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This is mine pump now in today's episode We talk about New Year's resolutions now most people a lot of people set New Year's resolutions Most people fail at them and the people that do get to those resolution goals Fail at maintaining them so in today's episode we talk about how you can set those resolutions and Stick to them and keep them forever remember We have trained people for over two decades and over those two decades We figured out what works long term so we talk about all the steps You can take to setting the right goals hitting your goals and then staying there for the rest of your life now Today's episode is brought to you by our sponsor zbiotics now zbiotics is a company that makes probiotics these are genetically modified probiotics that you take before you drink alcohol that help destroy some of the negative Compounds that alcohol produces in your body ladies and gentlemen this stuff actually works you take this before you drink the next day You feel amazing believe me we've tested this many many times. It's the only product like this on the market. It's patented There's nothing like this out there. There's no hangover cure anything That's out there that comes anywhere close to how effective zbiotics is now you can try them out and use the mine pump discount Here's what you got to do go to zbiotics calm That's Z B I O T I C S calm forward slash mine pump and then use the code mine pump for 10% off your first purchase Also, we have developed three bundle workout plans that we had on sale last year that we've extended This year so we've extended this till the 10th of this month Let me go over those three bundles and see which one works for you the first bundle is called the new to weight lifting bundle This is for beginners. It's a nine plus months of exercise programs So nine months plus of all your workouts mapped out and planned out for you with video demos everything The new to weight lifting bundle is for you beginners the next one is called the body transformation bundle This is for intermediate people So if you've been working out for six months to a year consistently, this is the one for you again It's nine plus months of all your workouts planned out for you The third one is for advanced people. So if you've been working out for one to two years consistently This is the new year extreme intensity bundle if you want to take it to the next level This is the one that you do also nine plus months of exercise programming and by the way all of these come with a Year of free access to our private forum where you could talk to other fitness enthusiast trainers You can ask questions. You can post videos of your exercises to get critiques You can get in debates about fitness and nutrition and you can also find your favorite fitness hosts myself Adam and Justin on there as well. So those are included with any of those bundles one year of free access to that private forum So here's how you sign up. You go to maps December.com. That's the word maps M. A. P. S December calm Dude, I looked up a Interesting statistic, but it makes sense after working in gyms for so long. So check this out, right? 45% so almost 50% of Americans make a new year's resolution every single year and that's Mostly fitness resolutions by far. Yeah, the most common new year's resolution is to get in shape lose weight Is it still is still one in two lose weight in cigarettes? Yeah, I was gonna say cigarettes or alcohol Yeah, number one fitness by far. It's like the vast majority and then I think that those are the other But 45% almost half of everybody in America. So you're talking, you know 150 plus million people Start a new year's resolution. Now. Here's the crazy stuff, right? Only 25% of those who make resolutions carry the resolution past the first week of January Week so almost half drop out After one week, I wouldn't surprise. Wow. What percentage do you think hit the goals? It actually hit their goal the lesson one percent. No, no more than one percent. I would guess Ten eight. Oh, that's a good guess Take your 10 minus is one Together just a zero He's like half a percent any confidence in anybody apparently So interesting statistic now working in gyms You know because all of us worked in gyms for most of our careers all most of our professional careers, right? I started working in gyms at the age of 18 and January is Such a it's a whole nother animal in the gym space. I mean you have your normal crowd that comes in people signing up people You know working out making goals happens all year long It starts to slow down around November October slows down a little bit November December definitely slows down holidays And then January, it's it's insane. You're looking at 50% to over a hundred percent increase over your normal traffic and that's just people coming in working out people signing up It's like it's insane. I mean I would manage gyms Where we would hit a hundred and fifty to a hundred and seventy thousand dollars of new revenue sometimes two hundred thousand dollars of new revenue For a club that same club would hit over three hundred thousand dollars in a month of January just to give some people perspective how crazy it gets and then like clockwork by April it's back to normal Yeah, every time well, it's interesting that they say the first week that 45% people drop off 25% or 25% of the 45% that made the resolution But I don't remember. I don't recall the gym starting to really get busy till at least two weeks in yeah So I wonder if that's the other that's a leftover exactly I wonder if the traffic that we are used to seeing in our space working in the gym at the gym Right, it was the people after the the first initial 25 dropped off because it wouldn't even get busy until Months 15 all right. Yeah, I'm curious to see like when people actually start their resolution You know because I'm sure there's a lot of people that don't start like January 1st Like right away like how long they delay before they finally like are like okay I'm gonna get going well I mean that's a good point because I think like what Adam is saying that's 45% people Let's okay 150 million people make a resolution Almost half of them or sorry. Yeah a quarter of them. I should say almost a quarter of them Don't even start right. That's the first week. They make the resolution. They don't even start, right? Yeah It was a drunk. It was a drunk