4 Steps to Fitness Success

Every year millions of people start the month of January with the idea that this will be the year that they finally get into shape. Unfortunately, it is widely understood within the fitness industry that 3 out of 4 people will be unsuccessful with their New Year’s health and fitness resolution. Follow these 4 simple steps to ensure that you will finally see success in the gym.

1. Quantify your goal(s)

   Is your goal to lose some weight? Are you planning on toning up? Avoid using vague phraseology like this when describing your goals. Every day I meet with potential clients who say that they would like to lose “a few” pounds. They usually refer to how their old clothes fit now and about how thin they used to look. That’s why my first step is always a physical assessment of the client. Once your current weight, body fat, and lean mass have been calculated, then and only then can your true needs be assessed.

   All too often “a few” pounds turns into 25 pounds once they see their real measurements. The good part is that the more specific you are about your goals, the more accountability you will have to your results. This will make you much more likely to achieve your goals. If you don’t know where you really are, then it is impossible to know where you are going and how to get there.

2. Recognize bad habits

   No matter the goals, I see the same bad habits inhibiting the success of almost every struggling gym-goer. First and foremost is poor nutrition. With that being said, I don’t expect any of our clients to have textbook perfect eating habits. Luckily, it usually only takes minor tweaks to a client’s nutrition to begin seeing serious results. Want the top 3? Stop skipping breakfast, focus on lowering your sugar intake, and increase your daily protein intake.

3. Select a program

   This is the only step that varies based on your fitness level. At the beginner level, or someone who has been out of the gym for a while, you should be looking for a workout program that focuses on the fundamentals. Be sure you are warming up and cooling down properly, using basic movements, and executing correct form. At the intermediate level, the intensity and diversity of the exercises needs to be increased. This is the stage when your initial progress has begun to slow down or has stopped entirely. At the advanced fitness level, your program should begin to emphasis specific weaknesses. This may be muscular imbalances between your right and left sides, performance conditioning for sports, or individual muscle group development (i.e., biceps, chest, or legs).

4. Stay consistent

   The most important rule of all is to stay consistent with your training. Even more so than which training program you choose, you need to give your body enough time to fully respond and adapt. This could be weeks, months, or possibly more than a year based on your fitness level. Don’t let periods of slow results discourage you from continuing towards your end goal. Remember, Rome wasn’t built in a day.

A healthy lifestyle, at any level, involves being active. This requires activity week after week, month after month, year after year. Even I must reevaluate these aspects of my own fitness journey on a regular basis to refocus my energy on achieving my short and long-term goals as efficiently as possible. Don’t let 2017 be another year that your health and fitness dreams slipped away. This system has already proven effective on myself and countless clients over my years as a Strength and Conditioning Specialist. I am confident that it will work for you too.

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