Welcome back to the Daily Dumbbell, the 3 day per week newsletter that occasionally finds its way to your inbox on all 3 days! Congratulations on making it through yet another week. We’re officially 55% of the way through the year.

We hope you’re still with us. Because we’re still with you! That sounded more motivational in our heads…

Let’s dive in!

A Quote

When our Editor used to manage a busy cocktail bar (like Tom Cruise? Exactly like Tom Cruise) he had one rule:

Don’t compound problems.

You of course aren’t going to be perfect, but when things get busy and hectic and stressful, our inclination is to try and go faster and match that energy.

Don’t do that.

Going faster usually leads to more mistakes. Which slows the bar to a halt while we try and figure out what happened & how to fix it.

When you have 25-30 cocktails to make, the customer is going to be waiting a while. They will not notice if their drink only took 18 minutes instead of 20. (They’re going to be annoyed regardless).

But they will notice if the drink they waited 18 minutes for was wrong.

Now you have to stop what you’re doing, make it right, figure out where you were in your task flow, yada yada yada you get it. It is nearly always better to just slow down. Take a deep breath, make a plan of attack, and knock out your to do list at a pace you can manage.

The same is true in nearly every aspect of life.

When you rush, you make mistakes.  

If you’ve ever been pulled over for speeding when trying to get to work on time you’ll know exactly what we mean.

Cutting corners & skipping steps in the gym leads to injury more often than not. The same is true of weight loss. The faster you lose the weight, the less likely it is to stay off long term. In this way, success on your fitness journey is really more about avoiding mistakes than it is about being perfect.

A Tweet

There is truly nothing more American than not following instructions and then complaining that it didn’t work.

“I substituted mayo for heavy cream and it was awful, maybe mention that next time.”

The audacity.

It’s reminiscent of the food pyramid. Low carb/carnivore/nonsensical diet gurus love to say the food pyramid made everyone sick/fat. But can that be true if nobody actually followed the recommendations?

Nobody eats whole grains, fruit, or veg. When we eat fish or vegetables it’s nearly always breaded and fried. Sugary sweetened beverages make up almost TEN PERCENT of daily calories. That is definitely not what the pyramid recommended.

They’ve since improved the recommendations with the introduction of MyPlate over a decade ago. But nobody follows that either so what can ya do?

An Article

The health and wellness industry is like a never-ending carnival of crazy these days, and this article in Rolling Stone serves as the ultimate showcase of what's wrong with the industry.

We have:

• Hopelessly uninformed influencers

• A “Doctor” claiming the link between sunburns & cancer is a lie

• A writer playing hide and seek with intellectual honesty

Take the opening paragraph for example:

While it is true that supplements and multivitamins don’t appear to work as well as getting those same vitamins from the source… that’s exactly what the moron influencer in question was suggesting. Vitamin D from dietary sources and from the sun are not supplements.

But let’s take a step back, because to be clear, the influencer; James Middleton is a moron.

While low levels of Vitamin D are associated with a litany of health problems, the opposite does not make you invincible. Seriously, what is with the flux in handsome influencers who didn’t pay attention in high school biology?!

Here’s the thing, getting roasted like a Thanksgiving turkey isn’t going to turn you into a superhero. Unless DC has a Lobster Man movie in development… we wouldn’t put it past em… but that sounds more like a villain to us.

What about the dangerous chemicals in sunscreen? Listen. Have there been studies showing some chemicals present in certain brands of sunscreen at levels above what the FDA has deemed safe? Yes, and you should absolutely avoid those brands.

But.

Has big sunscreen fabricated the sunscreen-skin cancer link? No! That’s one of the dumbest things we’ve ever heard. And the studies that have been done on Sunscreen (albeit only SPF 15) & Vitamin D absorption have shown unequivocally that lathering up does not keep you from soaking up the good stuff.

Sunlight is good for you. Bask in that shit from time to time. But make no mistake, it’s not your friend. Will it kill you given the chance? You bet it will.

Are we concerned about the future of humanity at this point? Absolutely.

Happy Friday!

Hope you had an amazing week. We know we did! Come back on Monday for an exciting look back at the new research you need to know about. Have a great weekend!