resolution I'm gonna get hell in shape this year and you wake up the next day like what the hell Yeah, you ever do next year Hey, you ever do that where you're with your buddies and you're all drunk and it's like three o'clock in the morning Do tomorrow you want to wake up really go hiking? Oh, we're doing everything tomorrow Never happens. But yeah, so then you get the rest of the people that probably start But like it said only 8% actually hit their goals and of those 8% this I couldn't find I was looking this up And I couldn't find it I would venture to say that out of the 8% that actually hit the goals a Super small percentage of them maintain the goal So let's say 8% hit their 20 pound weight loss goal very very small percentage of them actually maintain it I mean, that's the hardest part is sustainability. What can you what can you start with that? You can you know keep going and be able to see all the way through it really has to be well thought out for that to happen So I have a theory on why I think that we fail so much, right? I think that it's how unrealistic the goals are that's gotta be the first thing that to me That the biggest mistake that I think most people make on a New Year's resolution is they they swing for the fences They set some massive goal and Sometimes and I know we're taught like oh be very specific if you're gonna set a goal be very specific about it But in this case when you are if you have not been working out You've not been exercising at all or eating clean or anything like that and you head into this this New Year's resolution You're like, okay, I'm gonna get this fit I'm gonna do all these things and none of these things you were doing the previous year I just think you're setting yourself up for failure at least the at least from the perspective of a coach and a trainer Who would help people get in shape and try and maintain? You're totally right because what I used to think was successful as a trainer was just hitting the goal All right here. Oh, you got a goal. It's a big goal fine hire me and I'll make sure we get there sticking to Whatever got you there. It was impossible. It took me a long time to really self-exam I know you say this all the time Adam were at some point in your career And I did the same thing you look back and you say am I really helping people right? Half my people don't even hit their goal and then the ones that do don't stay there So I think it's important we talk about Not only how to hit your goal, but how to get to not just get to the goal but maintain it And I think that there's you know after working with people for over two decades I think we've I know we've talked about this off-air There's definitely some things we figured out in terms of what works what works not just to get you there But what works to keep you there? And the first thing you talked about was the the unrealistic aspect of of goal setting oftentimes now the reason why it's so unrealistic the reason why we set goals that are unrealistic is a top is it some psychological reasons number one When a goal is far away from us we tend to overestimate, right? So if if a psychologist takes a group of people and says if they do a study and they say What can you do two years from now the goals are crazy and lofty the closer it gets to today the more Realistic it starts to get when they say oh what can you do a month from now? Yeah, oh, I don't know I don't know if I can do too much a month from now, but two years from now I definitely can do a lot so I think that's number one and the second one is the state of mind that we do it in When it's a new year right the calendar changes. Oh, it's a it's a brand new year. That's it I'm gonna be a different person We're in this motivated state of mind and we have a tendency when we're in a motivated state of mind It's you know, you know what it's like my kids do this all the time. It really annoys me You're super hungry. So you order way too much food at the restaurant. Yeah, your state of mind is hunger So everything looks good and then you order way too much food And then you sit there and you're full and half of the food is sitting there in that super hyper motivated state of mind making a goal You have to be mindful of the fact that you're in a state of mind that you're not gonna be in all year long Well, don't forget we can the goal can change right so I mean I like the idea of of Setting like a long-term goal, but making short-term decisions based off that goal So maybe you have this massive goal of you know, I want to lose 50 or 100 pounds at one point That's fine, but you're not gonna focus on that you're gonna focus on the short-term decisions What like you said, what can I do tomorrow? Mm-hmm, and you set these small goals like hey if I haven't if I haven't strung a one month in of Lifting two times or three times in a month. That's a good place to start. That's a really good place just to start instead of going like Okay, I'm super motivated. I'm you know, I hate the way I look. I'm gonna change that 2020 was a shit year I'm gonna it's gonna be great I'm going to the gym every day this week and like going out the gates with something so extreme from where you were Just two months ago like start off with a very simple small goal and start to build wins and build on that Yeah, here's the exercise I used to have my clients do I would say What is it give me a goal that you have that you think you can That is that you can do forever and what I mean by that is not necessarily the end point lose 30 pounds But rather the behaviors. Okay, you want to start working out five days a week Do you think you can maintain that forever when you say forever people tend to be a little bit more? Realistic like oh, they backpedal a little bit. Yes, so what can you do now? What's a change? You know you can do now that's challenging That's the whole purpose of having a setting of goals. It's got to be meaningful. It's got to be challenging But what can you change now that you think realistically you can do forever? That's a better way to set a goal and usually what it looks like is way less than what you thought, right? So if you're not working out right now, and I say to you how many is a week? Can you work out starting now that you know you can maintain forever starting now? It usually looks like one day a week or two days a week. Definitely doesn't look like five or six days a week So realistic you have to set