Sit, Stand, Repeat: Why the Squat Is Non-Negotiable

You squat more than you think. Every time you sit down in a chair or stand back up out of one, that's a squat. It's the second movement on my list of the 7 functional movements everyone should master, and it might be the one with the biggest payoff for the least effort.

A strong squat pattern makes ordinary life easier: walking, climbing stairs, getting off the floor. It strengthens the hips and glutes, which helps protect the SI joint as you age, and it drives bone density gains that help fend off osteopenia and osteoporosis, especially for women. That's not a small thing — up to 58% of adults over 65 die within a year of a hip fracture. A big part of preventing that outcome is staying strong enough, right now, to catch yourself if you stumble.

You don't need a barbell to start. Add 10 bodyweight squats to your morning routine this week, then 10 more the week after, building up over the course of a month. Once that feels easy, start layering in variations — goblet squats, split squats, tempo work — to keep challenging the pattern.

It's no accident the squat shows up in nearly every session of the workout program, from Phase 1 all the way through Phase 3. Check out the Squat page for the full breakdown of why this one movement carries so much weight (pun intended).