New Year's Resolution
We are entering the last month of the year and New Year is just around the corner. This time of year, along with thinking about Christmas gifts, people start reflecting on what they have accomplished in current year and what goals they would like to achieve in coming year.
When the goal has not been met, we have tendency to believe that goal setting is not worth it and in fact it may put people to failure.
In fitness, typical goal setting at the beginning of the year is lose weight, get healthy and stronger. However, stats, unfortunately favoring the side of people who gave up in previous year again.
Definiteness of Purpose
When it comes to improving health, including weight loss and strength gains, it is very important to be certain that that is what you are wanting to accomplish. It is somewhat becoming cool things to say at the table during the holiday season about your goal being weight loss and being fit. But do you really want it? Because if your purpose is definite, half of the battle is done.
It’s like this. When you see something that you want online and you have a budget to purchase, you will not think twice about pressing that “Purchase” button. You’ve already made your mind to purchase even before you attempt to press that button. Although getting fit is similar, however, challenging part about committing to fitness goal is process may take time and there can be some setbacks just like anything else. Therefore, what you are wanting to accomplish must be definite to the point you can see yourself being in shape. By the way, there is nothing wrong with being overweight or being unhealthy. It is not a crime and does not make you a bad person. In other words, if your goal is not getting fit, it is ok.
However, if you really want to manage weight, being healthy and strong is a goal, here are somethings that comes along with it.
Delayed Gratification
When the fitness is a goal, it is important to know what you are willing to give up, temporarily. This is called delayed gratification.
For me to be efficient in training 55-65 client hours a week and managing to train myself to be stronger to be able to play soccer until 75, there are several things that need to happen. First is waking up at 4am and finish my workout by 6am. By doing so, I get my training in and not worrying about it while training my clients. Second is I cannot be sick, so nutrition and sleep need to be decent to make sure the body is recovering. Third is give myself at least an hour a day to study to keep on improving my understanding towards human body.
To process those three points, I don’t go out as much as other people do. I don’t have luxury of watching Netflix every night. And I don’t snack as much as I would like. This may be boring lifestyle for the others, but I am fulfilling what I would like to accomplish.
Similar things should be happening for fitness. Being physically active throughout the week, sleep at least 7 hours a day, making healthy food choices, managing your stress, drinking plenty of water are all requirements. They are not menu where you get to choose one.
With busy schedule that most people have there may need to be some adjustments, for the time being, to fit those requirements within your day.
Habit Over Motivation
People, especially younger generations, use the word motivation a lot. Need motivation to do certain things. One thing that I’ve learned over the years is when I wait for my motivation to wake up at 4am and workout, I will never workout. If I need motivation to eat healthy, I will never eat healthy.
When the purpose is definite you don’t need motivation. You will do them anyway. If you do need motivation, most likely you will struggle accomplishing goals.
I do realize that health and fitness goals are lifelong journey. At the same time if it is a lifelong journey, rather than focusing on finding a motivation, it will be easier by creating a habit. It does take some time to create healthier habits but so does keeping unhealthy habits. Prioritize creating habits over finding a motivation quote or video.
Starting Over
As much as we would like for our accomplishments to be linear progression where we can experience progress every day, every week, every month, however, life does challenge us. There will be a frustration moment where you have experienced momentum of progress then you get sick, you get hurt, you have unplanned travel for work and so on.
When things get tough and cannot seem to proceed forward, start over. When you think you are finished and want to quit, start over. When year has been long and success is too few, you realized December is here and feeling blue, January is there for you to start over.
Don’t quit, reset, and keep going.
Kota Shimada
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