the most realistic goal first Well another reason why I think this is really challenging is that what happens during this time? We talked about what happened in the gym space, right? So the marketing that gets pushed in January I mean, it's like I think most companies that are fitness companies front-load all of their marketing to this time right now Because they know that they know these and so what you have to as a consumer or somebody who's wanting to get into fitness or Somebody just wanted to pursue their fitness goal is you have to be aware of the marketing That's gonna be coming your way in the next few days few weeks and month Leading up and all of it is centered around quick results Yeah, if you're your marketing budget if you're in the fit in a weight loss space the diet space the health fitness space a Huge chunk of your of your marketing budget is for January. In fact, did you guys see? Planet Fitness sponsoring all the New Year's resolutions or the New Year's? Yeah, I mean that's their graphic right, you know, I was watching that and I was so what I was taking back by was wow Why did not any of the other big change? I know think of this first smart Yeah, why did why did Planet Fitness be the first one? I mean obviously the number one New Year's resolution is weight loss So the fact that and 90% of the people were watching the ball drop right during on New Year's Eve Why would you not if you're a fitness company market like crazy super smart? So I would say this in Janet really when you're just getting started you have a goal Be careful for the gimmicks if it sounds too good to be true. It is I promise you it is there is no weight loss pill There is no miracle diet and there is no special workout. That's gonna magically Make your body change quickly effortlessly and easily. It's just not gonna happen There's just gonna be so much of that out in the environment right now Like it's just gonna be all over social media. It's gonna be all over the TV. Everybody wants you To basically shuttle your momentum into, you know, their product or their quick fix You know way to to approach this. So, yeah, you definitely have to be conscious of a lot of these like short-term You know 30 day, I'm gonna lose all this weight and turn my whole life around You know, you got to be very conscious. That's gonna be thrown out And you're navigating to something that you might have never achieved before which is permanent health and fitness Not a I was lean before and now I'm at overweight. You've obviously if you this is your goal You've obviously never achieved permanence with this. So because you're navigating something new slower is better If you go too fast, you're gonna take a lot of wrong turns And you're gonna you're more likely to fail So take your time and do it one step at a time Have you guys do you guys remember how you used to communicate that slower is better to a client? You remember how because that was like a hurdle I was a major hurdle as a trainer when you get somebody who hires you and they Desperately want to get this 30 40 50 pounds off and they say I want to do it as fast as possible Do you guys remember that conversation what that sounded like from your side? Yeah for me? It was always really trying to communicate the gravity of what they're trying to do You you in order to change your body forever that means you have to change your lifestyle forever How you eat needs to be changed forever and your activity level needs to be changed forever those are not small things and In order to change fundamental aspects of your life big things of your life It just doesn't there's nothing that we do that changes overnight that way So that would be the company the way I talk to them and say listen This is a big deal when we're talking about forever results So if we it's we can't it can't be done permanently and fast I can't be done. I tried to paint the picture of what they were doing activity wise and what they're doing cardio wise And what they were eating and you know how many calories that was like You know once they achieved that quick sort of fixed goal And you know is that something that you're willing to live with is that something that sounds like you can sustain? And you can keep repeating that process long term or is there something you know? I can show you another way we can build to get you to your goal It's gonna take a bit longer, but it's gonna be something that you can last forever I used to give them this extreme analogy, right? So if someone came in and no matter I mean obviously depending on the weight amount it would I'd have to extend this analogy But it it tended to get the picture across right which was That if you came in you said I want Adam I want to lose 30 pounds as fast as possible or 50 pounds fast possible I said well, that's actually really easy to do If all you want to stop eating and get exactly what so what I would say to them is jump in the cell If all you care about is losing those 30 pounds. It's actually not as hard as you think it is So stop eating for the next two months come in here on the treadmill for an hour And then of course I'd say listen You know I'm not being serious and you'd probably die if you did that or feel absolutely miserable And we both know you can never do that But that's just an extreme analogy of what people are asking for when they say they want to get to their goal that fast Maybe we won't go to that extreme But we'll fall somewhere on that spectrum of doing things unhealthy and unrealistic and Without you being able to maintain it for the rest of your life So if you care about changing this losing this way and then maintaining for your rest of life There's a better way to do it But if all you care about is losing 30 pounds, well, then you go that extreme route But the more extreme you go the more unrealistic is that you'll maintain it for the whole totally totally now The next thing to focus on here is really about making a plan And it's interesting how little how few people when they set a goal Don't go about setting or creating the plan. They'll say oh, I want to save this much money And then I just want to save them and they don't have a plan to do it Or I just want to get in shape I don't necessarily have a plan to do it actually sit down and create a plan and again This goes in line with being realistic with your goal So if your goal is to lose 20 pounds, you're not working out right now You're