“It’s better to remain quiet and be thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.”
– Mark Twain (maybe)
Ole Sammy-boy may have been discouraging us from asking questions. There is also the quote, “There is no such thing as a stupid question,… just stupid people.” Ok, I added the second half of that statement. This is one of those topics that appears quite obvious but maybe it’s not. We have been all in meetings where everyone is throwing around words, concepts, or acronyms. In those situations, you feel like you are the only one “out of the know”, not knowing what in the world they are all saying. In my experience and to my surprise, most people adhere to the “It’s better to keep your mouth shut,” philosophy. I have been in those meetings and having a propensity to not care about social shame, I have asked a lot of stupid questions. In doing so, I have learned that most of the people in those rooms had the same questions I did but were afraid to ask. Even the one’s throwing the terms around. You certainly should go into situations well prepared but you will remain ignorant if you don’t ask the questions and find the answers.
Similarly, when pursuing improvements in your health and fitness, learn everything you can to understand how it all works. As I mentioned in prior posts, Making the Complex Simple, and The Premise of “Strength for Life” its easy to over-complicate things when it comes to the sometimes complex world of fitness. Understand enough to be your own advocate. Similarly understand human nature enough to be skeptical about what they are trying to sell you. That is, know enough to cry “BS”. Don’t be too eager to believe the promise that the person handing out the samples at Costco is telling you. They are probably just repping their product and you likely know more than them,… or you should. Read food labels. Doubt influencers and gym bros. Not nefarious, but the promise of Collagen Protein was all the rage because of its supposed properties of improving your skin. It likely does that but not more so than a higher-quality protein. That may have been a clever way of selling you a lower quality and (should be) lower priced protein. From my perspective, I will happily make that choice but only if it is well informed and intentional. I am not a fan of false promises.
It’s interesting, if you conquer the fear of social shame, ask enough dumb questions, and find the answers, you might actually become the expert. You certainly can and should become your own well-informed advocate.
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