When Everything Is a Priority, Nothing Is
A practical guide to choosing the right focus and structuring your training for long-term progress
Most people don’t come to training with one clean, specific goal. Someone will say they want to build strength, but they’re also wondering if they should be running more. Or they want to improve cardio, but also think they should probably be doing more mobility, especially after they pulled their hamstring trying to prove to their 9-year-old nephew that Uncle Steve is, in fact, still a threat in a footrace despite mounting orthopedic evidence to the contrary. Before long, they’ve built themselves a program that’s pulling in five directions.
And for many, that program isn’t even a program. It’s a rotation of group fitness classes stitched together with no real plan. If that gets you in the gym consistently and keeps you moving, that’s great. But if you’re frustrated by a lack of results, it’s probably not because you need more variety, it’s because your training doesn’t have a focus.
If you have followed a training plan that moved through different phases, like hypertrophy, strength, and then power, you’ve already used periodization. It’s the practice of organizing your training in a logical sequence so that one phase builds into the next, rather than competing for space. And while it’s often associated with athletes, periodization is just as useful for anyone who wants to improve in the gym without spinning their wheels.
Your body doesn’t adapt nearly as well when it has competing demands. Trying to build maximal strength, increase VO2 max, improve mobility, and master your handstand all at the same time creates a lot of noise for your body to handle. Instead, periodization helps you choose one primary stressor to focus on, while keeping everything else in maintenance mode. Maintenance mode doesn’t mean doing nothing. It means doing just enough to hold your gains in one area while you drive progress in another. It’s a system for maximizing adaptation and avoiding burnout.
That’s the core idea behind the framework I use for both myself and with clients: choose the right stressor, apply it with intention, and rotate emphasis over time. But how you apply it depends on who you are and what you’re training for.
Two Types of People, Two Ways to Apply It
1. The Performance Optimizer
These are the people with a defined goal: run a faster marathon, pull a double bodyweight deadlift, qualify for a competition. Their training needs to be specific, progressive, and relevant to the demands of the event. For them, the framework is about:
Making one adaptation the clear priority
Structuring weeks to support peak performance in that domain
Using other modalities in a recovery or supportive role
Trying to push everything at once just dilutes the outcome. For this person, periodization keeps the goal the goal.
2. The Health Generalist
This person might not care about a 1-rep max or race time. They want to feel good, move better, and train consistently. For them, the framework still applies, but with more flexibility. The approach becomes:
Maintain a baseline of strength, conditioning, and mobility
Rotate emphasis every 4–8 weeks based on interest, lifestyle, or lagging areas
Use the concept of "turning the volume knob": one modality gets louder, others stay present but quieter.
They still benefit from structure, just not the rigid kind.
Applying the Framework
If your training feels scattered or stalled, this is where adding some intention makes a difference. Think of it as turning one dial up while turning others down just enough to keep them alive. Here’s how that looks:
For the Performance-Oriented
Let’s say someone is a marathon runner in a 12-week build. Volume and aerobic capacity take center stage. Strength is pared back to maintenance doses at maybe one or two sessions a week with moderate loads. Recovery becomes non-negotiable.
Or take someone peaking for a powerlifting meet. In the final block leading up to it, everything revolves around strength: especially heavy squats, presses, and pulls. Conditioning becomes short and low-intensity, mobility work is targeted and efficient, and training frequency is adjusted to support maximal effort.
Here’s how that might look over a full prep cycle:
Block 1 (4–6 weeks): General prep – 3 strength sessions, 2 light cardio sessions, some mobility.
Block 2 (6 weeks): Specific prep – 4 strength sessions focused on meet lifts, minimal cardio.
Block 3 (2 weeks): Taper – reduce volume, maintain intensity, focus on recovery.
Each phase flows into the next with a clear purpose. That’s what lets you peak when it counts. The principle is always the same: train the quality you’re trying to develop, and don’t let other stimuli interfere with adaptation.
For the Health Generalist
This person doesn’t need to peak. But they still need progression.
So maybe they start with an emphasis on building foundational strength. They train full-body lifts 3x per week, sprinkle in zone 2 cardio twice, and do short mobility sessions after workouts. After 6 weeks, they shift gears: reduce lifting to 2x per week, increase conditioning volume, and add a weekend hike or longer bike ride. Then maybe a phase where mobility and recovery work come to the front.
Over the course of a year, they’ve improved in all areas, but never burned out chasing them all at once.
