IT WILL WORK UNTIL IT DOESN’T

The title of today’s post comes as an answer I provided to a question that I ended up being pretty proud of.  It was the typical “here is my laundry list of sets, reps and exercises: is it good?” and my answer was “it will work until it doesn’t”…and that is true of everything.  Literally everything will work until it doesn’t: the only difference is simply that some things work LONGER than others.  To the point that some things stop working instantly: they never get off the runway, but they DID work up until the moment that they didn’t.  It just so happens that the time of their not working had a direct overlap with the time of them working.  Other methods can work damn near indefinitely; relying purely on the ability off the trainee to maintain compliance and health.  In turn, when analyzing the effectiveness of a strategy, it’s foolish to ask “will this work”, instead one must ask “what will be the thing that makes this STOP working?”

I am sure the first 39 English soldiers wondered that very thing about this one viking at Stamford bridge

Here’s a classic example: Soviet programming.  Man, growing up I was told that Soviet programming was quite the bee’s pajamas when it came to being effective.  The Soviets were CRUSHING the world of sports in their prime, completely untouchable, and, in turn, any young trainee champing at the bit to get bigger, stronger and better, owed it to themselves to undertake some Soviet programming.  What did this programming entire? VERY rigid structures, precise percentages, and an unnatural ability to recovery through training, facilitated by state sponsored lifestyles and other unnatural means.  Will Soviet programming work?  It sure will: right up until the point that it doesn’t.  For the average trainee, that may mean it’ll work until the time that their kid’s birthday happens to fall on squat day, or they buy a new puppy and can’t get a solid 8 hours of sleep for a few weeks, or they experience even the most minor of injury.  No one disputes that the programming works: what gets disputed is what it takes to make it STOP working.

Will low carb work?  High carb?  Paleo?  Gallon of Milk a Day?  Yes, they will ALL work: right up until the moment that they don’t.  And herein things go twofold, because a diet “working” also depends on the goals of the trainee.  Gallon of milk a day works if one’s goal is to put on mass: it works less if one’s goal is to put on purely lean mass, and it rarely works if one’s goal is to lose weight.  So sometimes the reason a diet “stops working” has nothing to do with the diet but, instead, the goals change.  What was once a working diet no longer works, with zero changes to the diet at all.  And all that aside, the truth is, almost every eating strategy works, primarily BECAUSE it is an eating strategy.  Most folks HAVE no strategy when they eat: they just put whatever food sounds the yummiest into their face until they physically cannot eat more of it, and then they lament how they can’t lose weight.  If you are paying even the slightest attention to what you are eating: you’re ahead.

Although I'd rather you pay attention to the goddamn road

I used a bodybuilding program (DoggCrapp) before my first powerlifting meet.  Did it work?  Hell yeah it did: set my all time highest bench in a meet with that program.  It worked all the way up until when I wanted to drop a weight class, and then it didn’t work and I had to do something else that worked until it didn’t.  And this marks my entire training history.  It’s always a matter of things working until they don’t, and when they don’t work anymore I can either stubbornly keep doing it while it doesn’t work, change it until it DOES work, or do something else entirely that will work until it doesn’t.  Of those 3, the first one is the stupidest, while the other 2 are far less stupid choices.  So if you’re a fan of not being stupid (and based off my time on the internet, MANY people pride themselves on how not stupid they are), take that under consideration.

“How do I know if it’s working?”  Ok, I take back my previous comments about you not being stupid now, because you’re stupid if you asked that question.  How do you know if a program or diet is working?  By the RESULTS.  No: not the results IN the training.  It’s not about how you feel DURING the workout: are you achieving your goals OUTSIDE of training?  Are you getting bigger/stronger/leaner/faster/better/etc etc?  If yes: its working!  If not: it has stopped working.  We’ve run our course, and it worked until it stopped.  Now is the time to move on.

 
I'm all about moving on and not sticking with things well past the point where they no longer work

But there’s so much JOY to be had in “it will work until it doesn’t”, because this means one no longer needs to strain themselves looking for the holy grail of a working program/diet: they ALL work.  Some simply work better or longer than others.  But what’s great about a short working approach is that you can quickly abandon it and move on to a different approach until you finally find one that works for a long time, and then you can just ride that out until it doesn’t work.  However, this is going to require the one thing that many of the people asking “will this work” hate to employ: critical thinking.  You can’t just pick a program and follow it mindlessly, to say nothing of just putting numbers in an app or excel sheet and shut off your brain.  Nope: you’re going to have to actually evaluate if you are PROGRESSING in your approach.  And if you are, that’s awesome.  If you’re not: it sounds like it stopped working.  Cool: now go do something else that works until it doesn’t.