Focus On the Big Picture

My mom always told me that if you worry about the pennies the dollars will take care of themselves. This saying is true for financial conversations as well as exercise and nutrition. I’m amazed at how conversations related to exercise and nutrition are often dominated by details. When I try bringing the conversation back to fundamental or core aspects, people get disinterested or act like I’m talking about things that don’t apply to them. For example, go into a room with a group of young guys who are doing resistance and want to increase their muscle mass and the conversation will center almost exclusively upon what exercises they are doing or what supplement they are taking. The same thing would hold true for woman where the conversation will more likely focus on what diet they are trying or food they heard was bad. Women, to their credit, don’t typically get as hell bent over what exercises they are doing as men do.

What’s wrong with these conversations? Something is wrong when the conversation is dominated by a small detail, that in the end may or may not be making a difference, when more focus and attention should be made on a bigger aspect of things. Still not with me? If there are ten guys in that room, seven or eight of them should worry more about their commitment to their program than what exercise they should be doing. These same guys will banter back and forth about how this chest exercise works this part of your pec, but in the same light don’t train their back as hard or as frequently and forget about training their legs at all and if they do a couple of sets of leg extensions, leg curls and calf raises will do. Yet they aren’t growing, and it must be that chest exercise that’s the reason—it couldn’t be their lack of proper nutrition, supplementation, water or rest?

When it comes to supplementation, too much emphasis is made on what amino acid, nitric oxide booster or how much protein they are taking in, when their diet and other recovery efforts are complete garbage. We’ll be the first to tell you to save your money first and take some time and figure out ways to plug the holes in your diet. No breakfast, not sleeping enough, not sure what fresh produce means, etc, then you need to worry more about these things first. I know the guys at 1st Phorm very well, and I can tell you that even though they would like everyone in the world to use and buy their products, they want you to get the most out of it and to do this you have to clean up your diet, train regularly, etc FIRST (which they’ll be the first to tell you). While products like Level-1, Phormula-1 and Ignition can and should be core aspects to your program, you have to make sure other aspects are covered first. People don’t like this when I say it, but nutritional supplementation infers you are adding to something, like your diet or a regular training program. Sure, it’s not the sexiest or edgiest advice in the world, but hopefully makes some sense.