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PaperclipPerfector  2d ago (text post)   824 thread views

Wellness Wednesday for November 5, 2025

The Wednesday Wellness threads are meant to encourage users to ask for and provide advice and motivation to improve their lives. It isn't intended as a 'containment thread' and any content which could go here could instead be posted in its own thread. You could post:

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I wanted to discuss this article and what it misses.

The core thesis of the article is this:

It’s actually really simple to get jacked. That’s not to say it’s easy- just that the complexity of the challenge is trivial, requiring only time and energy to succeed.

Think of getting jacked as something like this formula: GettingJacked = TIME * (.6X + .3Y + .1Z) X is your adherence to primary concepts, y is your adherence to secondary concepts, and z is your adherence to tertiary concepts. Primary and secondary concepts are a collection of just a handful of relatively simple ideas that require little financial investment. If you just focused on these, you would find getting jacked to be relatively straightforward. But tertiary concepts, predominantly supplements, are innumerable, complex, and require tons of money.

His primary concepts are progressive overload, training to (near) failure, eating enough protein, and cutting a low body fat. His secondary concepts are Compound lifts, optimal set numbers, and following a lifting program. The tertiary ones are essentially everything else, calling out trends or minor issues.

I think the article itself is kind of confused, why is following a lifting program a secondary concept but going to a class or working with a trainer is a tertiary one? But those are minor quibbles.

The real term in the equation I want to talk about is TIME. It's the unexamined assumption underlying the whole article, and a lot of "common sense" lifting/workout advice you see online. I want to examine that unexamined assumption.

Time as the author looks at is really combined with the word "adherence" used later, so it's something like "time adhering to a plan/program." Adherence is almost never 100%, even professional athletes don't always do every written rep of every written set in every written workout they planned across a multi-month program. Things happen. 70-95% program adherence is pretty typical informally for people who say they "completed" a program block. Anything over 60% adherence is pretty much "doing" the workout plan.

My learned friend in argument @sapph (no o) talked here about this comment discussing the idea that life is about doing 100 things every day that you don't want to do. Sapph says:

I have no idea why ideas like "Life is about doing 100 things every single day that you don’t want to do." became so popular in the culture. Of course people don't always follow the advice but people most do accept that success is largely about enduring hardship...There is a logic to all of this but other points of view used to be more common. In Rock Climbing you still see people talking about the importance of "being psyched". Being excited and energized, having fun. Its a lot easier to put in the time if you don't actually need to expend much effort. No one thinks it wont hurt sometimes. You are gonna fall and your fingers will bleed. But its just a completely different way of relating to your goals. The most important thing is to stay psyched.

And that's my jumping off point for what I think is missing: for the formula above for GettingJacked, or for any other similar goal, it's important not to treat time and adherence as black boxes, that just need to be brute forced through. ChaoticNeutral views the world in that way: lifting is simple, and maybe or probably unpleasant, but you need to apply willpower to it so as to maximize time and adherence and thereby achieve the goal. At this point in my life, I can reasonably say I've been lifting for the better part of 15 years, and more and more I react against that style, instead choosing like Sapph to constantly chase a new thing I'm stoked about.

I don't seek to optimize my program around adherence to the xyz principles at all, but instead on maximizing the TIME I put in by choosing a workout I'm stoked about. For some time like Sapph that was rock climbing for me, lately it's been new sports like jiu jitsu and long distance bicycle rides. But often it's just a matter of picking a new lift, or a new program, or a new implement like a heavy kettlebell or landmine. Picking a new game for me always ends up looking like having four or five new ideas, and trying them all at once until I see which one sticks.

And while I'm not a competitor in any sport, I'm reasonably proud of the shape I'm in. More and more I notice my friends falling off, and I think a big part of it is that attitude that places fitness and athletics in that "100 things you don't like but have to do" category.

The irony that I think causes the disconnect is that for a certain mindset, what gets them stoked about a workout program is exactly the thought that they are following an optimal program, or the minimal effective dose.