Here’s how that might break down over a four month block:
Block 1 (6 weeks): Strength focus – 3 full-body lifts, 2 zone 2 sessions, short mobility.
Block 2 (6 weeks): Conditioning focus – 3 cardio sessions, 2 maintenance lifts, longer cooldowns.
Block 3 (4 weeks): Mobility and recovery – daily mobility, 2 light lifts, 1–2 walks or short cardio.
Then you recycle or adjust based on what needs the most attention next.
Coach’s Takeaways
Even if you're not ready to dive into a highly structured plan, just starting to notice where your training energy is going is a powerful step. Observation is underrated and often the first move toward sustainable change.
Periodization works because your body can’t do everything at once at max effort. Choose a focus and go hard on that.
Performance athletes need precision: one primary stressor, tightly supported by the rest of their plan.
General health clients need flexibility: steady exposure to all modalities, with rotating emphasis to keep progress moving.
Structure doesn’t have to mean rigidity. But it does mean making choices. And the clearer you are about which knob you’re turning up, the more likely you are to actually notice a change. Most people think the answer to stalled progress is doing more, when it’s often doing more of the right thing, and less of everything else.
So if you’re someone who’s been jumping between programs or trying to cover every base every week, pause and ask: what’s my focus right now? What’s supporting that focus and what’s competing with it?
That’s where better results begin.. But it does mean making choices. And the clearer you are about which knob you’re turning up, the more likely you are to actually notice a change. Instead, train the right thing at the right time, and give yourself the space to adapt.
References
Hughes DC, et al. (2018). Adaptations to Endurance and Strength Training. PMC5983157
Mikkonen RS, et al. (2024). Perspectives on Concurrent Strength and Endurance. Sports Med.
Lorenz D, et al. (2015). Concepts in Periodization. PMC4637911
What Else I’m Reading
“Combining an Internal Attentional Focus With Mirror Motor Observation Enhances Mechanical Output During Isokinetic Leg-Extension Exercise” — Mendonca et al. (2025, Journal of Applied Biomechanics)
This study explored whether watching yourself in the mirror while lifting could impact performance. Ten participants did leg extensions either with just verbal cues to focus on the muscle or with those cues plus watching their movement in a mirror. The mirror group maintained higher force output across sets and showed better muscle coordination, with the target muscle activating more effectively while opposing muscles stayed more relaxed.
📌 Takeaway: I love that Brad Schoenfeld often researches topics that have been labeled as “bro-science” to see which actually hold up under scientific scrutiny. Turns out, a lot of them do. This study is a great example: something as simple as looking in the mirror, often dismissed as pure vanity, may genuinely help you perform better and push through fatigue.
“Hormonal Birth Control Is Associated with Altered Gut Microbiota β-Diversity in Physically Active Females Across the Menstrual Cycle” — Brito et al. (2025, Journal of Applied Physiology)
Physically active women who are using hormonal birth control were studied over their menstrual cycles to see how their gut microbiome changed. The study found that hormonal contraception is linked with shifts in which bacterial types are present, even though overall species counts didn’t fluctuate much. Some of the bacterial groups tied to health-related metabolic byproducts were less common among users of hormonal birth control.
📌 Takeaway: This study gives us far from an exhaustive understanding of the impact of hormonal contraception on gut health but, the gut microbiome does seem to shift with hormonal contraceptive use. Interesting stuff, especially for active women trying to optimize gut health or metabolism.
“Bidirectional Relationship Between Sleep and Depression” — Yasugaki et al. (2023, Neuroscience Research) DOI: 10.1016/j.neures.2023.04.006
This review highlights how sleep disturbances and depression fuel each other. Roughly 75% of people with depression report poor sleep, often showing faster onset of REM sleep and reduced deep, restorative sleep. In turn, chronic poor sleep raises stress hormones and disrupts key brain circuits involved in mood regulation, increasing the risk of depression. Animal studies further show that specific neural pathways connect stress, sleep quality, and emotional state.
📌 Takeaway: Sleep and depression form a vicious cycle. Poor sleep can drive depression, and depression can wreck sleep; meaning that improving sleep may be a powerful way to break that loop and support better mental health.
Before you go 💬
I started writing because I kept having conversations that didn’t quite fit into a session or an Instagram post. If you’re thinking through something, training, nutrition, mindset, whatever, or just want to share what’s been working for you, hit reply. I read everything, and I’m always open to talking through it. And if someone in your life could benefit from this approach, feel free to share it. The more people thinking clearly about performance and health, the better.