Is LESS more, or is MORE more?

Thanks Gap.

I’m definitely less is more, which works for me because it’s less time spent PE’ing. I would say 30 min a day stretching is my max, and a rest day every 2 or 3 days to heal.

My thoughts also. I’m three weeks into the new newbie routine and if I get the maximum gains projected for it by J123 I would have reach my length goal by mid June. I really hope I’m not being over-optimistic.

Based on my past experience of PE it certainly feels like I should be doing a lot more to get those kinds of gains.

There is a part of me that’s tempted to start swinging weights in line with sparkyx’s suggestions (5lbs for ten minutes a day) to try and work more on my base girth (and hopefully develop a little more length at the same time). Maybe girth gained through swinging weights might actually be permanent also, which would make it a lot more worth-while, especially if it’ll reverse my baseball bat. I think I feel another change of routine coming on.

It’s far from ideal but rather than anything else it might just be a problem with semantics, but definitely a serious one that needs to be addressed, just due to the ambiguity of the comment. I had similar confusion over the use of the term ‘pain’, hence my thread “How Much Pain is Too Little pain?”.

What one person might consider to be ‘serious pressure’ might be very different from what the next guy considers ‘serious pressure’. Within the sphere of manual penis enlargement I’d probably consider maximum engorgement under two fully-tightened cable clamps ‘serious pressure’, but on a global scale, I’d expect ‘serious pressure’ to cause my dick to explode.

Big girtha seemed to know almost everything about clamping and always maintained you didn’t need maximum engorgement during clamping to make gains.

I started in February with Big Al’s newbie routine from LPSG, and gradually ramped up the intensity/time (to about 60 min jelqing, 25 min stretching) since my PIs were great (constant pleasant warm tingle, erections about half the time - off days and on).

Now I’m thinking I overdid it - is that possible when PIs are great, or do newbies get good PIs from just about anything?

Classic response of a “more is more” guy. Trust me, if you were a “less is more” guy, your EQ would have dropped into the toilet and your dick would stop working!

What I DO find with guys like you, is that you think PIs are great, even though you may be over training. HOWEVER, many times when you cut back you find EQ gets far higher than it was, and you find out that you were over doing it, but never knew it.

What makes you think you over did it? If you think thats the case, take about 1 week off, and if your EQ climbs higher and higher for most of that time, then you WERE over doing it. If it doesn’t then, I doubt you are over training.

Hey sparkyx,

I mostly thought I overdid it since it seemed like I was doing a lot more than the newb routine recommends - but it felt okay, both during sessions and on off days. I just steadily added time to my newb routine until it *was*, for one session, unambiguously too much (specifically, I forced a session when I really didn’t want to, then lost EQ for 3 days - this was the only time I’ve ever felt “bad” from PE, otherwise it’s all been either “baseline” or “good”), took a brief break until EQ came back, then did a lighter routine but got fewer good PIs - so I cut back further thinking I had to “detox”, then almost stopped getting PIs entirely - and was recently planning to take a longer break.

So - this is the exact opposite of what I should do?

I assumed I had overdone it initially since my good PIs were still present, but less pronounced, lately - that I had toughened myself up - but I guess I could just be *under*doing it now.

So, what you’re saying is that *until* you get negative PIs, you’re not overdoing it - but also, that negative PIs may be so slight and mild that you may not notice them until you take a total break (which would mean you’re only *slightly* overdoing it)?

I’m gonna take a week off anyway, so I’ll test this - but now I’m looking at coming back at the level of intensity I had *before* the injury.

Anyway - as always, thanks for your thoughts.

I do think you overdid it, but probably over did the INTENSITY and not the time. The first thing to show over training is EQ, if you continue, THEN you can get Neg PIs.

I say take a week off and watch your EQ, that will tell the real story. If you were over training, your EQ will steadily rise for almost the whole week. If you weren’t over training your EQ may not rise at all, or very little for a short time.

If you WEREN’T over training, then I would recommend going back to the last PRODUCTIVE level of workout you were doing. Obviously, when you hit a level where your EQ dropped for 3 days, that was too much. Go back to the last productive level. THEN, when you increase, don’t increase intensity (at first) just try increasing time. If increasing time doesn’t make much difference, then you can try to SLOWLY increase intensity, but never to the point of pain.

