Increasing your Motivation
Make Realistic Goals in Realistic Timeframes!
Creating an expectation to transform the body into something you see on the cover of a magazine in only three weeks when you have 10-30kg to lose is somewhat unrealistic, yet unfortunately a common approach to training is just that (dream body within 3 weeks).
Changing your health and transforming your body requires three universal principles that will determine the success or failure of even the most motivated of people – consistency, perseverance and patience.
Now I know this doesn’t sound very sexy or exciting and you probably aren’t going to put this up as your next Facebook status update. However it was those appealing magazine photos that got you motivated and got your bum off the couch and into the gym. So how do we harness that burst of motivation so you are still in the gym consistently in 12 months looking and feeling amazing, not fat and tired and desperate to try and melt off that excess fat?
Let’s face it, we’re all human, life takes time, we all have to work, have family commitments, we all have problems, we all have bad days, relationship problems. Sometimes life can get in the way and our exercise and good eating habits are often the first things to get pushed to the side.
Through enduring my own challenging life experiences I looked to learn from the experiences of sporting champions who inspired me, sourcing as much information as I could and keen to apply it to my own life and the lives of my clients.
Where many people go wrong including me, was thinking that while going through hard circumstances or bad days that we don’t have what it takes to succeed and be a champion in our own right. Champions aren’t the unfailing pictures of amazing humanity that we may think they are. I had always thought they were. Doesn’t life have to be perfect to be a real champion? Don’t all champions have everything handed to them; have big houses and cars and money with never-failing desire and superhuman resistance to pain.
Umm NO. Champions have pain too. They have been through failure after failure to get to where they are. Nobody’s life is perfect, and nobody has it easy. Fact!
When you’re mentally and physically drained due to uncontrollable circumstances, don’t question your motivation and DO NOT give up your exercising and healthy eating. Sure, some days you’re not going to feel like training, and it’s probably better to take it a little easier, but deep down if you had the desire before, then it’s still there.
Here’s what it boils down to:
Don’t beat yourself up, but realize that everyone is human and we all have hard days, sometimes hard months, and maybe even hard years. Life takes time, training takes time and it’s up to each individual to make the best of it all. Eating right and exercising will be the one thing in your life that you do have control over. Motivation gets you started but consistency gets you results.
Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up!