gonna sit down by the way the plan can be very basic or it can start to get more complex Usually the way it looks as it starts off basic and as you continue to stay consistent It becomes a little bit more detailed and a little bit more complex. So to give you an example You want to lose 20 pounds? I've never I don't work out. I haven't worked out for a long time Okay, let me sit down. Let me see what I can do. Can I realistically exercise every single week for the rest of my life? Three days a week and then you know have that thought with myself and I think no I don't think that think that might be too much How about two days a week? I think I can do two days a week. So that's one part of the plan two days a week I'm going to exercise And I'm going to stick to and now here's the next part of plan what days are they going to be this is important Okay, because you know working with clients again a loose two days a week versus a specific two days a week the people who tend to have Specifics tend to be more consistent pick the two days pick the time and then within those times say What am I going to do on those two days and here you can get as detailed as you want You could follow programs or you could say something like I'm going to walk for 20 minutes And then I'm going to do some resistance training for another 20 minutes It's going to be on Mondays at 3 p.m. And Thursdays at 8 a.m. Or whatever And you want to set a plan because then you have something to follow It's in your schedule and it's something that you can look forward to and move through as your map Well and creating the plan very similar to setting the goal. Uh, it's again you this is moldable Okay, just because you you you set a you have this ultimate goal of losing 100 pounds And you want to plan for that the better strategy is to set a more realistic goal and set a more realistic plan So it doesn't mean that after two months after you hit that first goal and followed that first bit of your plan You can't build upon that. So it's kind of I'm echoing what you're saying right now Sal which is you know set up things that you know that you can accomplish Start to get some wins make the plan very basic and simple Do not I'm going to all of a sudden be weighing and tracking my food, you know every single day I'm going to start doing the treadmill for 30 minutes I'm going to follow this program go to the gym six days a week Don't add all this stuff start off with a very simple plan That is better than the plan that you had two months ago And then as you start to get some wins and create some behaviors Then you can build upon that plan I've seen a lot of mistakes uh from uh, you know some clients have come in with all of this like excess like momentum that You know, well, it's going to be really tough to make this day work But they like try and force, uh, you know They're their time in on something that really just isn't going to be something that's going to be easy for them to rearrange And to be able to kind of figure out, you know, what is something that is like A total win it's something that's already going to be not that far away from your current schedule Is going to be a much better approach Yeah, and I used to tell my clients that okay, whatever goal we set whatever plan we set and they're and it's realistic Make those rocks in your schedule. Okay, so this is again part of the realistic thing What time on monday do you think for sure that you can work out? And they'll give me a time and I'll say now nothing gets in front of this for now Let's just keep this as consistent as possible make those rocks. Here's another tip pair activity with other behaviors This is very successful because other behaviors that you do consistently are things you already do consistently And when you attach something to it it serves as a reminder And is an impetus to get you to do those things. So here's an example. One of my favorites Walk 10 minutes after breakfast lunch and dinner So that's 30 minutes of walking a day that you're not doing right now 30 minutes of cardiovascular activity It could it could also be After breakfast lunch and dinner I do, you know, 15 squats and 10 push-ups or something like that, right? So you're attaching activity Two things you already do every single day and then it's much more likely to become part of something that you do It's something that is a part of your normal day Your your daily behavior now another thing that I didn't start doing till after I actually got into competing But I really like this to help my clients and the reason why I liked adding this into like part of their their their plan Which is to track your progress and I like to take Over a measuring body fat percentage and weight all the time I actually just like to have them take a picture front side and back of them first thing in the morning every Friday, right? So And what I what I like about that is one of the challenges as a trainer when you are when you're coaching somebody through like a big weight loss goal Is the very first, you know 30 days. I don't want to see any weight loss even though that's their goal I really want to start to build their metabolism up And so a lot of times we're increasing calories or we're adding foods in the diet And so they don't see the scale really shift that much But I promise if you've been consistent, you know for that month and you look at the pictures on day one Versus the pictures on the the fourth week of being consistent with lifting weights and making better food choices Even if the scale has not moved you'll start to see a body composition change Yeah, I like to I like to track performance and the reason why I like to track performance is because if you're stronger or faster Or you have more stamina It usually means you're doing things things are working in a healthy way, right? I mean not always there's unhealthy ways of improving performance But generally speaking it's a more More consistent It's going to show that somebody's doing something in the right way But here's how you measure performance because here's where you can some of the pitfalls One of the pitfalls with with tracking performance is people expect linear progress every single week So I have to get stronger every week. I have to get better every week. It doesn't work that way Instead what I would tell clients to do is track every workout how much weight you lifted How many reps or how much cardio you did