It’s 5:45 AM and John’s alarm goes off. After a swig of the generic pre-workout mix from the local GNC store, he jumps in his car and heads to the gym.

Today’s workout is yet another bodybuilding routine he found in the latest issue of Men’s Health magazine. After a brief warm-up of 5 minutes on the elliptical, he starts chipping away at his superset of bench presses and bicep curls. Or was it supposed to be lat pull-downs? And what about the sets and reps… was it 3 sets of 8-12 reps like last week, or 4 sets of 6-8 reps? Well, he thinks, whatever, at least I’m in the gym and doing some work.

Contrast this with Bill. He skipped the gym this morning because he felt a bit tired; after all, his alarm clock woke him up in the middle of an REM cycle, and he read somewhere online that ignoring your body when you’re tired is bad for you. That’s okay though, he thinks, I’ll just head to the park this afternoon for a bodyweight workout, like MovNat.

After spending his entire lunch break on MovNat’s website figuring out what he should do, Bill arrives at the park only to find that it doesn’t have the right equipment for what he was planning. After some haphazard warm-ups and drills, he heads home a bit frustrated without having gotten much done. Hmm, he thinks, maybe I should read a bit more tonight so I’ll know exactly what to do tomorrow.

Okay, by now you should have a pretty clear picture of what I’m getting at with John and Bill. Whereas John just puts his head down and heads into the gym without any real thought or background knowledge of what is better or worse, Bill, on the other hand, spends all his free time reading fitness blogs and never actually commits to the hard work required to see real results. John has done presses, curls, and pull-downs every week for the past year, but he can’t squat with flat feet or stretch his arms overhead. Bill knows that CrossFit is comprised of constantly varied functional movements performed at high-intensity, but he’s never actually tried the Olympic lifts. Whereas “post-workout nutrition” for Johnny means a few scoops of powder the sales rep at GNC told him to buy, Bill can list off numerous benefits of branched chain amino acids, even though he has never actually bought and taken it.

To combat the Johns and Bills in the world, I want to discuss how to balance your Health and Fitness Consumption vs. Production. If you are more of a blog junkie like Bill, then you need to start producing as much health and fitness in your life as you consume. For instance, if you spend one hour watching YouTube clips of Olympic lifters, then you need to spend at least one hour in the gym applying whatever you just learned. If you follow Mark’s Daily Apple and read all his recipe posts, then you better go shop at your local farmers market and actually cook your own food!

On the other hand, the John’s out there need a bit more thought behind what they’re doing. (Side note: since you’re reading this article in the Performance Menu, then you are probably more Bill than John. Additionally, if you are a trainer or a coach, then your clients and athletes are probably more John than Bill. Think about it!) For example, it would greatly benefit John to read Greg Glassman’s “What is Fitness?” article so that he can program a bit more variety into his fitness routine. And perhaps perusing Robb Wolf’s The Paleo Solution would be beneficial so that he can make a few simple dietary changes that would actually yield some pretty significant results!

"But Chris," you might be asking, "I do CrossFit three days a week, and I just love it so much that all I want to do for hours on end each night is read blogs and watch videos!" That’s fantastic; it’s great to cultivate hobbies in your life about which you are passionate. However, think a bit outside the box about how you can produce as much fitness as you consume here. How about sitting in the bottom of a squat while reading the Performance Menu? Or perhaps after watching another Ido Portal clip on YouTube, you actually try to hold a handstand against the wall for a few seconds? These are just some thoughts and suggestions, and obviously you should tailor your practice towards your goals.

Now consider the other stereotype, someone who produces more than they consume in health and fitness. Again, you might see this more often with your clients and athletes, and it is likely more common in the world of traditional sports than it is in exercise. Perhaps your friend really enjoys practicing Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu a few days each week, but outside of the gym he is sedentary, eats poorly, and only sleeps a few hours each night. This person would see huge performance gains in his grappling if someone points him towards Charles Poliquin’s website or suggests that he pick up anything written by Martin Rooney. Similarly, you might have some clients who are struggling to lose body fat because outside of your one-hour sessions twice a week, they forget what you tell them and revert to old habits. In this instance, getting them to try some recipes from Primal Palate and having them download the Lift app could seriously help.

Take a look at the chart above from Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s book Flow.

The Hungarian psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, besides having an incredibly difficult name to spell, is a leading scholar in the field of positive psychology and optimal experience. His concept of flow, as described in his book Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience, is “the mental state of operation in which a person performing an activity is fully immersed in a feeling of energized focus, full involvement, and enjoyment in the process of the activity.” Just as the chart shows that the Flow Channel is a delicate balance between Skill and Challenge, your personal journey of health and fitness depends on balancing your production and consumption. Too little of one and too much of another will impede your results, thus leaving optimal experience on the table.

Please take this article and use it for your own advantages. If you’re a trainer, then take the balance between production and consumption as yet another filter through which you can classify your clients. Just like you would screen their movements or assess their mobility before assigning strength work, now you can determine whether you should be pointing someone towards a blog or towards a barbell. And perhaps even you yourself can take something away from this to improve your own health and fitness routine, whether that means more cooking, more sleeping, or more squatting.