You don’t have to be the best at working out, you just have to be the best at showing up!
I recently saw a post from a trainer I follow that outlined the “best strategy” to long term success and commitment to health and fitness. The strategy had nothing to do with a particular diet or innovative form of exercise.
It was simply, for every 10 workouts:
7 should be of light or moderate intensity
2 should moderate to high intensity
1 should be of high intensity
The message was you don’t have to crush yourself, deprave yourself, or restrict yourself. What you have to do is SHOW UP. You have to show up for those 10 workouts again, and again. That’s the magic.
There isn’t a week that goes by that I don’t hear a member say “I’m glad I came in today, I was so close to cancelling my workout”. On the flip side, maybe once in my 8 years at GST have I heard someone say “Coming in was a mistake, I should have just cancelled”.
The hardest part about working out is getting to the gym! It’s not the training, the training takes care of itself. The training is pretty much out of your control. The great coaches at GST handle that.
Getting out of bed, stopping on your way home from work, planning ahead during a busy day to get your workouts in…those are the things that are completely in your control. Forget about a heavy kettlebell, this is the hard stuff.
If a magazine were to ask me what the #1 piece of fitness advice is, I would say “show up to the gym 3x a week with no exceptions for 3 years.”
The issue with that advice, they would never run that article.
NO ONE WANTS TO HEAR THAT. 3 workouts a week for 3 years?!?!? That’s insane.
Yes, it is insane. And guess what, it leads to insane results!
~468 workouts over the course of 3 years. 468 decisions to go to the gym, 468 scheduled workouts, 468 changes of gym clothes to clean, 468 chances to say “ not today, I’ll go tomorrow”.
You don’t have to be the best at working out, you have to be the best at showing up.
4 Tips to help you show up!
-Track your visits: Mark your visits down on a calendar. Everytime we do an accountability challenge with a check in board, visits skyrocket! What if you used that same strategy on your own? Put a calendar in your kitchen, bedroom, or office and check off every day you exercise.
– Erase and Replace: If you erase you must replace. If you have to miss a workout or skip a workout, that’s fine. However, you should schedule a replacement workout to stay on track. If you fall off track it can be a bear to get back on.
-Set a goal: Set a goal for the month. Your goal may be performance based (do 10 push ups, increase squat by 10lbs) body composition based (lose 4lbs), habit based (walk 20minutes a day), etc. Set a different goal each month. At the end of the year, I bet some of these habits stick!
-Plan: Each week plan when you will and when you won’t exercise, when you will and when you won’t stick to your nutrition plan. When you will and won’t go to sleep. Having a plan helps when it comes to decision making. If you constantly have to think about when you’ll find time to exercise, what you’re going to eat to stick to your plan, and how in the world you can get more sleep you’ll never act on anything.
Habits take time, results take time. Being healthy isn’t something you do, it’s who you are.
Be the best at showing up for yourself
-Coach Jeff
