BAD MAC N’ CHEESE/GOOD CHEESY POTATOES: A MATTER OF CONTEXT

Allow me to tell you a story, dear reader.  Really, what choice do you have?  It’s my blog.  But anyway, once, I attended the wedding of my wife’s cousin (which I suppose makes that my cousin-in-law), and during the reception, we found ourselves eating in a very dimly lit room.  The buffet line and seating/eating area was also functioning as the dance floor, and there was a desire for dark lighting to support a discoball/glowlights sorta arrangement (this was the aughts: raves were still cool).  In turn, I had a plateful of food that I had a vauge idea of what it was, but couldn’t actually see what I was putting on my fork and bringing to my mouth.  For the most part, my instincts held true: what I thought was chicken turned out to be chicken, the bread roll was, in fact, a bread roll, the corn was corn.  But then, upon taking a mouthful of, as Paul Kelso referred to them in Powerlifitng Basics Texas Style, a UFO (unidentified fried object), I leaned over to my wife and expressed to her “This is the WORST macaroni and cheese I’ve ever had”, to which my wife dutifully informed me “Those are cheesy potatoes.”  Upon receiving this information, I re-evaluated my experience and said to my wife “In that case, they’re quite good!” 

Although I don't claim to be the expert

 

Isn’t that interesting?  My initial experience was one wherein I was disappointed, borderline disgusted, and ready to stop eating the food, but upon reframing the context, suddenly an entirely new evaluation was rendered and I found in myself a new resolve to finish my meal.  Literally nothing had changed: there was simply a new context that the situation was being evaluated under.  And for another goofy example I’m a big fan of: have you ever taken the time to realize that Christian Hell is Viking Heaven?  In Dante’s Inferno, those who committed sins of anger/rage are sentenced to the fourth circle of Hell, wherein they fight against each other in a constant physical battle, only to be dismembered, die, and reborn again…kinda like how good little Vikings who die valiantly in battle are rewarded with entry to Valhalla, wherein they spend their days in perpetual battle, being dismembered and regenerated just to do it all over again.  I actually wonder if it’s the exact same place, and some folks are miserable while others can’t contain their smiles, but, yet again: context matters.

 

And if it’s true in matters of cuisine or the afterlife, it’s fair to appreciate that it’s true universally, yet that is a statement that many trainees in the quest of physical transformation tend to take significant umbrage with.  Context is frustrating because it eliminates the possibility of a simple answer.  We want to know the BEST program and the BEST diet…but best for who?  For when?  Under what circumstances?  UNDER WHAT CONTEXT?  That should be the most immediate follow-up whenever ANY statement is made regarding the process of physical transformation: under WHAT context?  I see trainees say that there IS an optimal number of worksets to accomplish the goal of hypertrophy, and I immediately must ask “under what context?”  Optimal for WHO?  For everyone?  Yeah, I doubt that.  The parent of a newborn that is getting 8 hours of sleep a week is going to have SIGNIFICANTLY different recovery abilities compared to the state sponsored 18 year old whose literal profession is lifting weights.  To say nothing of the fact that the dude with an 800lb deadlift isn’t going to hammer 8 worksets with 70% of his 1rm like newcomer Johnny with a 200lb deadlift.  The latter can knock out that workout and go have a fun Friday night, while the former just called into work on Monday and said they weren’t going to make it in because they’re going to be sick.  Meanwhile, you take these same two athletes and tell them to do just ONE workset to get some gains, and the first dude is going to absolutely CRUSH that goal and be just fine, while the second guy simply lacks the ability to dig that deep and get that outcome.  One NEEDS that volume, because they lack the tool of intensity, whereas the other has the skillset to employ either metric but, in turn, they will employ them DIFFERENTLY compared to one who does not.

Probably gonna need a few more sets

 

“A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down” is cute…unless you’re a diabetic.  Once again: context matters.  In the realm of nutrition this is INCREDIBLY true.  Because, quite simply, the best diet plan in the world sucks if you cannot COMPLY with it.  Some folks are natural abstainers: they’re better at simply eliminating entire foods from their diet, rather than including everything in small, reasonable regular occurrences.  Some folks are the opposite: moderators.  They’re really good at achieving balance, and as soon as you tell them “you can’t have X”, that’s ALL they want to have.  Knowing this about yourself is crucial for determining your success with a nutritional intervention: if you have to “white knuckle it”, to quote Vinnie Tortorich, you’re going to fail, because a diet based on willpower is going to eventually run out of willpower, and then the inevitable binge hits.  The best nutritional protocol is the one you don’t have to think about.

 

And in that regard, you have to think about what you don’t have to think about.  Are you the kind of person that NEEDS data in order to continue on?  This applies to nutrition AND training.  Some folks NEED to see spreadsheets and trackers and stats and facts and figures: they don’t want ANY mystery.  The unknown and uncontrolled terrifies them.  Other people are the opposite: they become obsessive ones numbers are introduced, and they need to be cut free of them in order to maintain their sanity.  If you try to prescribe an If It Fits Your Macros type approach to someone that is a natural abstainer that hates numbers because you feel it’s “the best”, you’re completely ignoring the context of your recommendation, similar to if you recommend a carnivore style “eat meat until you’re full” approach to someone who just got bit by the lone star tick.

There is a fair bet that THIS Tick doesn't have a beef allergy

 

But much like my experience with the cheesy potatoes, this should NOT be upsetting news at all, but, instead, bring you much delight.  There ARE no bad decisions: there are simply ones inappropriate for the context.  In our quest to say “good program”, “bad program”, “good diet”, “bad diet” in order to try to achieve simplicity, where forgot there is an even simpler answer: all of them are good: they may simply not be good for THIS specific circumstance.  When we find a method, rather than try to evaluate if the method is good, we evaluate if it fits OUR needs at that time.  3x a week lifting 30 minutes a day may sound like a sub-optimal method when trying to achieve the next Mr. Olympia, but if that’s what we have time for in our lives, it’s ABSOLUTELY the most optimal approach possible.  Hardboiled eggs and jerky from a gas station may sound like a poor nutritional approach, until we consider we’ve been traveling for 36 hours and this is the first food we’ve had in that time, in which case it’s excellent.  As far as Mac n Cheese goes, these choices are awful…but they make EXCELLENT cheesy potatoes.