The title of today’s post, Priority, Consistency, and Forever, is a bit of a word soup or maybe more like a word appetizer. They are 3 of the most important factors in meeting your fitness/health goals. In fact, those 3 words could probably be applied to just about anything that you want to set goals around like getting wicked strong, learning how to grow a sweet beard, or taking over the world in Risk (yes the old school board game!). But they are three words that I find are important, and understanding the context of them is just as crucial. So grab a protein shake and get ready to figure out how to apply them to your situation.
I’ve done it, you’ve done it, and your mother’s uncle’s brother has done it. What is that? Set a goal or decided to get in shape and failed miserably at it. You joined a gym, started some sort of exercise program, or a nutrition program only to bail 3 weeks in because life got in the way. The next time you start a program again, how can you make sure you succeed, or at least maybe continue into week 4 or 5. Make it a priority that’s how!
I find that most of the people I work with that struggle getting in a regular groove of exercise whether it be zumba, powerlifting, or prancercise is because they don’t make it a priority. Making exercise a priority is probably one of the most important things you can do for yourself. You need to be selfish with the time you schedule for exercise and make sure little to nothing will prevent you from doing it. Schedule it in your iphone, on your outlook calendar, heck tattoo it on your forehead, whatever works to remind yourself that exercise is one of the keys to losing fat, getting in great shape, and living life to its fullest.
The typical I don’t have time is a cop out. Mark Young, a well respected fit pro, posted something on facebook a while back that said, “When I find myself saying I don’t have time for something I will instead say I’m not making that a priority”. I’ve started doing this a bit myself and it really starts to change your mindset. Try this little exercise when you find yourself blaming a lack of time for not executing your goal. We all have the same 24 hours in a day, so make sure you prioritize the goals you want to accomplish. If you really truly think you don’t have enough time, keep a log of everything you do during the day and the time it takes, chances are you can find even 15 minutes to execute your goal. A 15 minute workout or 15 minutes spent organizing your meal plan is better than nothing, don’t fall victim to the all or nothing mindset. While a 15 minute workout may not help you make significant progress in your goals it will help you keep the habit, which is just as valuable.
Consistency is the second piece of the puzzle when it comes to reaching your particular goals. If you can’t consistently execute your plan more than likely you will not get the results you want. The old 80/20 rule applies here, because if you execute your plan about 80% of the time you will likely find success, as long as your idea of success is realistic. Consistency means executing your plan even when you don’t want to, but at the same time being able to enjoy life and not miss out on social functions or activities because of overly restrictive programs. It’s about finding balance in your exercise and nutrition programming and life so all of those pieces can peacefully coexist.
Be patient with the process. If you nail the right behaviors (nutrition and exercise) consistently, the outcome (fat loss or looking jacked on the beach) will come in time, but probably not as quickly as you’d like. More than likely it will take longer than you want so be ready for that.
At the end of the day the behavioral changes we’ve made, adjustments in nutrition, the exercise program, need to be viewed through a lens of can I do this forever? We have to be willing to apply and maintain these changes forever, otherwise when we return to old behaviors the fat starts to accumulate and our hard work quickly disappears. This is part of the reason why we need to make sure our programs have balance and are sustainable in the long term, ultimately forever.
Flash in the pan quick fixes fail every time. You don’t know anybody who has been on the cabbage soup diet for freaking life right? The forever piece is also a reason I’m not a huge fan of programs like weight watchers, medifast, p90x, and the like, most of these programs are ones we won’t adhere to forever. They teach us to follow a program, not necessarily educate us on how to make changes forever. There is nothing inherently wrong with any of those programs and we’ve all seen the drastic results they can produce. They absolutely can produce results and they may have other nuances that are good or bad, but you need to continue doing everything they provide, forever, or the old you will come back.
Priority, consistency, and forever, stay focused on these and you’ll be one step closer to your reaching your goals.:)