I posted this on my personal training site and it strongly encourages you to think before you leap in to resolutions. Like all journeys with health and fitness, start now, not Monday, use outcome based decision making and give it your all! Enjoy it is something we encourage all our personal training clients to do – make the change for the good.
If you have a list of things to improve and set about trying to achieve with the heading ‘My New Years List’ then I suggest you stop what you are doing.
Lance Armstrong, seven-time winner of the Tour De France and Cancer Survivor has a great saying;
‘Lance doesn’t have a to-do list, he just does’
By all means have that burning desire, that was probably festering away over Christmas to get fit, healthier and trimmer always lingering in the back of your mind.
The problem with most resolutions, if not all, is that they are focused solely on the outcome rather than the ‘how’ of getting there.
Case in point – lose weight. Great. But how?
Most of us don’t know how to. We set the first outcome based step in motion i.e. joining a gym but fall at the next hurdle. A crash diet sends us into the realm of moody, irritable and tinkeing with our metabolism or a faulty exercise programme yields NO results.
What then?
You can apply this to almost any scenario. Spend more time with the family –great but what’s your plan? Eat Healthy – great but what is your plan? Have a dream home – great , but what’s your plan?
It is great knowing what you want but the ‘how’ is where it is at.
In our case of health and fitness our behaviours must match what we want to achieve.
If they don’t then well-intentioned goals will fall by the way-side. Life-long dreams will last till March.
In other words it is all well and good trying to ‘eat healthy’ but if your behaviours include a cigarette at breakfast, lunch and tea-time washed down with 10 cups of coffee then there is work to do.
So how DO we go about making sure resolutions stick?
Well don’t set them for a starter. Make every day a New Year. It is like the dreaded Monday Morning
Syndrome or MMS for short.
‘I will start on Monday’
How about starting NOW.
That is the difference between those who succeed and those who faulter – speed of implementation. First step is to find someone who has been there before, made the mistakes and gained the necessary information that you want.
Then it is a case of chasing the rabbit. Not chasing 10 at a time and catching none. One rabbit, one rabbit with a 100% catch rate!
Let’s have a look at this in terms of ‘getting fit’. We all know what this means to us as an individual. For some it means running a marathon, the six-pack, toning our tum and bum. So getting fit has to become more specific.
Now let us pick 10 behaviours that a trusted individual has outlined that you need to do get you from where you are now to where you need to be.
You may need to start exercising for a total of 5 hours per week, eat more vegetables and more fish, take a fish oil supplement with every meal and look into managing your stress with Yoga.
See – now you have some direction and focus.
Each and every day you need to work at implementing these habits. Sure it is tough. But it works. The reward is in the journey.
So without sounding too much like a New Age Spiritualist make the decision now to ‘just do’. Sure you need a plan. But what are you waiting for?
If you are fat, do something about it. If you are unfit, get off your backside and move. If you are not happy with your current situation, what are you going to do about it?
The ball is truly in your court.
Visit John Lark’s website at www.john-lark.com and download your free report on the ‘7 Most Effective Ways of Burning Fat’ including a free sample workout and meal plan.
Some good tips and advice there. Procrastination is always the killer!