how you felt, you know that kind of stuff And then average it out for the for the week and then average out those weeks for the month Then you can start to see Some trends and if month over month you're seeing progress with your performance You are moving in the right direction. You're totally moving the right way I mean I look at it So I like that um because I think that speaks to everybody like if you have especially if you have body image issues, right? I don't if I and I think it's important that I say this right if I have a client who's Got body image issues. I'm certainly not making them stand in front of a mirror and take pictures every week and compare themselves, right? But if you have a good relationship and you're you're okay with going like hey I'm out of shape right now and I want to get in better shape and I'm okay with that. That's not an issue for me Um, I think that there's a lot of value in the pictures This the strength thing is this is I think the easy one that everybody is okay with and probably a better focus for most people But it's as simple as this it's just I think it's You know day one of the month compared to the end of the month If you try and do week by week looking at strength gains or body composition change week over week You know, it doesn't work that way. You're going to have a good week on both though Sometimes you're going to see your body's going to change one week really really well The next week you may see it like kind of stays the same So instead of looking at it as a week to week screenshot We're taking it every week the picture or we're painting tracking the strength over every single week But we're really comparing the first of the month to the end of the month every single month And if you are seeing progress over that, you know, you're moving. Yeah. I also like circumference measurements I like those waist Hips you could do thighs arms, of course the scale now Here's why I don't push the scale too much People get obsessed with it and then they start to lose weight in the wrong way or they lose muscle So you want to use a comment by the way the best thing to do if you really want to get You know more specific with tracking is to be is to use more than one method Because each method on its own you can actually start to game it and you won't realize you're gaming it But you start to game it, right? If you just want to lose weight you start finding yourself starving yourself a little more If you're just trying to gain weight You'll find yourself stuffing yourself a little more if it's just strength You might start to cheat and your exercises, right with circumference You might start to suck in your stomach a little more But if you have three things that you track and you can start to see the trends all of them It's more likely to paint an inaccurate picture I've seen actually some cool apps now that they offer where you can take pictures of yourself And you can actually see over a timeline and time span like just you know Like a video of how your body's been kind of morphing pretty cool Now here's the thing with tracking your progress. It's this is very very effective early on in your in your journey But eventually in your long-term journey, it's not something you really use all the time Like I don't track my progress anymore unless I have more of a specific So keep that in mind. It's okay to drop off on the tracking once you find yourself in this really good and smooth rhythm Which actually brings me to this the next point which I think this is very important One of the hardest with biggest challenges. I should say with People hitting their goals is just they're not consistent and that sounds obvious It's you know, a lot of people listening are like, well, duh But knowing that I think it's important to create a strategy to improve your accountability There are things you can do that have been shown statistically and things that I've observed in my clients That dramatically improve accountability for example When you set yourself up with a goal The more people you tell and the more likely you are to actually stick to what you need to do to hit that goal So if you just keep it to yourself, we let ourselves down very easily, right? I can promise myself things all the time and then and then be okay with it because I forgive myself It's not a big deal But if I promise, you know, Adam or Justin or Doug or my wife or someone else that I'm going to do something I'm much more likely to stay consistent because I don't want to let them down This is a very big deal for me, especially like when I verbalize it when I say to somebody else like to me That's like a bond. That's something that I I am working my best to To get to exactly what I said I was gonna do so I'm very careful about like You know telling people about that, but if that's something you're really serious about I definitely think it's it's a valid strategy To get people rallying behind you. That's funny. I think we're all very similar when I come to that Like I'm like you Justin. I'm very careful about what I put out there and say Because I'm the type of person that if I'm gonna say that I'm gonna do that I'm gonna do it. So I better be careful. I'm like what I commit myself to That was like a man. I tell you that what led to the consistency into Competing was I put that out into the instagram ether You know I said that on a platform where I at that time probably hundreds of people your reputation is on the line Yeah, and what I knew was okay The the ultimate goal wasn't a weight loss goal for me the ultimate goal was to build a business around this social media platform So I knew if I came out and I said I'm gonna do this And then I didn't I could just kiss that big goal. Goodbye Because at that point then I'll lose all credibility Nobody will believe me anything else that I say if I say I'm gonna do something and then I'm not gonna follow through I'll lose everybody. So there was a lot of pressure that okay. I said I'm gonna do this transformation I'm documenting it like I can't stop or else I'm gonna ruin my big goal Which is to build a business and this is why it's important You carefully pick the people that you tell that are going to help keep you accountable Tell the people that matter to you people that support you people that Cheer and celebrate your victories and mourn your losses, right? You don't want to tell somebody that's like you don't want to tell