I had an epiphany not long ago (I am sometimes a bit slow at coming to conclusions). I had given all the credit for my success in finding great health and a new physique to my personal trainer - although he was great, obviously he was not the magic bullet for some others to achieve the same type of success. Could I have had the same success with a different trainer? Maybe, but does it really matter? I would have paid any price and given him my first born for the great results I got. The training was incredibly valuable. I found out what I was doing incorrectly, learned proper form for weights, had someone with expertise blow my previous beliefs that I was too old to get fit right out of the water - but I did not give nearly enough credit to my part in my transformation.
Since then I have had 12 weeks away from training in 2008 due to major abdominal surgery and 16 weeks away from training in 2009 due to a serious shoulder fracture. Both times, I did not gain weight during the hiatus. I stayed on my clean eating nutrition plan, and did what I could within my limits. Sure there was some loss of muscle bulk, higher body fat and less lean muscle tissue. But both times I came back with a vengeance, alone, no trainer in sight. So how am I achieving prolonged success and why not everyone else?
(I am noting the following reasons simply because they were the reasons for my failures before... with one exception - booze - I am not a drinker)
- Maybe they really don't want to.
- Belief that everyone likes you the way you are.
- Hiding the problem by avoiding mirrors and wearing oversized clothes.
- Blaming health issues for not being physically active.
- Suffering from an untreated or improperly treated major depressive disorder.
- Not going into the fitness journey with the mind-set that it is for life – a lifestyle change.
- Having previous trainers who failed to 'teach you to fish'
- Having the wrong catalyst to ‘down-size’ such as a short term gain for example looking good to attend a high school reunion or wedding.
- When the latest health scare is over, old bad habits return.
- Belief that their genetic profile makes obesity inevitable.
- No association with the bad habits and future damage. Immediate gratification is not overcome.
- No self motivation - once the personal training segment is done, they can’t continue without a whip.
- They set themselves up for failure by wanting results too fast. This interferes with the process of making a lifestyle change. It is NOT magic. It is hard work.
- Using expensive alternatives such as purchased pre-packaged food plans. Money runs out and once they have to eat ‘normally’ they have no idea how. These foods are not nutritious, they are usually just portion control plans. Only whole foods will give the health boost needed to know how great you can feel.
- Too many people ‘diet’ not knowing that significant reduction diets do not work and are not sustainable long term. Many do not realize that one can actually eat more eating clean and never be hungry and that they will really taste food for the first time once all the crap is out of their diets.
- Many refuse to give up their booze, French fries etc using these types of foods as rewards for 'having to work out.' You can't out run French fries.
- Many undo a whole week of clean eating and exercise with an overindulgent eating and drinking fest. (Eat clean for a sustained period and then use moderation when having a treat. Once you have eaten clean and felt the benefits, you will immediately notice the difference in how you feel and you will be much less likely to do it again).
- Deprivation. Totally removing yourself from social activity to avoid the temptations will soon lead to failure. (There are lots of healthy choices even at social events. Make it a challenge to find tasty but healthy foods on menus when out to dinner)
- Impatience - many jump from fitness plan to fitness plan and diet to diet, never giving enough time to measure or see results.
- Lack of record keeping and estimating food intake and guestimating progress with cardio and weights leads to failure. Measuring will help track even small changes keeping you motivated.
- Most do not change the attitude toward good nutrition and exercise going at it as if it is something horrible instead of using visualization, rewards, and other methods to truly learn to love exercise and good food. Associating pleasure with feeling and looking great instead of with deep fried foods and lying on the beach goes a long way. If you don’t change this one thing, you will not be successful for very long.
- They hang on to their fat clothes, telling themselves psychologically that they are going to fail.
- They are not willing to spend as much on maintaining their health and bodies as on their house, cars, vacations and toys.
- They fail to research and learn all they can about their health and fitness so that without a trainer, friend, diet outfit or other structure, they cannot succeed on their own.
- There is too much television and computer use in their lives.
- They don't increase activity to compensate for a sedentary job.
- They downsize in summer and upsize in winter totally screwing up the metabolism.
- They yoyo diet.
- They fail to believe in themselves.
- They play the martyr always putting others first.
- Too much cardio and insufficient or no resistance/weight training.
- Start too aggressively and get injured.
- They always go back to an old fitness or diet plan. If these programs really worked, they would be part of the lifestyle and not something to return to when weight is regained.
- They don’t pay attention to what they ingest, scarfing food down indiscriminately to ‘fill the hole’ rather than nourish the body.
- They don’t stay on a nutrition plan long enough to lose cravings.
- They associate success with the scale instead of how they feel and how clothes fit and feel. Weight can fluctuate significantly and one can be still on the right track.
The only other thing I can think of as to why I finally succeeded is because I was tired of failing and tired of being tired, ugly and obese. Not to forget when I was unable to avoid a camera I actually saw what I looked like and it was nobody I recognized.
I guess until you reach your saturation point and you stop accepting your condition as irreversible and not in your control, you won't succeed.
You are the only one who can find the determination within yourself to change to a better healthier life.
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