"Better" Is the New "More"

Isn't it strange that articles on health improvement practices will usually be titled, "Eat better, exercise more" -- and not "Eat more, exercise more," or "Eat better, exercise better?"

It is though they presume that while foods may be different, exercise is not -- and so quantity is what differentiates, rather than as any real athlete or performer knows (outside of the invariably fat nutritionists with Ph.D.s, no less), that how they exercise and move, is the difference between one person being in remarkable condition -- while the other is not, and may in fact, be exercising harder. putting out more effort -- while obviously having no idea what they are doing, what is important to do, and what the whole purpose and objective is to do.

And so these people maddeningly get the ball and dribble and dribble and dribble until everybody doesn't want to play anymore -- and then they dribble in uncontested for a lay-up -- after everybody else has gone home. Such a person may hold the world record for points scored -- when nobody else is there to witness it, and thus further embellish their legends in their own minds.

As writers, we recognize when reading such articles, it really doesn't matter what that writer says, because it is so inconsequential, that nobody will ever entertain seriously what that person has to say. Nothing is intelligible or verifiable. They may as well say the moon is green, and tastes like cheese. It doesn't matter.

Unfortunately, that is the present state of writing about exercise and fitness in most mainstream media discussions in particular -- which should also serve as an indication of the validity of everything else they're saying, and think everybody else should believe. Aficionados of every activity have long recognized that what they know about their favorite activities and what the media presentations of it to the public are, are invariably and often shockingly, two totally different things.

Every worthwhile coach and instructor realizes that the objective of their instruction is not so that their students work as hard as they can, but that they work as smart and as efficiently as they can -- and that makes the difference, not only between winning and losing, but every other distinction and discrimination one will make to improve the possibilities of success in anything they do.

So obviously, when we see the encouragement just to do "more" rather than "better," it indicates the limits of that expertise and advice.