Thousands of years before crossfit, Pelaton, steroids, pre-workout
supplements, Fitbits, and infomercials for workout gizmos like Total Gym, there
were only The Basics.
Uhhh...no.
Recognize bullshit when you see it.
If you’ve been alive 25 years or more you’ve seen quite a few fads come and go. Especially around the new year a host of articles and online discussions center on the NEW: new workouts, new “super foods” and more.
What you may have also noticed is that people who got all excited about these things last year are no longer doing them this year. That’s what a fad is all about —a temporary popular thing.
I have a friend who throughout the years bought into a lot of fads. He installed a floatation tank in his man cave. He extolled the virtues of coffee enemas, of taking as supplements oregano and capsasin, of drinking distilled water, then alkaline water, eating carob instead of chocolate, gorging on quinoa and flax seed, swearing off meat for a while—you get the picture.
On the TV show Mad Men, Don Draper says something to the effect that “the greatest idea ever conceived in advertising was the word ‘new’”. I agree, as little piques our interest more than something new and different and shiny that promises to change things up for us. We’re always searching for the latest and greatest, and sometimes we actually do find the latest thing beneficial.
Lifting weighted objects to build and sculpt muscle has been around since the ancient Greeks, as can be seen in 2500 year old statues in our museums. So has eating basic foods like meat, fruits and vegetables and grains. These are basics because they’ve always worked. There’s nothing wrong with investigating the shiny and new, but the next time you’re tempted, recall in your own personal experience how many of these that may have once caught your eye have since faded away with time, while the basics endure.
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