Three Subjects Everyone Should Study

School will be back in session in a couple of months so I thought I'd give some early advice on picking classes for the new semester.  This is the same advice I gave to my younger brother who will be a freshman at Harvard this fall and to all of my students.

1. Psychology- This is by far the most important one.  Not only will you have a better understanding of how others think and behave, you will have a deeper understanding of the inner workings of your own mind.  I enjoy almost every subfield of psychology (developmental, abnormal, humanistic, analytical) but the most important ones for the average person to know are social, cognitive, and evolutionary psychology.

2. Economics- You don't have to know it at a highly advanced mathematical level. Knowing the essential concepts will suffice: supply, demand, market equilibrium, taxes, diminishing marginal returns, unemployment, GDP, Keynesianism, et cetera.  Two semesters that cover micro and macro should be more than enough.

3. Statistics- All the sciences use large sums of data that need to be analyzed through statistical methods.  In addition, having a strong grasp of statistics can help you make better decisions in moments of high uncertainty.  It may not come easily to some of you, but it is worth knowing well.

An excellent book that touches upon the importance of each of these subjects is Thinking: Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman, the 2002 Nobel laureate in economics for co-founding behavioral economics with Amos Tversky.  Kahneman is a top authority among social scientists, in the same league as John Maynard Keynes, B. F. Skinner, Jean Piaget, Jürgen Habermas, and Noam Chomsky.

(Optional) Computer Science- We live in an era full of computers and their ubiquity will only increase as time goes by.  Unfortunately, most people don't know what computers are or how they work.  They use the Internet, but what is the Internet exactly?  Is it a really just a series of tubes?  Eventually, you will need to know some basics of computer science as they start merging with our bodies and perceptions of reality.  (If you have no idea what I'm talking about, look up The Singularity is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology by Raymond Kurzweil.)

Five Essential Weightlifting Exercises

What are the most important exercises you should do in the gym?  That really depends on your goal.  Most young people go to the gym to look better.  Athletes go to increase their strength and overall fitness.  Older individuals go to maintain or strengthen their bodies.  Although these goals may not always overlap, there are some movements that everyone should perform.  I will list them here in order of importance.  Here are The Big Five:

1. Squat- This is by far the most important lift you can do.  It strengthens your legs and core while stimulating muscle growth for your whole body.  However, it is very difficult and make sure you use proper form in order to avoid injury.  Make sure to squat below parallel to get the most out of the movement.

2. Deadlift- The deadlift is the best full-body strength exercise.  Again, make sure you use proper form or you can risk permanently damaging your lower back.  Strongly resist the urge to sacrifice form to put on more weight for this one.

3. Bench press- Although benching is not as important as people make it out to be, it still is the best exercise for developing upper body strength since it strengthens your chest.

4. Bent-over row- To be honest, I was tempted to put this above the bench press or at least have it tied for third on this list.  I find this movement more difficult than the bench press but it is the best move for developing your back.

5. Shoulder press- The press is definitely the best shoulder exercise.  There's just something about lifting weight over your head that makes you feel really really strong!

I know that I probably left out some of your favorite weight exercises.  A lot of guys might complain that I forgot to rank the bicep curl.  As much as I enjoy curls, I have to admit that curling to make your arms bigger is mostly for show.  Curls don't directly develop functional strength the way the press or the row does.  The same goes for leg and tricep extensions, flyes, calf raises, and pull downs.  By all means do them if you want to.  I usually do them too.  I just give The Big Five priority over the others.

A lot of men fall into the trap of only training their upper bodies.  Even then, they only focus on benching and curling.  Trust me, they should focus on developing their lower bodies as well.  They will have a more complete, well-rounded look.  In addition to looking stronger, they will be stronger too.

I began weight training for sports in middle and high school so my focus was initially on developing strength (mostly upper body).  To this day, I confess that I am still more focused on increasing my strength but I do put some emphasis on overall fitness and aesthetics.  I hope this helped.