Thread by @stevemagness

Many of us think we are the elite performer who is looking for the final 1% to push us to gold.

The reality is...most of us are the person who needs to simply exercise most days, eat some vegetables, take a walk, sleep more, and that would boost our performance and well-being.

I understand that message doesn't sell as well as the magic supplement, the perfect daily routine, the optimization of our biorhythms...but it actually works.

When I was a young athlete with potential, my coach didn't say "take this supplement." He said, try running on weekends.

Too many of us skip to the 'sexy' details, the 1% items, before we've tried 'running on weekends.'

We skip to relying on some magic drink elixir to give us energy in our day, instead of taking a walk, a 10-minute nap, or stepping away from our device for a few minutes at work.

So here's to the simple things that actually work:
-Sleep
-Take breaks
-Go outside
-Exercise- often easy, occasionally hard
-Eat real foods
-Experience novel things in the real world
-Quality time with others
-Have some control over your life & feel like you can make progress

Get back to the basics.

Stop overcomplicating life.

Stop thinking that the magic is in some substance, optimal routine, complicated exercise.

First, nail the basics. They give you much more bang for your buck. And chances are, you are neglecting some of them.

Notice: Most of these items are free and simple. They are simple but not easy.

The complicated but easy answer is to take a supplement, drink coffee with special butter, or whatever it is.

Stop reaching for the shiny object, reach for what really works.

And I get it...The allure is great. I spent over a decade of my life trying to perfect getting people to run seconds faster.

But what you realize is the magic isn't in some specific combination of workouts. All elite runners are doing 95% of the same things.

The best simply stack months and months of good, solid consistent work.

They didn't find the 'optimal' workout like so many performance gurus push.

They just do a nice variety of work that gets them to the starting line healthy, and ready to meet the demands of the race.

The same applies to the rest of life.

If someone tells you that you need to only eat X food during Y hours, or consume Z supplement, or perform X workout in order to maximize whatever energetic pathway, or work in Z manner, run away.

Two halls of fame type coaches told me essentially the same thing early in my career:

Charlatans complicate. People who actually know what they're doing take the complex and make it simple and actionable.

Focus on what actually matters. Do that well...over and over again.

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A collection of past threads for those interested:

https://twitter.com/stevemagness/status/1371847907259916298