In this article, we’re talking about SMART Goals for Strong Results. The fitness industry boasts hundreds of thousands of solutions in the form of cure-all supplements. They show up as magical hacks that will solve your stubborn fat problems and other forms of snake oils. It is easy to see how consumers who are looking to reclaim their health may experience being overwhelmed.
Understanding the basic tenets of fitness can help clarify what may be of help and what you can easily discard on your way to better health and fitness.
Start by identifying your desired outcomes. What is it that you want from your health or fitness?
If you’re not sure what to say outside of “tone up” or “lose weight,” consider what it is that you DON’T want. By creating a list of places or outcomes you prefer not to have year over year, eventually the outcomes you DO want can start to become clear.
It’s great that you now have some clarity about what you want for yourself. So the next step is start fleshing out the details of the timeline. Think about when you want to accomplish your specified goals. Break that end goal with some smaller milestones that can help you stay focused. Losing 50 lbs of fat may be the goal, but losing 1 to 2 lbs per week may be disheartening when considered next to the huge number of 50. Stay focused with micro-goals that you can set up underneath your milestones.
Great, now that you have your goal set.
It’s the form of specific or measurable outcomes and a timeline along with some milestones to help you along the way, you’ll want to think about what things may come between you and achieving those goals. Imagine driving on a road trip across the country. Most people will drive as quickly as legal (and then some) to get to the desired destinations. Often carelessness can lead to getting pulled over with a nice vacation ticket after the exchange.
Knowing about that speed trap can help navigate a trip with less undesired outcomes, much the same way that having a distinct plan can help navigate some similarly undesired obstacles like nagging injuries or frequent illnesses.
With obstacles identified, figuring out resources to help negotiate those obstacles with the least amount of interruption is key to timely success.
If one obstacle consists of not knowing how to lift free weights safely, some resources may include hiring a trainer for real-time supervision. Or check out some Youtube videos if you’re relatively confident in your abilities to pick up new skills quickly.
Creating a plan is one potential obstacle. But a resource may be reading some periodicals in Men’s Health or some other publication to get some ideas. Obviously working with an educated and experienced fitness professional is best. Moreover, if you’ve never tackled fitness on your own. But budgetary concerns and scheduling can be issues that prevent specific resources from being available. By identifying what resources are available and which ones will likely work best for your budget and schedule, you can start to refine your timeline and expectations around the effort necessary for accomplishing your goals.
SMART goals, potential obstacles, and resources for accomplishing the results you desire form the cornerstone of starting out with fitness. Without these guiding points, it becomes easy to lose yourself in new fads and shiny object syndrome. Once these points are clear to you, it becomes a process of setting goals and developing a plan. Then get out there and execute the plan, and refine it until you get to where you want.
Now get out there and set some smart goals to smash your results!
