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You are here: Home / Archives for persistence

Seeking Exercise Success? Your Key Ingredient Is Persistence

May 3, 2013 by MikeTremba Leave a Comment

treadmill hazard exercise

Finish this sentence for me: If at first you don’t succeed…

If you were going to say, “try again,” you would have been right by conventional standards.

However, I’m not a conventional guy.

No, I don’t just think you should try again if your first attempt is a flop; you should take your failure as a victory. It implies that you’re challenging yourself. In place of the old adage, I’d say a more accurate and motivational iteration would be:

If at first you don’t succeed, you know that you’re after something worth accomplishing.

The path to success is paved with a lot of face-first tumbles; a healthy serving of embarrassment; a dollop of stress and, most importantly—the base that holds the recipe together— a generous scoop of persistence.

But when it comes to getting in shape, developing persistence is no small task; it requires a bit of persistence in and of itself. In order to get yourself motivated to follow through, you need to ask yourself a few honest, hard-hitting questions.

Is Your Goal Worth It?

Before you endeavor to work your butt off achieving something, ask yourself if what you’re working toward is going to improve your life enough to be worth the effort you’ll have to exert.

For instance, if you’re dieting to lose weight, but you only have five pounds to lose, is it worth the temporary uprooting of your entire metabolic and dietary cycles? Probably not. Upping you game at the gym while maintaining your same healthy, steady diet is a lower-risk, slower reward option, but wiser in this low-stake situation.

However, if you’re trying to shake off twenty pounds, a total overhaul of what you put in, and how you treat, your body is definitely called for. And won’t be a walk in the park, either.

It’s a matter of choosing the battles you force yourself to fight. Sagacious selection will make it that much easier to motivate yourself to stay standing.

Why Do People Fail?

A program called The Diet Solution Program Review cites most peoples’ main reason for failing to lose weight or get in shape as one simple thing:

lack of persistence.

Look, it takes weeks for you to notice physical changes once you’ve started working out; it takes those closest to you months, and people with whom you’re distantly acquainted and see infrequently can take months to notice… and may not notice at all.

The lack of reinforcement—from the mirror and your peers—makes giving up seem a lot more appealing than persevering.

And that brings me to my next point.

Why Do You Want To Succeed?

I think it’s important to preface this by saying that anyone who endeavors to adhere to a healthy diet and exercise regime does it at least partially for the physical payoff.

That being said, you should never embark on journey to change your body for the sole purpose of looking different.

Persistence is nearly impossible to come by when the goal you’re working toward is misaligned with reality. For instance—if you’re working out to get chiseled abs, you’ll probably give up after two months of core boot camp when your stomach doesn’t look anything like the picture from Men’s Health (or Women’s Health).

Getting fit means constantly being accountable, which means you have to consistently persist with yourself. The most successful fitness stories typically happen because someone had a deeper reason to get fit beyond just “looking good”.

What’s In The Way?

Finally, what’s stopping you from getting into the shape you desire? Really—take a look at the roadblocks, and be honest with yourself.

How many are imagined?

Your mind wants what’s best for you, but it’s also programmed to avoid discomfort and disappointment. As such, it’ll trick you into thinking that exercise is too difficult, or dieting too restricting, to actually stick to.

We’re what’s in the way of our own persistence. If you want to succeed, you need to stop out of your own path and set yourself on the track to success. Practice being you’re number one fan, searching for positive reinforcement in even the most challenging situations, and tell the little voice that says, “You can’t,” to find someone else’s subconscious to bring down.

About The Author: Dr. Mike Tremba has found every excuse imaginable to not exercise. Through a great deal of motivation found through others, and in places like the review of Truth About Abs, Dr. Mike has been blessed to develop the persistence to eat well, lose weight, and expand his world while helping others expand theirs.  He lives in Mobile, Alabama with his wonderful wife Shari, where he continually challenges himself to better the lives of others.

Filed Under: Exercise, goals, Guest Author, planning, Success Tagged With: exercise, exercise program, getting in shape, persistence, planning, stress

Never Too Late to Start Again

February 27, 2012 by Scott "Q" Marcus Leave a Comment

Self-Acceptance Affirmation

Starting “Again”

It’s never too late – nor too early – to begin again.

Progress, by its very definition, is not a linear process. We move forward, we fall down, we get back up again. Each time we slip up, it means we’ve tried something new. We need to congratulate ourselves for that.

Therefore, the more progress we make, the more times we will fall down. What matters is how long it takes us to get back up again.

Today, I will re-commit myself to something I want that I had previously stopped pursuing. I will take one small step. I will congratulate myself for my persistence. I am proud of the fact that I keep going.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Affirmation, mental health, Overcoming Obstacles, Overcoming Perfectionsim, Success Tagged With: affirmation, affirmations, happiness, perfectionism, persistence

Monday Motivational Memo: Building Willpower

May 2, 2011 by Scott "Q" Marcus Leave a Comment

Willpower is NOT the ability to say “NO.”

It’s the ability to say “Not right now.”

One of the biggest reasons we give up is we feel that it takes too much energy to resist whatever temptation we face. The thought of “going without” for long periods of time is daunting, overwhelming – and quite frankly – depressing.

The solution is to realize that willpower does not have to mean “forever,” it can simply mean “for the next few minutes.”

If you’re tempted to give up on your goals because you don’t feel you have the strength to stick with your plan, simply make a commitment that you’ll stick with it for the next ten minutes. That’s all. Most of the time, you’ll find the urge to give up passes in a few moments and before you know it, you’re back on track.

Note: Every Monday, a new motivational memo is posted. Subscribers to ThisTimeIMeanIt.com’s coaching service get this – and many more benefits – sent to them directly. If you’d like to know more, follow this link.

Filed Under: goals, Inspiration, Member Benefits, Motivation, Motivational Monday, Overcoming Obstacles, planning, Procrastination, Success Tagged With: coaching service, lifestyle change, persistence, resolutions, resolutions that stick, stress, temptation, urge

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