It’s all about Mindset

💭Thoughts are powerful; bring awareness to yours. 

👍 Do you encourage yourself with positivity 👎or hold yourself back with negativity? 

😁A change in mindset could be all it takes to get your health and fitness on track.

A positive mindset sees life as a journey rather than a destination. You need to believe that you can get fitter, stronger, and healthier, no matter where you are starting from. I know this can be easier said than done at times.

If you believe you can’t improve, you’re not going to put in the time and effort needed to actually see improvement.

When you believe you are good at, say running, you actively work harder to improve and get better. However, if you don’t believe you are good at, say deadlifts, you avoid working on them, and as a result, don’t make any progress and strength gains.

Think about the last time you tried a new exercise, if you struggled did you think “I am not going to let this beat me. I am not giving up and will work at it until I get it”? Or did you think “I will never be able to do this so I might as well give up”

Having a more negative or fixed mindset means you generally believe that your skills and abilities are predetermined, so you are either good at something or you are not. You tend to believe that there is not much you can do to change, who you are is who you are.

Having a more positive or growth mindset means you typically believe that no matter where you are starting from, you can improve. Yes, it will be hard work and take time. But it will always be worth it when you look back at how far you have come.

Here are some tips to develop a positive/growth mindset around fitness and exercise:

Believe that talent is grown, and not something you were born with 

Getting into a positive mindset and believing this is an important first step toward goal setting and achievement, because this is the mindset you’ll need to even allow yourself to try.

Make the time and effort to set short, and long-term goals 

To see significant progress, you need to set both short, and long-term clear goals, then break them down into manageable and achievable steps.

For example, if you have a goal of competing in a Triathlon, your goal setting process might look like this:

Long-term goal: Compete in triathlon. It is important to give yourself a realistic timeline to work toward this bigger goal and may depend on a number of factors, including your current fitness level, current known weaknesses, amount of time to train each week, available triathlon dates that work in your schedule, etc.

Short-term goals: Create a training plan that takes into consideration all of the above and breaks down your training into days, weeks, and months. The key is to break your goals into smaller, achievable steps that allow you to track your progress and adjust as required while working toward your bigger, long-term goal.

Put effort before talent 

If you want to really make progress toward a long-term goal, you not only have to believe you will get better, you also need to place effort before talent.

For example, it is easy to look around at the gym and notice that some people seem to naturally know what to do, have the perfect form and seem to be more fit and confident. 

What you can’t see from this is what will happen when you put in the necessary time and effort. Believing that effort counts more than talent is a piece of developing a positive mindset.

Cultivate Grit

Developing grit means combining persistence, ambition, and self-discipline in the pursuit of your bigger goals that might take months or even years to accomplish. Grit is what allows you to stick with your goals even when you hit obstacles or plateaus.

The passion for pushing yourself and sticking with it, especially when it is not going exactly the way you had hoped, allows you not only to push through but to thrive during some of the more challenging times.

Embrace possible failures

Having a positive mindset can be vulnerable as when you allow yourself to try at something you are passionate about, you may be setting yourself up for possible failure. When you try really hard at something and fail, it is normal to feel disappointed. But being open to failure is so important.  If you do not allow yourself to fail, you will not allow yourself to truly give it everything you’ve got.

The key here is to change your mindset around your goal to focus on the process rather than the outcome alone.

Embrace the Word “Yet”

When you discover that you can not do something, flip the script. Instead of saying “I will never be able to do this,” try, “I can not do it… yet.” This reframe gives you room to grow, and helps to get rid of the feeling that your challenge is impossible.

Chances are that if you can not do something you want to be able to do, it is likely you just haven’t put in the required time and effort to get there yet. The more challenging your goal, the harder and longer you will have to work for it.

If you are not there… yet. Wherever you are at, keep going.

Do you need help in getting into the right mindset so you will succeed with your 2022 Goals? Let us know.