Setting realistic goals

It’s 7:45am and I have to be at the gym in 5 minutes. I have breakfast half way done, still have to get dressed, need to make my shakes for training, and I’m super pissed. I’m pissed I put myself in this situation because I know last night I decided to watch “Schitts creek” with Meg on NETFLIX instead of prepping for today…. I rationalized with myself the night prior that spending time with my wife on the couch was more important than getting ready for the next day and now I’m paying for it. My day is off to a poor start… and my goal of hitting my macros every day this week is in jeopardy.

 

This is the tug of war of our day to day lives. We want to be disciplined enough to reach goals we’ve created, but life demands so much of us from moment to moment that we tend to give in more than we don’t, leading to a revolving door or let downs and goals left in the rear view mirror.

 

Here is what you do about it and what I have my clients do before they create any goal.

 

1.     Create a timeline of your daily “must dos”. These are things like eating breakfast, lunch, and dinner, dropping the kids off at school, work, working out, etc. Anything that is a non-negotiable in your day to day life.

2.     Write down the goal you want: Loose 10 pounds, make the CrossFit Games, graduate college.

3.     Next, write down what must be done daily to make this goal happen? For example; if you wanted to lose 10 pounds you have to eat your meals every day which takes up about 20 minutes minimum for each meal. You must prioritize sleep and shoot to get 8 hours of sleep a night.

Working out is also very important and will take up about an hour of your day three to five days a week.  Meal prepping and grocery shopping is a 4 to 5-hour commitment each week, and that’s if you hustle!

Each of these takes a certain amount of time to accomplish and needs to be written down and placed on your daily timeline. Be as specific as possible with your timeline.

4.     Ask yourself, “Do you have the time in your day to fit these tasks in?”

 

Number 4 This is the hard part. You’ll want to push, shove, and stuff them into your timeline, often sacrificing things that are most important to you to make it happen (like spending time on the couch with my wife after a busy day), but most of the time I’ve found that after someone makes a goal and then does steps 1-4, they must re-think their goal, as there just isn’t enough time in their current daily life to make it happen. We all get 24 hours is a day, but usually try to fit 26 hours of activities in it.

 

I hope going through this process helps you make realistic and attainable targets to reach for. If you would like any help in this process, please don’t be scared to reach out to me on Instagram @wespiatt2013 or email me at wes@coastrangecrossfit.com.