If you know me you know that I am pretty big on goal setting to achieve with your health and fitness. Well I am going to take that a little further and let you know that while goals are great, you need to go further to have truly lasting health and fitness.
To me, you need to have a health and fitness mission statement. Sorry to sound like a bit of a tool, I know it is a bit cringy, but bear with me.
I have been in the health and fitness industry for bang on 10 years, and in that time I have seen all manner of goals set by participants in programs. And on top of that I have seen all manner of goals achieved. Sometimes, that is where the problem is.
Once the goal is achieved then what? People will set goals based on a future point in time, like a wedding, high school reunion, competition, etc. And once they get to that date, health and fitness is forgotten, goal accomplished! Don’t need to get back to the gym now, I did that! Then in a few weeks the pants start getting tighter, the flight of stairs taller, the bags of chips on the lounge in front of a movie bigger and life goes back to being unfit, and unhealthy.
So what is it about that person you know that hits the gym regularly, goes for a run, never seems to have much fat on their frame, is super motivated, not only in the gym but all aspects of their life??
Chances are they probably have something resembling a mission statement that keeps them going. You see a mission statement can never fully be accomplished, you can strive for it, work towards it, tick goals off along the way, but never completely attain it.
With a goal in mind some people can get discouraged when they go off course and so pack it in. The people with the mission statement know that there will be times that you are off course, but that you can bring it back around again. Think about an aeroplane, it is off course up to 99% of the time it is in the air, it continues to make small alterations to the flight path time and again to bring it back into line and then in the end achieve its goal of landing at its destination.
Health and fitness is like this, you have a goal of losing 5 kilos, running 5Kms in a certain time, but there is a birthday party this weekend. For some the goal is destroyed, others just see a small deviation in their course in getting them where they want to be. Now if you had that goal of lose 5KG by a certain date as your only driving motivator it is easy to drop it when off course, or once you hit it.
If your motivator is something along the lines of, I want to be the fittest healthiest person I can today, then it might stick a lot better. The 5KG loss goal then becomes part of trying to never fully achieving that statement, it is one step in the process of living your mission.
It can be referred to as your why, your purpose or your mission, but if it isn’t strong enough you won’t stick to it.It has to align with who you are and where you want to be in life. Agian, if it doesn’t, it won’t happen.
Health and fitness isn’t a short burst, a sprint with a time cap, it is a lifelong pursuit of being better than yesterday. We can’t take a break from life, everyday we get up and move about. We can’t just pop it on hold when we feel like it, and your fitness and health is part of that. It is the foundation it is all built upon. Set short term goals and stop every three or four months for a couple of weeks break and soon enough you will stop for a month, and then that will turn into a year and well, you get the picture.
So have a look, see what your goals are, align them with your values and set your mission statement. Make sure you can never fully attain it, but can strive towards it, remember, better than yesterday.