Why We Obsess Over Numbers that Don’t Matter

Most people come to DEUCE for some intangible, but important reason. Even the people that say they are here to weigh less pounds or increase certain lifts will soon find that those reasons aren’t the real reasons. 

Have you ever met someone that is actually perturbed by their relationship to gravity? No chance. People equate the number on the scale with a look or a feeling or some other thing that would be true. The same is even true with new PRs. The best follow up question to “I want a bigger back squat is: for what?”

You’ll get another answer. 

So, why, then, are we obsessed with numbers? We assign them. We record them. We memorialize them and compare them and on and on. What’s the deal?

It’s our belief that when it comes to improvement and change, bringing objectivity is almost always a better idea than leaving something to trend toward subjectivity. Said differently, if our students did workouts and then evaluated those workouts by looking in the mirror after each session they would actually have a worse time improving how they look in the mirror than if they measured objective metrics (i.e. time, load, volume, intensity, etc) and improve those things. 

Objectivity goals are almost always the best path to your subjective goals.