Working in the fitness industry, my job is littered with questions in regards to fitness and lifestyle modifications. My usual answer is to add just a little bit more to their current routine. If you are training 3 days per week, make an effort to add a 4th. And when you reach 4 days, 5 is not too far away. If you're disciplined enough to train 5 days per week then I feel that you have it in you to train a 6th day. The same can be said for diet. If you eat well 50% of the time, make it a priority to eat well 60% of the time and so on. Reasonable diets and tough workouts are the basic template to live a healthy lifestyle. It sounds simple but there is nothing easy about it.
7 Ways to Make it Happen
- Goal setting. The difference between exercising and training is having a point. Point A is our current state, Point B is where we want to get to. The mission is to keep the mission the mission. The goal is to keep the goal, the goal.
- Get help. I always think of the joke about the lawyer who represents himself in court: he has a fool for a client! It is tough to do it alone and there are tons of different ways to get help. Hire a trainer, find someone who specializes in nutrition, join a fitness group, get your friends on board, etc. Tell them all your goals and they will (hopefully) hold you accountable.
- 212 Degrees. Remember that quote when times are tough. Make that your battle cry (it was for the Junior Varsity football team I coach this past season). The difference between success and failure is a fine line. Often times we are close to that line and don't even know it. Men and women throw up their hands and surrender when a little more effort and patience would take them to the next level. Hopeless failure would then become glorious success!
- As Margaret Thatcher once said, "you may have to fight a battle more than once to win it". Every decision is not life or death. If it were, I'd be dead a thousand times over. There will be days, weeks or months when we struggle to stay on track. Experience tells me that no one stays on path. Everyone gets lost at one time or another. Just don't let that define you. We can't always avoid short-term failure but we can always strive for success!
- Elimination and addition. For those with time constraints lets take a look at the big picture. If you eliminate 30 minutes of television or web surfing each day you get back more than 180 hours each year! If you add something new each week, you create over 50 additional opportunities for excitement and challenge each week. And if you really want to make a statement, add something new twice per week and that is over 100 new opportunities that you wouldn't have had before!
- Act like you've been there before. Every time you succeed in life does not call for several extra rounds of beer, a salutary cupcake accompanied by high-fives and back slapping. It is what you set out to do, don't be surprised when you do it. Be proud, celebrate, but remember, stay focused on your mission!
- Effort! There are no secrets to success. Success with anything, success in anything has one fundamental aspect- effort!
Chris
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