of Young Wit 33V]
No Paines, no Gaines. If little labour, little are our gaines: Mans fortunes are according to his paines.
[1648 Herrick Hesperides 298]
For the most part they courageously accept the law of labour, No pains, no gains,—No sweat, no sweet, as the appointed law and condition of man's life.
[1853 R. C. Trench On Lessons in Proverbs iv.]
Forget the coach's rule of ‘no pain, no gain’. Today, exercise researchers are replacing it with the ‘talk rule’.
[1985 Washington Post 22 May (Health Supplement) 14]
As Peter Sacks shows‥, there is very little tolerance on the part of students for any real work; ‘no pain, no gain’ is not part of their emotional vocabulary.
[2000 M. Berman Twilight of American Culture i. 58]
Related to: wanting and having
Bibliography of major proverb collections and works cited from modern editions is available here.
American Heritage Dictionary of Idioms:
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no pain, no gain
Suffering is needed to make progress, as in I've worked for hours on those irregular French verbs, but no pain, no gain. Although this idiom is often associated with athletic coaches who urge athletes to train harder, it dates from the 1500s and was already in John Ray's proverb collection of
1670 as "Without pains, no gains."
Wikipedia on Answers.com:
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No pain, no gain
For other uses, see No pain, no gain (disambiguation).
No pain, no gain (or "No gain without pain") is an exercise motto that promises greater value rewards for the price of hard and even painful work. Under this conception competitive professionals such as athletes and artists are required to endure pain and pressure to achieve professional excellence.
It came into prominence after 1982 when actress Jane Fonda began to produce a series of aerobics workout videos. In these videos, Fonda would use "No pain, no gain" and "Feel the burn" as catchphrases for the concept of working out past the point of experiencing muscle aches.[1]
It expresses the belief that solid large muscle is the result of training hard and suffering sore muscles repeatedly, implying that those who avoid pain will never reach a professional level as bodybuilders.
In terms of the expression used for development, the discomfort caused may be beneficial in some instances while detrimental in others.
The expression has been adopted in a variety of sports and fitness activities.[when?]
David B. Morris wrote in The Scientist in 2005, "'No pain, no gain' is an American modern mini-narrative: it compresses the story of a protagonist who understands that the road to achievement runs only through hardship."[2]
Origin
A form of this expression is found in the beginning of the second century. It is an expression originating from the Faroe Islands. Rabbi Ben Hei says, "According to the pain is the gain." This was written in The Ethics of the Fathers 5:21 (known in Hebrew as Pirkei Avot) Pirkei Avot. Rabbi Ben Hei Hei was giving a spiritual lesson; no pain in doing what God commands, no spiritual gain.
One of the earliest attestations of the phrase comes from the poet Robert Herrick in his Hesperides. In the 1650 edition, a two-line poem was added:
NO PAINS, NO GAINS.
If little labour, little are our gains:
Man's fate is according to his pains.— Hesperides 752.[3]
A version of the phrase was crafted by Benjamin Franklin in 1734 in his persona of Poor Richard, to illustrate the axiom "God helps those who help themselves":
Industry need not wish, as Poor Richard says, and he that lives upon hope will die fasting. There are no gains, without pains...
— as reprinted in his The Way to Wealth (1758)[4]
References
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Look up no pain, no gain in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. |
- ^ "No Pain, No Gain". The American College of Foot & Ankle Orthopedics & Medicine. September 22, 2002. http://www.acfaom.org/pain.shtml. Retrieved 2008-03-24.
- ^ David B. Morris (March 28, 2005). "Belief and Narrative". The Scientist 19 (Sup. 1). http://www.the-scientist.com/2005/03/28/S14/1/.
- ^ Herrick, Robert; Alfred Pollardi, ed. (1898). The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2. London: Lawrence & Bullen. Vol. 2, 66 & 320. http://www.gutenberg.org/files/22421/22421-h/ii.html#p752.
- ^ Franklin, Benjamin (1758). The Way To Wealth. http://itech.fgcu.edu/faculty/wohlpart/alra/franklin.htm#Way.
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Copyrights:
Oxford Food & Fitness Dictionary
Food and Fitness: A Dictionary of Diet and Exercise. Copyright © 1997, 2003 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.
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Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs
The Oxford Dictionary of Proverbs. Copyright © 1982, 1992, 1998, 2003, 2004 by Oxford University Press. All rights reserved.
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American Heritage Dictionary of Idioms
The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer. Copyright © 1997 by The Christine Ammer 1992 Trust. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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