your jealous Friend exactly about your goal because they're going to sabotage you. I've seen this before I've actually seen this with clients where such a good point where I've had clients who are significant others Yes, they're working out the significant others not working out and they're kind of jealous about them working out and then There's significant others like oh, it's okay if we eat out Oh, if you miss a workout not a big deal because they're sabotaging them So tell people you you know that matter that celebrate your victories tell those people and have a serious conversation Hey, listen, I have this goal. I want to accomplish I'm telling you because you're somebody I don't want to let down and I want help with remaining accountable And again studies show that this actually works just telling people Actually makes a big difference by the way This is one of the reasons not all the reasons but one of the reasons why hiring a trainer or coach is so successful when you look at people Reaching their goals their fitness goals when when they hire a trainer versus when they don't Obviously you have someone who knows what they're doing teaching them to exercise properly that stuff But a big part of that is the accountability. They know that the trainer is waiting for them at you know Six o'clock on tuesday to train them. I don't feel like working out. I can't cancel my session So and so is waiting for me. I got to show up makes a big difference Oh, that's why you see a lot of coaches that have coaches for that exact reason. Oh, yeah It's not a lack of knowledge or experience or know how for themselves It's that they know that Man, if I paid for this or I tell somebody else to be there I'm not going to let them down whether I want to or not versus if it's just me Real easy for me to go like I'm fucking tired today. I'll wait till the next day Yes, so hiring a trainer or a coach obviously you're going to get a lot of the value of their knowledge Which is I can't speak I can't speak more to that. That's there's so much value there and just that But then the accountability, this is a trainer and a coach, especially if you hire a good one They know how to keep people motivated inspired. They know how to take people through the process So it does make a very big difference to hire somebody that's good You know along the lines of accountability This is another thing that I like this too and I know that we've kind of bashed it early on But I use this strategy a lot, which was the prepping. Oh food prepping Yeah, and part of why the food prepping worked for me so well was I think that I go out I buy all this chicken and rice and vegetable and steak and then I prep, you know Hundreds of dollars of meat and stuff and one sitting and then I have like I don't want to waste that And so if it's ready for me in the refrigerator Even when I have those cravings like everybody has you know at a certain time in the day or watching a show or whatever And I'm like, oh god, this sounds really good But I know I've got five meals that I've already I paid for I took the time to prep and it's ready for me right there I normally go Okay, I'm gonna go eat that and then I eat it and then I feel 10 times That's why it works for me because when I when I food because eating out for me can be a problem Right, so if I'm trying to get leaner and I eat out a lot eating out. It's just going to screw you over Cal you know the calories and the macros and all that stuff in Restaurant food is just through the roof. Uh, it's very difficult to get a good healthy meal They sell food that's super tasty and palatable So that's what they tend to make But if I have food set up if I have lunch ready breakfast ready dinner ready, uh, and it's there You know, I hate for your success You are that's basically like what you're you're just like you're making sure like everything's gonna work out and You know clearing the cupboards and things that aren't like excess temptations for me It's just that's all part of the process if I'm really serious about a goal I'm gonna stick to it by setting myself up for success One strategy with food prepping by the way you can do two ways you could do it One way is on the weekend you can make a bunch of food For the whole week another way is to make a big dinner and then the following day the leftovers are what you have for For lunch I do that often so I'll make a big healthy dinner and then I'll have enough food left over for the day after And so I tend to prep one day in advance another accountability thing You know and this took me a long time because I guess as a as a trainer Maybe it's our trainer pride right where you know, I've I've read all the books And I know how to put together a program for myself And so I don't need anybody else coaching me or telling me what to do But there is something to be said about having that completely mapped out for you to where you don't have to think about it And you know what you're supposed to do every day and you either accomplish it or you don't Versus I'm gonna go in and work out and I I'm gonna hit arms today or chest today And it's like you maybe I quit a few sets early Maybe I do a few extra ones and it's just kind of there's no rhyme or reason or structure to it Where if you have invested in like a really good program that's done a good job of like it's written Well, right by somebody you trust it's got a good progressive overload built in it All I need to do is execute. I just need to follow the plan do it And if I've done it and if I've got a good program, I know that I'll see results Yeah, when you have a good Workout program, uh, that's all set up for you a lot of great digital program Obviously, we have our own that we sell and on them it show, you know, it's your workout demos shows you the exercise form All that stuff and what happens when you do this is you know, you're doing on Monday You know what you're doing on Wednesday. You know what you're doing on Friday or whatever So it helps me keep you accountable because Monday comes along you're like, I got to do Monday's workout on Monday Otherwise, what am I going to do with Wednesday's work? I got to bump it and it tends to make people more accountable and consistent Not to mention like Adam said takes out all the guesswork. You know what you're doing that day Yeah, when you got to think your way through it. It's like you're you're coaching yourself on top of also training