The Most Important Muscle for Fitness Success: Patience
Working out day in and day out, but still haven’t reached your fitness goals? Do you have trouble losing weight or building muscle? Don't freak out! In fitness, as in life, patience is a virtue.
No matter how hard you work, the results won’t come overnight. Your body needs time to grow and achieve the shape you're after. Sometimes, it can take months or even years to get dramatic results.
If you’re looking for some (non-scale) ways to measure your progress, check out our last article:
3 Ways To Measure Progress (That Aren’t The Scale)
Okay back to the point...
The Missing Piece of Your Workout Plan
Different people start exercising for different reasons. Some want to lose fat and get leaner. Some are looking to build muscle and strength. Others are trying to get a bigger butt, slender legs, or ripped abs. They all have one thing in common: they want results and they want them now.
Surprisingly, 92 percent of people never achieve their goals. They either go about it the wrong way or have unrealistic expectations. Some simply lack the structure, discipline or commitment needed to reach their fitness goals.
Fitness is an ongoing journey, not something you do for a month or two and then stop. There's a reason why athletes and fitness models eat clean and train hard for years. They know that it takes time to achieve results.
Fitness isn’t a goal that you accomplish and then stop working on, however, you do get to coast on the habits you develop. Once you get in shape, you work to maintain that shape. Many times individuals get discouraged along the way and quit due to a lack of progress. Thus, patience is essential, you won’t always be making progress. Some days the weights don’t get heavier and the scale doesn’t say your lighter, and that’s okay.
It’s part of the process.
There Is No End to Fitness Only Endless Potential
When it comes to fitness, it's easy to find a workout program, start a diet, and stick to your plan for a couple of weeks. Unfortunately, getting started is just one piece of the puzzle. The only way to stay fit and healthy is to make lasting changes. I cannot emphasize enough, you must, must, must have patience with yourself. You won't get it perfect. Period. That doesn't mean you shouldn't give yourself permission to try again with the goal of improving.
The most important - and difficult part of any fitness plan is patience. Try to make lasting changes rather than striving for perfection. As you progress and get closer to your goals, you'll realize that there is still room for improvement. Commit yourself to regular exercise and tweak your eating habits along the way.
Shift your mindset from “how do I get (insert your goal here)” to “how can I keep (aforementioned goal.)” Set long-term goals and then break them into smaller, achievable benchmarks (read: moments of celebration) along the way. Remember, a journey of 1,000 miles begins with just one step.
For instance, if you need to lose 90 pounds, dropping five pounds per month is both realistic and attainable. That means that you won’t be reaching your goal in 1 month, or 6 months or even a year and it also means it won’t happen right-on-schedule. Whereas trying to lose 15 pounds in one month is both unlikely to happen but also likely to have negative rebound effects.
As Jordan Peterson once said “Being a better you, is better, than being you.”
There is no end to getting fit. Think of it as a life-long journey, with all its challenges and rewards.