Optimal Nathan

🧬 I build 30yo+ professionals step into being the leaders of their social and professional lives

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

Now I'd plan the reverse and the off-season as seriously as the cut. Treat the comeback like part of the prep.

So go hard, sure. Just know the bill comes due after the stage, and if you didn't budget for it, that shit hits way harder than the diet ever did.

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

Prep's supposed to be hard, and like, I agree.

But hard should come with a clear picture of what it's doing to you and how long getting back actually takes.

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

So that's a guy running on fumes by show day. Like, that's just what getting that lean costs a body, and it'd cost yours the same.

The recovery's the part people don't plan for. I mean, the show's one day. So the months after it are where you either rebuild properly or wreck yourself.

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

So track your steps the same way you track your lifts. The gym's great, but if the rest of your day's spent in a chair, like, that shit's undoing a lot of it, and that's fucked.

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

People think the hour in the gym covers them. Like, it helps a ton, HOWEVER what you're doing for the other fifteen waking hours counts for way more than you'd guess...

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

Now the fix is boring. Walk after meals, take calls on your feet, and park far away. Little stuff that adds up without needing more willpower.

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

Now I'd treat it like a low-risk extra. Sleep, light from the actual sun and training come first, and a panel's not replacing any of that shit.

I mean, if you've got the basics handled and want to try it, cool. Just don't buy a fucking two-thousand-dollar panel expecting it to fix a body you're not taking care of.

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

Red light's getting sold as essential, like you're missing out on something without a panel.

I'm into it and use it with my clients BUT the evidence is a lot earlier than the ads make it look.

So here's where it actually stands:

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

The best-supported human use at this point might actually not be ours and might be myopia in kids.

Repeated low-level red light slowed how fast myopia progressed, acting through cytochrome c oxidase in the mitochondria.

So it's legit enough to take seriously. It's just way earlier and narrower than the marketing would have you believe.

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

I mean, it's a cheap thing to rule out. TSH, free T4 and free T3 next to your lipids, and you'll know pretty fast if that's part of your story.

So if your cholesterol's climbing and you're also tired, cold and foggy, get the thyroid looked at. That shit's connected way more than people think, and it's a fucking easy check.

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

If your cholesterol crept up and nobody checked your thyroid, that's a miss. Like, your thyroid has a real say in your lipids, and it gets ignored all the time.

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

So for some people, high LDL is partly a thyroid problem showing up on a lipid panel. That's a different conversation from jumping straight to a statin.

Now I'm not anti-statin, and plenty of people need one. I just want the thyroid checked first, because fixing it can move the numbers on its own.

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

I mean, if the caffeine's still going in at 4pm, no amino acid is gonna save you. Sort that first, then see if theanine adds anything.

So it's a reasonable thing to try if you're stressed and the basics are handled. Just don't expect a capsule to do the fucking job your sleep schedule should be doing.

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

L-THEANINE gets sold as the chill-out amino acid from tea. Like, the marketing's way ahead of the evidence, but there's one decent little piece of human evidence worth knowing about...

[Optimal Nathan @OptimalNathan]

Now where I'd actually use it is somebody who's wired at night and sleeping like shit, and who's already sorted their caffeine timing and their phone.