Pick your battles

Don't try to do everything. It won't work, and it'll suck to high heaven. For most people you can break life down into three parts: family, work and training - and that's the order of priority they sit in (I got that from a Swede Burns piece here: http://www.elitefts.com/education/the-obstacles-youll-face-becoming-a-great-powerlifter/). You can substitute family for personal relationships if you're young enough not to have your own family yet or if you simply don't have one. If you're lucky, work and training are the same thing, and this post doesn't apply to you. If training isn't a part of your life, it should be.

I figure you can break training down into three parts too: moving shit around, eating and sleeping. It's pretty easy to do the moving shit around part. All you need to do is turn up regularly. Then it gets a bit more involved. Since you're turning up regularly, you're investing your time and like any investor you want a return. That means eating and sleeping so you recover. That part often gets overlooked, because it's so basic. I sure as hell did. Cutting out a lot of bullshit I think that realistically, you're going to get one out of those three right; get another one just about sort of OK; and a third goes out the window. That's in direct contradiction to my last post, except it isn't and I'll explain why later.

You have to pick which one you get right depending on what you want. This is just my opinion of what's what, but I'm sure enough it's fairly sensible or I wouldn't be posting it.

1. Sleeping

Prioritise this if being tired scares the shit out of you. Otherwise, take what sleep you can get and work with that. You'll be tired a lot. Get used to it. I know sleep is a cornerstone of recovery, but in my experience (which is limited, I know) it really isn't that important provided you do a couple of other things right. Shoot for seven or more hours sleep at least once every five to seven days and try to make sure you limit how often you have to function on less than four hours sleep to no more than twice every five to seven days and you're fucking golden.

2. Eating

This is non-negotiable. You've got to get it right at some level or you're pretty fucked. Now, if appearance is your priority, this is the one to focus on - in which case good luck because it's a bitch. The amount of time and effort required to really control and regulate what goes in your cakehole to get your bodyfat down to the 'looks good' margin and below is pretty staggering. If recovery is your priority, good news: it doesn't take anywhere near as much effort to control what you eat enough to make sure you recover while still maintaining an unslobby appearance. In this case, just about getting it right works fine. You'll initially be surprised by how much you need to eat, and it can be a bit of a pain in the arse and wallet if you're bigger but it really isn't difficult to manage. You might have to put up with three days a week where you keep track of your carb intake, for example, but that's about as bad as it gets which is not at all. Hell, if all you care about is recovery go nuts, but in the interests of your older self try not to actively block your arteries while becoming diabetic.

3. Moving shit around

For me, this is the be all and end all because I want to get stronger and that means I must get this one right. That means both the programming and the execution. As long as I'm not a slob, my appearance is not of paramount importance to me. Sure, I have to fit into a weight class but as I found out recently that isn't too hard to manage at short notice. If you just want to look good, this one you can kind of fudge if your diet is spot on and you don't care about your strength. It helps if you can minimise the fudging, of course.

Here's why all this isn't contradictory to my last post: for any given priority, you still have to get it right. All that happens is the priority determines what it is you must get right. Can you get all three right at the same time? Sure, if you're prepared to sideline your family and quite possibly limit your income because you will only do certain work or work certain hours. Otherwise, pick your priority and work with that. It'll be less stressful, you won't be a dick to the people who love you and you'll get good results. One day you might even be good enough.