Some of this humor is inspired by Dom Mezzetti (Bro Science Life) and ChatGPT, which added jokes about protein shakes tasting bad. I actually quite like a protein shake. I thought about giving some protein shake recipes even. TBF, I lived on Soylent for a month and am a texture queen.

Protein bars, on the other hand are overpriced garbage.

I know this topic is over discussed, but OMG I do not want to hear about anyone’s protein levels ever again.

It happened again. A friend told me I need 1.6 times my body weight in grams of protein. They couldn’t tell me if that was based on pounds or kilograms—or if it's even really 1.6. Could be 1.5. Or 1.2. And, once again, they refused to believe that plenty of people are out here crushing workouts on little more than black coffee and a half-eaten banana. But, sure, let’s all pretend like we need to eat our weight in chicken breast just to keep up.

Protein has become this mythical substance, this “gains genie” that’s gonna come out of the shaker bottle and grant you muscle with each sip. It’s like people don’t even see food as food anymore. They’re like, “Bro, you’re eating a bagel? Where’s the protein?” Well, Carl, sometimes a bagel is just a bagel. Not everything needs to be a “fuel source.” But here we are, living in a world where protein is worshipped like some kind of gym religion, with bro-preachers telling you salvation is just a scoop away.

Let’s talk numbers. My buddy’s advice means I’d be eating, what, a couple hundred grams of protein a day? For context, that’s about a herd of chickens. Motia, my gym buddy, told me he goes through a tub of protein powder a week. A week! He says his grocery budget is basically whey powder and almond milk, and he’s genuinely proud of that. Meanwhile, his fridge is a museum of Tupperware filled with grilled chicken and broccoli, and I’m pretty sure he hasn’t tasted anything resembling flavor since 2019. And for what? Maybe a bit of definition? Maybe some vascularity? We’re out here sacrificing taste for the dream of a single vein popping out during bicep curls.

And don’t even get me started on protein bars. These things could double as doorstops. They’re as dense as concrete, taste like sadness, and yet, people swear by them. “It’s convenient, bro,” they say, while gnawing on something that’s basically a glorified chalk stick. I took a bite of one once, and I swear, I aged five years chewing that thing. By the time I finished, I had more jaw muscle than my actual biceps. I had to carry a gallon of water just to help it go down. But yeah, “totally worth it” for those 20 grams of protein.

Now, let’s dive into protein powders. There are so many flavors, it's like Baskin-Robbins for gym rats, but each one is somehow worse than the last. You’ve got your classic chocolate and vanilla, which are bearable, but then you’ve got wild stuff like “blueberry-lemon-mocha-bone-broth.” Who is this for? Who’s sitting there, craving their next scoop of chicken-flavored powder? And don’t tell me it’s “clean,” Steve. If I need a blender to make my dinner drinkable, it’s a smoothie—not dinner.

And the timing obsession is next-level. According to the protein prophets, if you don’t consume your grams within exactly 30 minutes of finishing your workout, your entire day’s worth of lifting is invalid. That’s right; all those bench presses just disappear into thin air because you didn’t chug protein during the mystical “anabolic window.” I mean, what is this, an Indiana Jones movie? Is my metabolism a ticking time bomb? It’s like they’re telling me that my muscles are Cinderella, and if I don’t guzzle down a shake before the clock strikes 31 minutes, they’ll shrink back into noodles.

And it doesn’t stop there. Every gym bro has an opinion. “Bro, you’ve gotta meal prep.” “Bro, you’ve gotta eat every two hours.” “Bro, if you’re not chewing chicken in between sets, you’re basically wasting your time.” Listen, I came here to lift weights, not turn my entire life into a protein-eating contest. I just wanted to do a couple of sets and go home, maybe eat a normal dinner. But no. Apparently, I need a six-course protein banquet just to keep up.

So, here’s the deal. I’ll eat a reasonable amount of protein and call it a day. If that means my gains are “suboptimal,” then so be it. I’m not about to spend my life turning every snack into a science experiment or live in fear of the so-called protein police lurking around every corner. Life’s too short to spend it hiding from carbs like they’re the villain in an action movie. Besides, if evolution meant for us to down a farm’s worth of protein daily, we’d have been born with a built-in shaker bottle.

Let’s lift some weights, eat some food that tastes like actual food, and leave the math to the people who actually enjoy crunching numbers. After all, the real gains are made when you’re lifting weights, not calculating how many pounds of grilled chicken it’ll take to get through a Tuesday.

These days I lift twice my body weight, without the shakes. But I go for high protein bamba and protei snacks when I can. But seriously, who cares?!

Here’s some memes to end the post: