Work in Progress
We live in a society that doesn’t like to wait for things. We want it and we want it now. This holds true in every aspect of our lives. When things don’t work out the way we want it to we throw it away and move on to the next thing. This is true in our careers, relationships, education, spirituality and yes, even our fitness!
I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to sit down with clients who have been frustrated with their lack of results only to admit that they were never really putting in 100% in our sessions. They were sneaking those glasses of wine on a nightly basis, or eating those daily donuts at the office “that guy” brought in to be “nice” to everyone without reporting their calories.
I’m going to share with you some easy ways to create some realistic goals that are TRACKABLE. Trackable goals are important because we want to be able to measure success. I will also share some common tracking tools that can help you be successful.
Give Yourself Time
Create reasonable weight loss, muscle gain and performance goals.
Nobody expects perfection. When you fall off the wagon, get right back on.
An individual who is severely out of shape will most likely see immediate and dramatic results in the beginning, but it will slow down dramatically as you either come closer to your goal or hit a training plateau. It is important to set realistic targets and remember that it’s not the goal that you should set your sights on, but the actions that create success. These actions include: making healthy eating choices, not missing your workouts, integrating an active recovery day where you are still active (beach, hiking, walking the dog, bike riding, etc.) without beating your body up with an intense training program (this will help your mind reset as well).
Create Goal Specific Programming
Make sure your program is designed specifically to help you achieve the goals that you are looking for.
It is important to understand that you have to be realistic about where you are at physically. Many issues, to include joint problems, limited flexibility, poor muscular endurance, medical concerns, etc. can be overcome by laying the appropriate foundations. This, however, means that you might not be able to jump right into the program that you want. Most people don’t like spending weeks in a flexibility program, then into a balance training program before they can feel like they are getting the fast paced workouts that will help them get results. Building the proper foundations will ensure that you don’t risk excessive wear and tear on joints ultimately resulting in injury.
Advancing your training program should be a matter of program specificity and facilitating your goals. Your program shouldn’t be limited by joint immobility, flexibility, or pain. In other words, with proper program design you will not be held back when it’s time to advance your training program.
Celebrate Every Success
What do we focus on when we lose motivation?
There are so many aspects to a well balanced fitness program that there are many opportunities to celebrate and get excited about progress. Certain other things listed below might not be important to you directly, but they will impede your progress in the future if you do not address them, so it’s important to acknowledge and celebrate them.
Training progressions begin with:
Correcting inflexibility and muscular imbalances
Stabilization
Endurance
Hypertrophy (muscle gain)
Max Strength
Power
Max Power
Keep reading the blog, because every month I will write more extensively on these phases.
Program & Nutritional Tracking
Track your progress in a way that works for you
Everyone is different. Some clients love to use our app to access their workouts, nutrition, cardio and flexibility programs. Other clients like to use good old fashioned pen and paper. Other clients have used an excel spreadsheet. Whatever your preference, it is imperative that you find an option that will help you create the habit of actually logging your data.
By logging your data, you can compare your current fitness levels to what you were doing months ago. This will help keep you motivated knowing that your program is actually working.
The other benefit to tracking your nutrition and exercise program is that your fitness professional has all the data that he or she needs to overcome training plateaus and identify what may be helping or hindering your fitness goals.
Now What?
Where do I go from here?
If you are unsure where to begin, we can help you get started here at Unbroken either with online programming or 1 on 1 personal training.
Unbroken will give you nutritional guidance and online programming through our cutting edge app available through your App Store or Google Play Store. We will customize your strength training, cardiovascular, flexibility, nutrition and supplement programs. We take out all the guesswork. The best part is that we will educate you on the why behind the what so you can do it on your own.
Check out our plans and pricing at: https://www.unbrokensd.com/plans-pricing
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