But I think a lot of people get stuck on that simple-but-difficult formula, banging their head against the wall, because they think that the only way to solve the problem is to apply more willpower. There's a tendency to refuse to try other things, or pay for other things, out of a kind of ascetic sense that it isn't necessary. But that's wrongheaded: the thing that makes you stoked about working out is nearly always worth it. The value of being in shape is nearly inevitably higher than the cost, and if being stoked is what you need it is what you need.

Or maybe I'm completely wrong. Maybe I'm weird in that I do enjoy working out in a reasonably-decent way, and most people don't, no matter what they try.

There are alternative views.

Which is why I struggle when I hear of people that talk about how much they enjoy training, as, to me, it’s a sign of ineffective training. In total “no true Scotsman” form, enjoyable training can’t be effective, because effective training ISN’T enjoyable. If one is enjoying their training, they are not doing what training is meant to do: specifically, make one big and strong. Primarily because the body grows bigger and stronger in response to trauma. And yeah, science is telling us it’s not about microtears anymore (so I hear), but the fact remains that body grows bigger and stronger in response to a DEMAND placed upon it to grow bigger and stronger, and the only reason such a demand can be placed upon the body is for the body to experience discomfort and trauma. And, quite frankly, if you ENJOY discomfort and trauma, you are a literal masochist.

Fun is one thing, being stoked is another. See also type 1 2 and 3 fun.

I don't want to get into an argument with an absent third party about what he enjoys. But...he's obviously lying if he says he doesn't enjoy lifting weights. He might have found some way to influencer his way to some money out of lifting now, but he did a whole lot of lifting before ever reaching a point where he could make a dime, and even now it is probably just a hobby. If he didn't enjoy doing it at some level, he wouldn't do it. If he wasn't stoked about it, about reaching his lifting goals, he wouldn't do it. I've read his posts before, he often works out multiple times a day, and he's not a real competitor in any serious lifting series. He's doing this because he loves it, because he is stoked about it. He just likes bitching about how much he hates squats because he finds that kind of negativity to be more serious or whatever.

I'm stoked about jiu jitsu. That doesn't mean I'm constantly smiling doing jiu jitsu, or that it is always fun. There's a lot of times I'm not having fun. Six months ago it was even less fun. But I'm interested in reaching my goals, so that even when I'm cooked and my muscles are exhausted and I'm pinned under some gorilla who is trying to smother me, I'm still stoked to keep showing up, every day that I can, so that I can get better. The stoke is what gets me through the unpleasantness. If I just did unpleasant things for no reason, I'd be a literal masochist.

So like, yeah, I can picture a hypothetical person who just fucks around doing the "fun parts" without ever doing the unpleasant training parts. That's good advice for people like that.

But I know a lot of people who just don't work out at all. Those who keep starting a program they don't like working toward a goal they don't really care about, and give up after a few weeks every time. Those people need to try other advice than "do what sucks."

He might have found some way to influencer his way to some money out of lifting now, but he did a whole lot of lifting before ever reaching a point where he could make a dime

I'm pretty sure he doesn't make a penny from this.

If he didn't enjoy doing it at some level, he wouldn't do it. If he wasn't stoked about it, about reaching his lifting goals, he wouldn't do it.

I think he likes achieving his goals, but he doesn't like the process at all. I don't see why that should be impossible.

I don't really think it's possible to "enjoy" doing a program like deep water, even if you enjoy achieving your goals.

I'm pretty sure he doesn't make a penny from this.

I didn't think so, but I haven't been reading lifting blogs for a while, so I didn't want to make an assumption.

I think he likes achieving his goals, but he doesn't like the process at all. I don't see why that should be impossible.

That's pretty much what I'm getting at when I talk about being "stoked" on something. Being interested in it and finding meaning in it.

I don't really think it's possible to "enjoy" doing a program like deep water, even if you enjoy achieving your goals.

I would guess that the majority of people who have done deep water enjoyed lifting at some level, because almost none of them got anything useful out of it.

Maybe they were all cumming day and night

Unfortunately, when it comes to high rep squats, the COOM feeling from the pump is overwhelmed by the sensation of having been hit by a truck.

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