How do you define success where your fitness is concerned?

With each of the changes we have needed to do due to covid-19 over the past few months have you changed your fitness goals, or have you kept your pre lock down expectations?

If it’s the latter how has that been working out for you?

As I have mentioned before, I love what I do! I think the human body is the most incredible piece of engineering ever. It is constantly pushing new boundaries and we are always discovering or updating our understanding of how we work. What I dislike about the fitness and nutrition industry I work in is how some, not all areas of it define success.

A successful workout is not crawling out of the gym on your knees, and on the flip side it isn’t about skipping out as fresh as a daisy pleased that you haven’t pick up anything heavier than a 2lb weight. For exercise to be beneficial there has to be an overload but there also has to be recovery.

Success is about much more than looking better in the mirror and that is what is still not given enough media time.

What I’m about to share is a statement that some trainers may roll their eyes at. Some may think it makes me a bad trainer, but I’m going to state it anyway.

I have clients I have worked with for a number of years that on the outside don’t look a great deal different from when we started.

Do I see that as being a failure? NO.

The reason I don’t see it as failure is because training has been successful in so many other ways for them.

• They are enjoying training.
• They are consistent.
  • They show up for every training session and are fully “Into the session”. In the past exercise may have been an easy thing to bump off the “To Do” list but now it’s a priority.
• They want to train.
  • This is different to enjoying training and being consistent. So many people don’t enjoy the process of exercise, so it doesn’t become a lifestyle choice lifestyle. We often enjoying working out or eating healthily when we are doing it, but not often the thought of it. To feel excited about training is great.
• They feel good about themselves.
  • This is important. When you feel good about yourself, often change happens easier than we think. This is due to not having those annoying stress levels elevated playing pushing up stress hormones which effect how our bodies respond to exercise and nutrition.
• Sleep improves
• Energy levels improve
• Mood in general improves
• They stay injury free.
  • If I can work week in week out with a client and they stay illness and injury free it means they can keep consistency levels high.
• They are no longer out of breath when they run for the train and they are able to perform physical tasks with ease. They get STRONG!

The problem is none of the above look good in Instagram post or on the cover of a magazine. That needs to change if being fit is to become “seen as” accessible to all.

Expectation often hampers success. If it is set unachievable high and based on other’s expectations and not yours then it will be out of reach.

It has been said many times before “The model on the cover on the magazine isn’t really like that, its lighting or PhotoShopped”. What about the ripped athlete or the star on the red carpet? They are real, but it’s a bit like Cinderella their time looking like that is limited but unlike “Cinders” there is often no fairy tale ending to their story. Success comes at a price either monetary or health wise.

Athletes have to sacrifice a social life to train; follow strict diets and live their lives walking a tight rope of being at the top of their game or being injured/ill.

The Star on the red carpet may have trained 4+ hours a day 7 days a week for the past 3 months to fit in that dress, and restricted calories and fluid to unhealthy levels. None of this is sustainable long term or even medium term. It is short term success at the sacrifice of long-term health if performed too frequently.

We often like to focus purely on the success of completing a fitness or nutrition goal, that’s great and I’m not knocking you if you set specific goals. What happens when you have completed the “Goal” do you take a break, stop completely or look to a tougher challenge?

To me and this really, really is something that it has taken me a long time to realize having been that “I must push harder to be successful” person. Success is not wanting to look to push myself to the limits every day in my training, it’s not thinking it’s a “Win” if I never eat dessert anymore.

A successful workout is one that leaves me wanting more. It’s one that still challenges me physically but not so much that I can’t function as a trainer or a parent for the rest of the day. It’s successful when it makes me connect mind and body, it challenges me to move in different ways.

Fitness is successful when it becomes a lifestyle, you start exercising and eating well as a child and you are still doing it when you are 90.

One final thing. In the very strange time’s, we are living in during a global pandemic, it’s made me think that we should find a success in every day. Look for the success in the now and congratulations yourself for the small successes not just the big ones. A successful fitness routine doesn’t have to revolve around a gym, to be successful it has to be consistent, enjoyable and for life.

 

Stay safe, stay happy and have fun,

Laura

Want to work with me online? Go to laurawoodley.com