Common mistakes made with stimulation, supply, and soul (and the monster in the closet)

The rabbit hole of environment is a lot juicier than people first realize. It’s 24/7. Your body is not compartmentalizing its hours into domains.

You’re on. All the time. Hence the tangent last letter.

Now we can move onto common mistakes and screw ups.

Your body is a wizard. It’ll do what it’s triggered to do (via information from the environment) without your conscious awareness if serves biological fitness interests.

• Environment -> Information -> Trigger

Good information pulls the trigger. Bad information doesn’t. And bad information comes from the environment, which is to say: stimulation, supply, or soul.

Stimulation, supply, and soul change your signaling.

Mistakes are manifold, but I’ll compartmentalize as best as possible.

1. You send the wrong information.

People stop at red lights. Something in the environment (red light) relays information (red means stop) and pulls a trigger (stop).

Sending the wrong information is like putting a green light where there should be a red light. You change stimulation, soul, or supply…but the signal doesn’t do what’s intended.

Extreme examples:

• Eating a lot of high energy food in order to lose fat.
• Being sedentary in order to become more mobile.
• Distance running in order to build muscle.

These are doofus examples, for the most part. But that’s only because I peeled the flesh from how they appear in the real world.

Jim wants to lose fat. He hears about the paleo diet and decides to scavenge on nuts and seeds. All day. Little does Jim know, nuts and seeds are high in energy per their volume. IE: Jim wants to lose fat, but he’s eating a lot of high energy food.

It’s not about what System 2 (you) THINKS is happening. Jim thinks he’s sending a certain message (lose fat!) by going paleo and shoving ten pounds of nuts and seeds down his face.

It’s about the information System 1 is ACTUALLY getting. Jim is actually shoving mounds of energy (gain weight!) down his throat.

2. You send noise.

If you see a flare in the air, someone wants their position known. Signals are clear. Or, I should say, signals should be clear.

But maybe you’re stranded in a field of cows. Lost. You have no flare. Instead, you decide to moo like a cow in an attempt to have your position known. You’re trying real hard to send information, but, in the end, it’s just noise.

Noise is tricky because something is happening. You’re still making a sound when you moo like a cow. You’re working hard. Trying.

Noise is similar to sending the WRONG information, but here’s the difference: misinformation accomplishes SOMETHING (just not what was intended), where as noise does just about nothing.

Distance running to build muscle is misinformation. But distance running can improve your cardiorespiratory system, lymphatic system, help with mood, help with recovery, help with fat loss, etc…

But the Shake Weight is noise. Lifting a five pound dumbbells for 1000 reps with an intent to build muscle is noise.

Noise is perhaps better described as junk. There is junk food. There is junk movement.

Junk is better avoided.

3. You send conflicting information

You can do everything right and still end up with a little wrong.

You build a red stop light when you want to stop…but you only flick the red light on for two seconds every day. At all other hours, the light is green.

Call this conflicting information. It’s what makes the rabbit hole of environment so important—you have to appreciate your body being receptive 24/7.

So let’s say you want to do the splits.

You work on your flexibility and mobility almost every day. You do (hopefully) active mobility exercises to compliment any passive stretching you’re doing.

You’re doing everything right…

…but you’re only stretching for a grand total of thirty seconds every day. And at all other hours, you’re sitting in a chair.

So what this means, info:

• For thirty seconds, you’re telling your body the split position is important and having mobility in that position is a good idea.
• For one-thousand four-hundred and ten seconds, you’re telling your body the split position isn’t important. And you’re telling your body the opposite of the split position is important.

Now…

I could go on here. I could make up some other situations and rattle off a bunch of other mistakes. Like, for instance, expecting your body to deliver top quality information on first attempt(s).

Enter: comedian. You can’t just get up on stage and talk. Well, I guess, you COULD…but you’d fail at producing any sort of meaningful response.

You have to craft jokes. You have to master timing. You have to arrange everything so the information is perfectly timed, perfectly delivered.

But focusing on these individual (and loosely defined) hiccups flies us over the real monster in the closet:

In this letter, I wrote:

I mean, just tell me the sets, reps, exercises, blah, blah blah…my body is a wizard, right? I don’t need to know the why, my body has my own why. Why are you still typing? You’re wasting my time. JUST TELL ME HOW TO SEND MY BODY INFORMATION THAT’LL PULL MY TRIGGERS. 

Which makes 100% total sense if you read the entire letter. (You don’t need to know how it all works because System 1 takes care of business without System 2 having to talk your body through the process.) It also makes you hate me because I’ve done nothing but dance around the simple information sending trigger pulling prescription to this point.

Unfortunately, being trigger happy backfires. In other words, I’m not dancing around the prescription to upset you, I’m dancing because, in the long run, it’s going to help you. Immensely. Here’s why…

Your name is Anthony and you decide to put your hand atop a scolding hot stove burner. (Note: this was young Anthony. Three or four year old Anthony. Anthony doesn’t remember this. His parents, however, do. Very much so.)

Blah blah blah, environment (hot stove), information (thishurtsmyfleshisfallingoffomg), trigger (move).

After your System 1 takes care of business, System 2 does a little association. I touched the fire stuff and it hurt real bad…don’t do that again.

The feedback from the environment-information was instantaneous.

Now think of training and eating. Anthony wants to get jacked, so he starts lifting weights. He starts eating more vegetables and nutrient plentiful foods. More lean proteins.

But it’s not like the moment Anthony swallows vegetables his throat starts to singe. Anthony doesn’t wake up the day after his first training session and look like a professional bodybuilder.

And this changes everything.

I want you to think about why.

Until next time.