How to Set Your Health and Fitness Goals
It is crucial when starting a new fitness regime to set firm goals to help you stick to it.
This can be losing 10lb in 4 weeks, losing 2 inches in 2 weeks or maybe doing a 5km run in under 30 minutes.
Goals are meant to be personal and everyone will have different ones.
Some people opt for fairly conservative goals so that they can be confident of reaching them.
People can be a bit intimidated by tougher goals - it isn't unusual.
But some people will go for broke with their goals.
2 people, for the purposes of this article, Mr A and Mr B both set out on 1 Jan 2011 to change their fitness and body shapes for good.
Mr A aims to lose 10lb of body fat in 6 months.
Mr B aims for 30lb.
Both set out a proper nutrition and training plan (remember body shape is 80% nutrition, 20% training) from the start and off they go.
Mr A comfortable loses 10lb 3 months in, and relaxes, complete in the knowledge that he achieved his goal.
Mr B works hard for 6 months, and loses 25lb.
He failed in his goal, but he still lost 15lb more than Mr A.
One may have the satisfaction of knowing they met their goal, but the other made it much further and looks and feels a lot better for it.
People take notice of Mr B - while his waist has gone down from 40" to 34", Mr A has gone from a 40" to a 38".
Who do you think is happier? Whatever your goals may be, you need to make them SMART so that you can get to them.
SMART stands for: S - Specific - you need to know what you want.
"Lose a bit of weight" doesn't cut it here.
M - Measurable - you need to be able to track it.
A - Achievable - having that confidence to get there, what can be done assuming you have the ability, resources and time R - Realistic - similar to achievable, but more sort of what you SHOULD be doing with your ability, resources and time T - Time based - set a timeframe for achieving your goals.
So ask yourself, as you set out on your new health and fitness regime, what are your SMART goals?
This can be losing 10lb in 4 weeks, losing 2 inches in 2 weeks or maybe doing a 5km run in under 30 minutes.
Goals are meant to be personal and everyone will have different ones.
Some people opt for fairly conservative goals so that they can be confident of reaching them.
People can be a bit intimidated by tougher goals - it isn't unusual.
But some people will go for broke with their goals.
2 people, for the purposes of this article, Mr A and Mr B both set out on 1 Jan 2011 to change their fitness and body shapes for good.
Mr A aims to lose 10lb of body fat in 6 months.
Mr B aims for 30lb.
Both set out a proper nutrition and training plan (remember body shape is 80% nutrition, 20% training) from the start and off they go.
Mr A comfortable loses 10lb 3 months in, and relaxes, complete in the knowledge that he achieved his goal.
Mr B works hard for 6 months, and loses 25lb.
He failed in his goal, but he still lost 15lb more than Mr A.
One may have the satisfaction of knowing they met their goal, but the other made it much further and looks and feels a lot better for it.
People take notice of Mr B - while his waist has gone down from 40" to 34", Mr A has gone from a 40" to a 38".
Who do you think is happier? Whatever your goals may be, you need to make them SMART so that you can get to them.
SMART stands for: S - Specific - you need to know what you want.
"Lose a bit of weight" doesn't cut it here.
M - Measurable - you need to be able to track it.
A - Achievable - having that confidence to get there, what can be done assuming you have the ability, resources and time R - Realistic - similar to achievable, but more sort of what you SHOULD be doing with your ability, resources and time T - Time based - set a timeframe for achieving your goals.
So ask yourself, as you set out on your new health and fitness regime, what are your SMART goals?
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