through the process So even like for somebody like me that, you know, I know what to do and I can you know I've learned all these techniques and it's just really nice to be able to just show up and get through the workouts Just like an athlete right now. Here's the next thing that I think is important and this is a psychological piece that is Imperative it's absolutely imperative for anything you want to accomplish long term And that is to fall in love with the journey and not the goal, right? So your goal is to lose 30 pounds. That's great But don't get so focused on the goal that once you get there you think to yourself. Well, okay now What where do I go from here? Rather you got your goal of 30 pound weight loss But now start to teach yourself to fall in love with what it takes to lose the 30 pounds Because here's the deal if you fall in love with eating healthy If you fall in love with exercise, then you're always going to do it It's never an issue and it is very much mental. Okay, it is very much a mental thing In fact, I've done this with myself with things that I previously used to hate like I used to hate Chores around the house. There used to be something. I totally hate it But at one point I had to grow up and say to myself Uh, I need to start doing this. So I'm going to learn how to enjoy it I'm actually teach myself to fall in love with it and then I find myself being more consistent You know one of the quotes that I like to use all the time is like, you know Who's gonna who's going to walk further the man who's in love with you know Reaching a destination or the man who's in love with walking, right? The guy who loves to walk he's just can he's always going to be walking So falling in love with the journey is the most important part If you do that, you'll not just hit your goal, but you'll surpass it and you'll never want to stop You know as a bunch of trainers It's really easy for us to say that right, but if you're somebody who hates working out, you know Do that this is a very tough hurdle right here And it took me a long time As a coach and trainer on how do I help somebody who comes in admittedly and says Adam, I don't fucking like being here like I'm here because I know I need to be here I need to make this change. I know it's important to me. I love my family I want to live a long healthy life But I I hate it, you know and then trying to tell them like hey, you just need to love your journey They're like you fuck you guys. I don't like coming in here. You tell me I love this place So The thing that and it took me a long time to figure out how do I get this person to love that And that was starting to act like they would come into the gym to see me And we would no longer talk about their goal We never talk about building the five pounds of muscle or losing the 50 pounds of fat or running faster What all the all the goals that they set for their new year's resolution? I quit talking about that and I started to make all the connections in all the other aspects of their life So if I just told them like hey, let's start eating this way I add something to their diet like I say I do one with a new client You know, I'd add something in their diet and then I would see them the next time in our training session And instead of going like, you know, how do you how would your day going and all the other bullshit stuff? I'd be like, hey, how was your digestion? Did you notice or how did you sleep or how was your energy levels? And as they'd say, oh, I've been good or I find or I noticed this or my stool's all normal I then I would connect it with the behaviors that we were starting to implement Whether that be eating behaviors or that be training like, oh, yeah I noticed that I feel really good when I do this Oh, that's you know the exercises that we did the last week It's starting to make connections with their day to day activities with the work that we were putting in the gym Yeah, a big one is the stress relief that you get from exercise I think when people hate exercise to them it's a stress like, oh, I know I need to lose 30 pounds I gotta go work out, right? So I would help my clients that say, okay How do you feel before the workout and how do you feel after and pay attention to that? And of course, if you work out properly, you by the way, if you do a good workout a proper and appropriate workout You should feel better at the end. You should not feel like you need to you want to throw up or crawl to your car You should feel more energized at the end of your workout So when I would train people at the very end, it's a How do you feel now versus how do you feel when you came in and they'd say, oh man I feel way more energized. I feel really good And I would ask them that for a while and eventually they would Get to the point where they're like, you know what? I want to have that after workout feeling I feeling crummy right now. I want to have a workout an appropriate workout that makes me feel good So once you fall in love with that, it's like you're done And there's other things too like your relationships with your family and the things that you get done around the house And your productivity and work There's so many things that I don't think I really noticed and connected before. I mean, I just I notice again right now, right? We're ramping up our own consistency And I'm boy am I just a better partner and husband at home like I'm in a better mood like I'm just more balanced Yeah, if Katrina asks for something that I have to like get up and go do like when I'm in like November like Thanksgiving time lazy mode and she's like hits me when I'm sitting down watching football Like hey, could you go do this in the garage? I'm like, you know grumbling as I go downstairs to do it Or I'll get to it later Where when I'm on my kick and I'm training like I feel like I have so much more energy that when those those things I'll get up and go do it on my own or I'll find myself just assisting her and helping her a lot of times We just don't make that connection. We don't realize this. Yeah, you don't realize from that You think oh, I'm in a better mood today or whatever But you don't realize where that came from that the root cause of that was because you train and you've been Consistent with your eating and you've been good with your workout. You're so right because we we we tend to only pay attention to the Physical changes, right? I'm more muscular. I'm