Here’s to a New Year and renewed optimism. In addition to the calendar turning we know the New Year brings with it the annual new gym membership migration with it. Unfortunately we also know over 90% of these hopeful souls will crash and burn by March. Harsh I know, but so is subjecting oneself to the same cycle of hope and despair every year.

 So instead of setting yourself up for another unfortunate turn of events let's talk a strategy that may still be bearing fruit 12 months from now.  Here’s a very boring but amazingly effective strategy to save yourself the letdown this year. So then maybe when 2020 arrives you will say, “hey look at me I actually made progress this year. I’m better now than I was at this time last year.”

Instead of setting some lofty weight loss or fitness goal you don’t have the accountability or discipline to achieve, set the only goal that matters when getting started. The only thing you need to be concerned with right now is consistency. Nothing else matters at this point, not that number on the scale, not the type of workout, not type of exercises or even what top matches your new yoga pants. The only thing that matters at this point is developing enough discipline in your daily life to get your weekly workouts in.

If you are getting your workouts in then you are finally learning how to make fitness a priority. By definition if you are being consistent with working out, accountability is being developed. It is this accountability that is absolutely required for any of your loftier goals.

Want to be an Instagram model? Starts with consistency.

Want to fit into your 20’s jeans? Starts with consistency.

Want to do 10 pull-ups. You guessed it.

Nobody likes boring, nobody gets excited about simple. We want flash and bang and we want it when we ask for it. So, we can exist in our own ego-protected bubble, or decide to live in a world of realistic self-reflection mixed in with a little bit of patience. The sooner we can come to terms with what we have known for a very long time about getting in shape the sooner we might actually get there and stay there.

Fitness Truths…

1) It’s always going to be hard, that’s why they call it working out
2) It will hurt sometimes and you will get sore sometimes.
3) There will always be distractions.
4) You probably won’t get much credit for your hard work.
5) If you're lucky you will feel motivated to workout even half the time.
6) The rest of the world probably will not care about your excuses.

So to review, until you can do something on a regular basis (also known as creating a habit), it would and should be ludicrous to think you could or will achieve a loftier goal.  This is called being realistic, it's like picking up a guitar a couple times a month and strumming for about ten minutes at a time but telling yourself the goal is to be able play like Hendrix.  Your goals must be compatible with your behaviors.  So until you have established the basic but essential behavior of consisency nothing else matters.  This is so simple that is actually is difficult for a lot of people who cannot just focus on one thing at a time.  Do it, commit to 12 months of staying committed and the fruit will fall from the tree year round instead of only in January.