The “more is more” guys, many times don’t see gains until they are doing a fairly long workout. Thats why I say the trick is to figure out what camp you are in as quickly as possible. I think EQ should be very helpful in helping your figure that out.

You know what level of intensity you got injured at, I would definitely stay below that level.

Right - once the week’s up, unless my EQ goes way up (I’m 2 days in so far and no major EQ change, or change of any kind) I’ll gradually ramp back up to around what I was doing just before the injury - when PIs were so good they encouraged me to go overboard (3 days in a row instead of 1 on, 1 off), and the resulting injury sent me into a self-reinforcing death-spiral of overcautiousness (“I should do less - I’m getting fewer PIs - I must have toughened myself up - I should do less” etc).

Not sure how much smaller that gyre would have tightened without your advice. If gyres tighten. So, thanks again - the “more is more” diagnosis makes sense - I tend to be suggestible (“hey newbies, don’t hurt yourself”) and to err on the side of cowardice and ineffectiveness.

Some guys need to be told to take it easy - I don’t think I’m one of them.

I think you need to be careful with FORCE, but not time.

Yeah, more is more guys really many times don’t see shit until they really have a lengthy workout. If your EQ doesn’t rise then I think thats diagnostic of you being a more is more guy.

Yes, then I really think you need to watch the force you use, but with time you should feel free to up it and experiment with it. If you go over in time, it will drop EQ, but won’t destroy you. Just bear in mind to up time by reasonable amounts, not go from 20 minutes to 60 in one jump. You are probably safe with going up by 5 minute increments.

As far as force goes, I’m just manual so far (no bowling ball hanging) - and, unlike a lot of guys here, I’m not a bodybuilder.

I was jelqing as hard as my fingers/deltoids would let me a few days *before* the injury, and was okay - I think it was just the leap to 3 days in a row that hurt. The last session before the injury felt bad from the start, and I only went ahead with it because I thought maybe PE was supposed to feel bad.

I’m thinking/hoping that individual jelq strokes that feel okay shouldn’t add up into a jelq session that hurts.

That sounds like way too much force, I don’t care if you are a bodybuilder or a librarian.

Fair enough - just enough that the glans swells, then?

“Moderate” is so subjective - we should quantify this with scales.

It should never feel bad. The bad feeling is probably your body’s way of telling you you’re overdoing it.

Jelqing should be invigorating. If you do it so much that it screws up your erectile quality you’re probably definitely overdoing it. I used to hang weights until my unit was as limp as a noodle. All it did for me was toughen it. Yes I probably could have towed a bus with it, but that’s not the object of the exercise. The idea is to stimulate it enough to make gains, not to toughen it up. I used to try and deliberately condition mine so that I could hang heavier and heavier weights, because I thought higher weights would make me gain faster, but all it seemed to do was strengthen it making it more difficult to stretch. It truly did seem to become conditioned and strengthened to cope with the added force. A conditioning and strengthening that seemed to prohibit growth.

It seems you’ve at least found some limits. I’d say definitely stay within those limits, and if you’re strong enough to jelq regularly than fighting to use all of your strength to do it is definitely overdoing it. It’s similar to ‘ballooning’: You wouldn’t use all your strength to balloon as hard as you possibly could, because it could easily cause you an injury, and jelqing should be handled similarly.

Yeah, this is kind of how I was feeling: I was getting great PIs and some apparent growth, but lately I seem to be back at the size I started (it fluctuates), and each session does less for me.

I got the one unambiguous injury (when I forced myself to do a session that definitely felt bad), but no other negative PIs - but my dick was definitely getting tougher, like cooked rubber - also looking kind of tanned and leathery. Is “toughening” a PI?

Trying to have shorter/softer sessions just got me less results, and eventually left me feeling completely baseline: trying to do more just seemed to toughen it. So I’m on detox for a while, and trying to interpret if I should come back in with “more” or “less” (so far, I’m thinking “longer but with less force”).

So, Mr. F - you gradually shifted to a “less is more” routine - did you have a drop in PIs as you did?

Thats the problem with many of the PE methods its hard to quantify. Thats why pumping and hanging have an advantage in its reproducibility.