As common among ectomorphs, I’ve spent a lot of my life at home, working away in solitude. Specifically, I’ve been building websites and as of late: web software.
Not many people seek advice from programmers because they have the stereotype of being locked away in their parent’s basement coding till 2am in the morning and pepped up on Red Bull. But even if that’s true in some (okay, most) cases, the programming-mindset still acts as a great teacher.
Only one solution is the best
On your journey to strength and muscle you will be pulverised with tons of crap circulating the internet in the form of supplements, “get big quick” schemes, and other temptations trying to suck the life out of your wallet and take you away from your goals.
Avoid bouncing around from different training routines, or meal plans (in fact, consider killing meal plans), or recovery methods. Make a commitment to a certain approach that you believe in, and stick with it. A programmer who avoids decisions will never finish a project. An ectomorph who avoids decisions will never build a muscle.
Take the time to debug
It’s easy to fall into the trap of endlessly adding “stuff” to the process of building strength. You may add crazy new training techniques, or a new special type of super food. While addition has it’s place, don’t overlook subtraction.
Ask yourself: is there anything I can strip away?
Perhaps you’re wasting effort on an ineffective or unsustainable exercise. Or you’re consuming a food you “should” eat, but hate the taste of anyways. Strength is important, yes, but it’s not worth clouding your life with crap.
Identify and then eliminate all the baggage (both physical and mental) that is not taking you towards your goals.
Persistence is more important than talent
When I developed my first piece of usable and useful software I had no idea what I was doing. I started completely from scratch and was well and truly just hoping for the best as I went along.
Over the period of three days or so I spend upwards of 12+ hours solving a few key problems that arose and was finding difficult to overcome. If I had talent the solution would’ve been simple, but like I said, I was a complete newbie.
Even so, I stuck with it, the roadblocks soon buckled and by the end of that third day I had built something that I felt was fantastic. The more time you give yourself to build strength the more chances you’ll have to:
- Make a breakthrough.
- Correct bad technique.
- Increase your calorie intake.
- Learn to love the process.
- Identify what works for you.
Embrace the long term mindset and stick with it.
