Black or White Thinking and What Works Vs. What is Optimal

The fitness industry loves extremes. It's more common to find black and white patterns of thinking than it is to find those who think in shades of gray.

I get asked a lot of fitness questions, and by far my most common response is "it depends". People don't like that answer because it means there is not a simple yes or no answer, no black or white divide. "It depends" means people have to think, to consider the context, and to consider the advantages/disadvantages of either end of the spectrum.

Black or white thinking leads people away from finding realistic and honest answers to their questions because, ironically, the truth is usually somewhere in the middle.

It's hard to blame fitness enthusiasts, especially competitors, for being extreme. Competitors are some of the most determined, driven, and strong-willed people, traits that are hard to come by in the general population. They don't make excuses, and they're willing to do whatever it takes. But that "whatever it takes" attitude is ultimately their downfall.

On a quest to find "the best meal plan", "the best lift for big delts", or "the best cardio for fat loss", it's easy to get suckered in to gurus selling snake oil. Just look at all the myths in the fitness industry: you have to eat clean to see results (FALSE); you have to cut carbs to lose fat (FALSE); you have to eat fish and asparagus for contest prep (FALSE); you can't eat past 7:00 pm (FALSE); you have to eat every 2-3 hours (FALSE); you must do fasted cardio to get lean (FALSE); low reps for bulking and high reps for cutting (FALSE). And the list goes on...

Do many of these bullshit protocols work? Sure, but they "work" in spite of themselves, not because they are overall "good" strategies. This leads me to what works vs. what is optimal.

Training and nutrition are a science, and research provides evidence to support what is optimal. If there is no science behind the approach, it is more than likely sub-optimal. Just because it "works" does not mean it is an optimal approach.

Quick fixes, short cuts, and extreme approaches are not sustainable. If you cannot sustain it, whatever results you do achieve will be short lived. If you want sustainable results, the approach is somewhere in the middle, not an extreme at either end of the spectrum.

Bodybuilding is not a sport where more is better. It's a sport where better is better. I encourage each of you to not ask "what works?" but to ask "what is optimal?"