leaner. I look better, but exercise proper exercise nutrition Literally positively affects everything everything your mood your attitude your skin your hair your nails your sleep your libido Your you know your your productivity how much sharper I had one guy one confidence Oh, yeah confidence I had a client once that I trained who hated working out right? He was this business he owned his own business self-made millionaire very successful I hated working out, but he did it in you. He's one of those disciplined guys I'll just do what I hate because I have to and I remember one day this is after I don't know six months of training He comes to me and he says hey Sal. I just noticed something He goes since I started working out and since my fitness has improved He goes I'm a way but he did sales. He did a lot of sales. He says I'm a way better sales person I said, oh really? He goes. Oh, yeah when I'm in front of a potential customer He's like I have this energy and confidence. He goes. I'm way more effective Do you think that guy wanted to stop working out the guy who loved to sell products and build his business No, because he's connected exercise to making him better at the stuff that he loved doing And this is something that you can do if you just pay attention to build those associations You just got to pay attention and now here's the last one and this is important. This is an important thing to understand. Okay Most of you 99% of you listening right now If you get on this resolution and you follow all the steps we just said you're going to stumble You're still going to stumble as part of almost nobody is going to go all the way through smoothly No hiccups whatsoever Almost everybody is going to screw up fall off lose, you know consistency Whatever, this is a wonderful opportunity to practice self-care and to be kind with yourself Because if you're not kind with yourself, then you'll get into the situation where you just say screw it all I don't want to do it anymore. I don't want to get into this situation where I keep messing up So i'm just over it be kind yourself everybody everybody screws up everybody stumbles when they are on this journey It's not just that it's that when what happens to so many people when you again you set these very rigid big goals And you and you mess up you have a bad day or two or whatever like that. You think you've just you fucked it all off It's like, oh my god. I'm already off. Yeah. Yeah, you don't say I just yeah I'll never get there now It's so it's so much further away and then it just causes this spiral effect You know, I remember getting clients right and you would you know do their follow-up and You know, you'd see that they didn't get progress right It's like a month later and we we go to track and they like they got they put on body fat Like the worst thing ever is a coach you want to see your trainer and they would blame it on like a time like Oh man, that must have been from that weekend that I went drinking this Listen, you didn't consume 12,000 calories in one sitting and put on two pounds of fat in that one sitting What so I promise you what happened was you might have had that hiccup and then from that You started to create better or worse habits again and falling off versus just realizing like ah I had a bad day back on it tomorrow like and then you just get back on the horse like it's going to have So I had this strategy and this has worked for me for a really long time. I share it with all my clients And so I would compete with myself And the way I would compete with myself is I would consider what I consider a perfect day is You know eating eating well all day long getting my training in And so when I would start off on a on a goal like this or in a new year's resolution Or any sort of a fitness journey that where I have been off the wagon for a while I go, okay I'm on it and I'm gonna start going and then inevitably just like sal said a day will happen where I'll stumble This will happen to me this time around like every time When what I do is I go, okay, how many days was that? Oh, I made 12 in a row without a single stumble So my new goal is to beat that is 13 days brilliant Can I get to 13 days and then of course what ends up happening on day 13? I normally can make 14 15 or 16 and then day 17 a stumble happens Okay, new goal. Can I make 18 days and what ends up happening is that just keeps compounding the before you know it You've you've been able to string a whole month or two months in a row without even messing up But you don't stress yourself out on it. You say, hey, man, that was instead. I celebrate that like, oh, shit I went a whole 12 days without a single stumble. That's cool. Okay. Let's try make 13 now And it's it's so much more encouraging looking at it as a positive thing that when you have that stumble because we know It's inevitable. So when it happens look at it as like, okay, I got this many in a row Let's see if I can beat that see and if you're not kind yourself Here's what it looks like and this may be you this is probably you the last time that you You know quote-unquote screwed up right instead of having you know one Oreo cookie You had a whole sleeve of Oreo cookies or one, you know Scoop of ice cream you went nuts and ate the whole pint This is the behavior that happens when we're not kind to ourselves when we stumble because then we stumble and we're like screw it It's over and then we go crazy. We go wait. We actually Create behaviors that we didn't even do before before we started we go crazy But if you're kind to yourself and you stumble you get up you dust yourself off and you say, okay, you know I screwed up. Everybody screws up. It's a part of the game. Let's get back on it and let's see what happens Let's beat what we did last time. I love that strategy Look with that mind pump is recorded on video as well as audio come find us on youtube It's mind pump podcast You can also find all of us on social media instagram is our favorite place to be You can find justin at mind pump justin me at mind pump sal adam at mind pump adam And behind the scenes dug the producer at mind pump dug The movement of you know Doing things like as far as fitness related this idea that you have to go to a gym And get a workout in and have a membership and sweat, you know in this on a treadmill I think that's it's gonna slowly go away And more and more people will find more creative ways to get in shape