Majoring in the Minors
The problem with health influencers today
A couple of weeks ago at work, we were writing sales emails and honing in on how sentences were written. We were getting hyper-fixated on singular words, where they were placed in the sentence, and how spaces were used. My team and I ended up scheduling an hour call to critique and re-write each other's work.
After the call, I thought, damn, we spent all that time hyper-fixated on everything that was wrong with what we wrote, versus pointing out what was written well. Even worse, we spent an hour critiquing an email assuming it wasn’t going to work versus… actually sending emails to test if they would work.
It got me thinking about how, generally, no matter the pursuit, people tend to hyper-fixate on minor details versus focusing on actually performing the fundamentals. Sure, details are important, whether that is with sales emails, exercises, or food choices. But the problem is, most people don’t do the basics consistently well enough to warrant getting caught up in the details.
In sales, it’s showing up every day, making phone calls, sending emails, getting rejected - day after day after day, until finally, you see get rewarded for your persistence. In the wellness space, being a zealot drives clicks. The most extreme people on both ends of the health spectrum draw attention, traffic, and clicks. The result tends to be a populace who is thoroughly confused about what is right and what is wrong.
For people who don’t enjoy learning about health and wellness, like our parent's generation or people who are set in their ways, these polarizing viewpoints we see on social media do the only thing worse than blindly following bad habits - shut down all new information because it’s too much to take in and too conflicting.
Like most things in life, the best things to “major in” aren’t sexy and polarizing - they’re usually somewhere in the middle of the crazy spectrum.
Health Influencers’ obsession with minor details
If you are following the health and wellness space on social media today, you’ll certainly stumble across the zealots I referenced above.
Some are hyper-fixated on being carnivores. Some can’t stop talking about seed oils. Some insist on only one modality of exercise. And of course, I can’t leave out the vegans who think I’m satan because I hunt and eat animals.
What I’ve observed about ALL of these zealots, is that they eventually break. One of the well-known carnivore guys eventually started eating fruit and honey and another one of these even was even caught on his story with a coca-cola, which he quickly deleted. And of course, one of the more prominent ones was on steroids and lying out of his injected ass cheeks.
The seed-oil obsessed run out of things to talk about and become insufferable to listen to because they don’t deliver helpful content except fear-mongering on one ingredient. Then they spread their negativity to others while on vacation because the places they are traveling to would even dare to have seed oils on the menu.
And of course, the vegans eventually break and start eating meat but have to hide it out of the fear of their following coming at them.
I’m not faulting any of these people who decide to change their minds or to indulge every now and then. I applaud them for doing so. Shoot, I myself love some hot Cheetos every now and then or a fat cookie! We are human and are allowed to (or should be allowed to) change our minds or simply enjoy the spoils of modern society at times.
The key is being human enough to share it with the people that follow you for information because believe it or not, many people look up to these influencers because they have no one else to get information from.
Paralysis by analysis
When people lie about their own health outcomes from following a certain lifestyle, it not only discredits the “influencer” but it discredits and does a greater disservice to the movement of being healthier humans as a whole. This is because there is a huge population that simply doesn’t know what to believe due to information overload. And when we have information overload, we tend to do nothing and continue on with whatever we are currently doing, even if we know it isn’t the best for us.
I believe that people get so caught up in the minor details of health and wellness because they want to carve out niches for themselves or align themselves with certain groups. Look, I get it. It was and might still be the way to grow a following and monetize quickly. But it’s just not sustainable, as most extreme lifestyles aren’t.
Either you end up being an insufferable person to be around OR you end up being miserable because you’ve built such a large following and become easily recognizable that you can’t act normally out in public because someone might see you “cheating” on your lifestyle that you supposedly live by. Something has got to give.
As mentioned above, the people who suffer most are the followers of these people. I used to be this way when I first came out of an illness I had throughout college. I was always into working out and living an active lifestyle, but had to take a long layoff after my surgery. When I was able to workout again I got super into “bodybuilding” style exercise and eating habits because that’s what everyone who was fit was doing on social media. I thought that this was the only way to gain muscle and be healthy because everyone I saw was doing it this way. I did whatever was trending, even drinking soy milk sometimes cause it’s what everyone was saying was “healthier” (shudder).
It’s crazy looking back at how I used to eat trying to follow the trends of whoever was big at the time and realizing that I was probably annoying to cook with/for. Everything had to be perfectly measured or I wouldn’t risk eating it and throwing off my macros. I had friends who wouldn’t play pickup basketball cause it would burn too many calories and “they were bulking bro”.
All this stress about the minor details of simply being healthier probably caused me more stress to the point that it was detrimental to my day-to-day life. As I’ve gotten older, I’m much better about things now, but there are many people who are just starting out on their health journeys or in the middle of them and are likely caught in a similar cycle of analysis by paralysis. That’s who the following tips are for.
What you SHOULD focus on
In a world where everyone wants to fast-track success because that’s what they see on social media, here is what you should actually focus on when it comes to your health, fitness, and wellness:
Sleep more
Watch the sunrise and sunset to help regulate your wake and sleep cycles. Go to bed at a reasonable hour. Finish your last meal 3 to 4 hours before bed.
Eat better
Ditch processed foods. Opt for whole, nutrient-dense foods like meat, eggs, wild game, and in-season fruits and vegetables. Preferably local and organic.
Exercise more
Go for multiple walks per day. Take up an exercise that can also double as a hobby like jiu-jitsu or yoga. Don’t make it complicated. If you want the most basic plug-and-play template for constructing a strength training routine, let us know and we will make a $5 1-pager. It won’t be groundbreaking - but it doesn’t need to be.
That’s it - If you do the above 3 things consistently for a long time, you will be in better health than 90% of Americans. Seriously. Become a master at exercising more, sleeping, and eating better and once you are consistent in those, you can start dabbling in the minors.
Take action: Pick one of the above topics to focus on and build your habits around that. Think about the things in your life that you need to change in order to improve this area. For example, if you’re trying to eat better, start by throwing out all the processed food in your home and replace it will healthy produce and meat.
What resources can we provide you to master the core 3? Let me know!
Get moving.
- Sebastian