Three Questions to Ask Before Adding One More Thing

Another certification course just landed in your inbox.

It's about optimizing performance through advanced periodization strategies. Or maybe it's a nutrition protocol that promises better recovery. Or a new supplement stack that could give you that extra 2% edge.

You're already doing upper/lower four days a week. Cardio three times. Meal prepping on Sundays. Managing macros daily. Running your business. Raising your kid. Trying to be present for your partner. And now you're looking at this course thinking, "If I just wake up 30 minutes earlier..."

Let me stop you right there.

The Addition Trap

Here's what I see happen with every high-achieving client who walks through our doors: They're not failing because they're not doing enough. They're failing because they're doing too much, none of it particularly well.

You've mistaken activity for progress. Accumulation for optimization.

And I get it. Your whole life, adding more has worked. More hours studying got you better grades. More certifications advanced your career. More effort built your business. So when your training or nutrition stalls, your default response is: "What else can I add?"

But there's a fundamental difference between building a business and building a body:Your business doesn't need to recover from the work you put into it. Your body does.

When "Investing in Yourself" Becomes Self-Sabotage

That certification you're eyeing? It's going to require 6-8 hours per week for 12 weeks. Plus the mental bandwidth to actually absorb and apply the information.

Where's that time coming from?

If you're honest—and you need to be honest—it's coming from one of three places:

1. Sleep(which means your training suffers, your recovery suffers, your decision-making suffers)

2. Your existing training or nutrition consistency(which means you're learning more while executing less)

3. The mental space you need to actually be present(which means you're there physically but checked out mentally)

None of these trade-offs make you better. They just make you busier.

The Three Questions

Before you add anything—a training session, a supplement protocol, a course, a new tracking metric, whatever—you need to pass through these three filters:

Question 1: Does this make me more effective or just more busy?

Effective means it moves you measurably closer to your stated goal. Not a goal you might have someday. Not a nice-to-have. Your actual, primary objective right now.

If your goal is to add 10 pounds to your squat in the next 12 weeks, does this thing directly contribute to that? Or does it contribute to some vague sense of "being better"?

Busy means it creates activity without outcome. It makes you feel productive without making you more productive.

Be ruthless here. Most things that feel like investing in yourself are actually just expensive procrastination.

Question 2: Can I sustain this for 12 weeks without white-knuckling it?

If your honest answer involves the words "I'll just," "I should be able to," or "I can sacrifice," that's a no.

Here's why this matters: You don't get results from what you do when you're motivated and fresh. You get results from what you can maintain when life gets hard. When your kid is sick. When work explodes. When you're just tired.

If you can't picture yourself doing this thing on a random Tuesday in week 9 when you're already running on fumes, it's not a sustainable addition. It's a future failure you're scheduling.

Question 3: What am I removing to make space for this?

This is the question that separates people who actually want to improve from people who want to feel like they're improving.

You cannot add indefinitely. Your time, your energy, and your recovery capacity are finite resources. So if you're adding something, what are you taking away?

And "I'll just be more efficient" is not an answer. You're already efficient. That's not your problem.

Your problem is that you keep adding without subtracting, and now you're overtrained, underfed, and wondering why more effort isn't producing better results.

What This Actually Looks Like

Real scenario: You want to add a fifth training day because you saw a coach online programming five days and getting great results with their clients.

Question 1:Does this make you more effective or just more busy?

• Current issue: You're inconsistent with your four days because of schedule chaos

• Adding a fifth day when you can't reliably hit four is busy, not effective

• Verdict: Fail

You don't need to ask questions 2 and 3. This doesn't pass the first filter.

Better move: Figure out how to protect your existing four days. That might mean different training times, shorter sessions, or having an abbreviated "bad day" version of your program ready.

The Subtraction Test

Here's your homework: Before you add anything new, subtract something for two weeks.

I don't care what. Pick the thing you're doing that has the lowest return on investment. The supplement that you're not sure is doing anything. The fifth cardio session. The food tracking that's consuming mental energy without providing useful data anymore.

Remove it. See what happens.

Nine times out of ten, you'll find that nothing gets worse. Often, things get better because you've freed up bandwidth to execute on what actually matters.

That's your proof that addition wasn't your problem. Subtraction was your solution.

Your Next Move

Open your training app or your calendar. Look at everything you're currently doing.

Now ask yourself: If you could only do 80% of this, what would you keep?

That 20% you'd cut? Cut it now. You just told yourself it's the least important stuff. So why are you still doing it?

Then—and only then—if you want to add something new, run it through the three questions.

Most of the time, you'll find you already have everything you need. You just need to execute it consistently without the distraction of constantly looking for the next thing to add.

If you're tired of doing more but achieving less, we need to talk. Our coaching focuses on helping high-achievers figure out what actually matters and eliminate everything else.Book a calland let's build a plan you can actually sustain.

Stay Strong,

Paul Oneid, MS. MS. CSCS

Founder and Head Coach