Happy Friday you wonderful humans.
Every now and again I get into a conversation with someone about what I do, and my own training and health and fitness. And the sentiment flows something along the lines of ‘It must be nice having a gym, being able to train whenever you want, you must be super fit.’
I and the other coaches at Virtus wish this were the case, but unfortunately, we can find ourselves in a similar situation to these scenarios.
– The Chef who eats food from the microwave because she is too tired to cook for herself.
– The builder who has been doing renovations on his own home for years because she puts other jobs ahead of his own.
– The massage therapist who has forgotten what it feels like to be on the receiving end.
– The teacher who spends most of her free time developing lesson plans and marking her students work instead of putting her feet up and winding down at the end of a long hard week.
– The coach that spends most of his waking hours on others. Coaching, programming, troubleshooting and giving advice. Leaving him void of energy and desire to train herself.
I have no doubt you all have a version of this that is inherently linked with your own life and profession. We tell ourselves it’s ok because it’s our job. But when it begins to impact our quality of life and capacity to others, we need to reassess both our priorities and for us, our health and wellbeing.
Fortunately, if you’re in the same position that I’ve been in, you are more than qualified to do something about it. Most people get into my industry because they love to train, I know I certainly did. But over the past 10 years, my love for training has certainly waned. To a point where (apart from football) it has been nonexistent for much of 2019.
At the end of the football season, I said enough is enough. I had a decent year, but we fell a few weeks short of where I want to be. For us to reach the ultimate and get back to winning a premiership, I can’t be leaving my performance up to chance by not being as physically fit and healthy as possible. Plus, at the end of the year, KP and I will be parents, and the threat of a dad bod is looming. Best I get on the front foot and ensure that I’m strong and healthy for all of the things I want to be able to do over the next 60 years.
Over the past month, I have been slowly getting back into the groove, fast forward to today, the 18th of October and I am enjoying training and accumulating sessions like I used to. In the scheme of things, a month is a very short period of time, but I know that every session is a building block towards the health and fitness levels that I need to have to have the capacity to give to all of those around me and create an anti-fragile body that thrives when things get tough.
Here is the framework I’m using to help me get my mojo back, so far, a month in, it’s working a treat. Fortunately, this framework already existed, it’s the same one we use at Virtus for the Virtus family, I guess I just had to take some of my own advice.
1. Know where you’re headed. Set a few clear outcomes that are based on your desires, and supported by those around you. Vocalise your goals and ambitions, there’s something concrete in telling the world what you’re going to do. It’s much harder to let someone else down than it is yourself.
2. Get a clear understanding of where you are starting from. If you know where you’re going, and know where you are, then you can follow step #3 completely aware.
3. Set a plan in place, and execute. Understand that ‘life happens’ you’ll have to adjust, but stay on the path and keep ticking the little boxes along the way. Lots of small wins pretty quickly turn into big wins.
4. Track your progress. Train Heroic has been a wonderful tool for me to see each rep, set and session accumulate. Adding in a little competitive element with Coop has reminded me to turn up even when I don’t feel like training.
5. Celebrate your success in an environment that supports you on your journey. Some days you’ll crush it, some days you’ll barely get there. But if you show up, the battle is one. When you do, pat yourself on the back. And if you fall, stand up, dust yourself off, and carry on.
A healthy body does not come easy, you can’t buy it, it must be earned.
Show up, do the work, repeat.
That’s what I’ll be doing, and although I know I won’t enjoy every session, I’m excited to be a better version of me. If you see me slacking off, you know what to do.
LW
