How to Maintain Consistency In your Fitness Routine Year Round

When it comes to physical transformation, the inability to adhere and commit to your goals for the long term is often an overwhelmingly difficult obstacle that results in stagnation. You may find that life stressors, time and schedule restraints and lack of direction may demotivate or prevent you from sustaining consistency. We have to understand that it is this commitment for the long term that yields the highest reward for time investment in that small incremental progress over extended periods of time will eventually equate to significant cumulative gains.

Three Workouts A Week Is Sufficient

The mistake that is often made as we begin in our quest for physical transformation is that we have unrealistic expectations; as a result of this we start with the mindset that by doing excessively too much, we will see rapid results for our time investment . It is a common for the average gym-goer to believe that by investing more time and energy, they will see more noticeable results; faster. This is the mentality that permeates most of the fitness industry. The fact of the matter is that nothing can be further from the truth. On a well planned and progress driven routine, the majority of us; even those at the advanced level can make measurable weekly progress just by training an hour a day, three days a week. Although the human body is highly adaptable, it is practical for most busy individuals to perform a workout on just three days a week as it provides a good balance of both sufficient stimuli required for changes in body composition and optimal recovery between sessions. 

Another common mistake made is that we may invest excessive time into our routines; not only is this highly impractical but may lead to physical as well as mental burnout early on which will greatly hinder your ability to continually make progress. Spending upwards of 90 minutes to 3 hours in the gym will greatly diminish the quality of work done. After a certain point during a workout session, exercise technique will likely diminish as your body's energy systems become increasingly depleted leading to the increased risk of injury, adrenal fatigue and decreased work output. Your ability to perform high quality work directly correlates to how well you'll be able to progress at various stages throughout your workout sessions.

Respect The Concept of Progressive Overload

The type of pain or soreness induced throughout or after a workout session is not a primary indicator of progress. Your body may create metabolic adaptations towards that type of stress; and subsequently you may see progress, but only to a relatively small degree. A lot of people unknowingly waste years in the gym chasing muscle soreness and fatigue rather than tracking measurable variables such as weight lifted, repetitions performed or total work done over time periods. The process of physical transformation can be continual in that measurable progress is being made on a consistent basis. The human body, being highly adaptable will then be forced to either create new muscle or lose bodyfat based on manipulating only a few measurable variables. A few practical examples would be:

- Decreasing the time taken to run 1 mile will improve your body's ability to more effectively utilize glycogen stores and circulate oxygen rich blood to your muscles and organs. Greater mitochondrial density in your muscles will improve your ability to lose stored bodyfat.

-Going from a 95lb barbell squat for 8 repititions to a 135lbs for the same amount of repititions will result in muscular gains in lower body musculature; as will increasing your 95lbs X 8 squat to 95lbs X 15-20. Being able to progressively increase the amount of pullups you can do in a single set will result in improved upper back, rhomboids and latisismus dosri development

-Increasing overall workout density; that is being able to perform the same amount of work in less time while maintaining the overall quality of work being performed will also lead to progressive overload.

It is important that progressive overload to be seen as the most relevant and calculated factor when it comes to physical transformation. Simply going through the motion and training intuitively is not enough to ignite radical, long term progression. 

Don't Follow Fad Diets/ Workout Routines

The inevitable fact is that it is easy to fall into the trap of doing routines and diets that are not only sub-optimal, but also counterproductive to our goals. Most fitness marketers understand that the wider audience of consumers have unrealistic expectations and as such they leverage this fact in order to sell you their product by promising unrealistic results. In fact, more often than not many people fall prey to this marketing tactic and often commit to a series of products for years on end without seeing the results they expected. Fad routines are easily identifiable in that they don't allow enough progression for certain movements/exercises; there is little specificity when it comes to fad exercise routines; but there may be a lot of variation in how their workouts are designed. This variation is simply made with the intention of keeping the routines challenging and unpredictable and as a result the consumer may develop the impression that what he/she is doing works. The best way to progress on any routine is to select key/core exercises to create the foundation of your routine and allow you to remain objective in your goals. 

Fad diets, like fad routines typically promise unrealistic results in a short time frame. They are also likely to be severely calorie restricted and unsustainable for the long term. The moment you cease from following these type of diets, you may find that you revert to the same physical condition that you have started. As such it is important to eat according to your macronutrient needs for your intended goals. It is common that you find that fad routines are accompanied by fad diets and vice-versa. They both promise that their product is the end all be all magic pill to your fitness goals.

A perfect representation of the fad diet cycle.

Take One Week Off Every 8-12 Weeks

There are 52 weeks within a year; by taking a full week off on 2-3 month intervals you would have been working out consistently for 46-48 weeks out of the full year. By performing three workout sessions a week; cumulatively you would have done anywhere between 138-144 sessions throughout the full year. Not only does this help you to maximize progress, but resting on 8-12 week intervals allow you to prevent psychological and physical burnout. This period of rest also allows you to re-adapt to the imposed stimuli to ignite more potential progress. It is also important to note that during every 8-12 week program, we should strive to achieve at least one or a few specific fitness goals; taking a week off allows us to assess our progress and set new goals in a more systematic fashion.

Closing Thoughts

As we continually progress in the process of physical transformation, we must also understand that building a healthier and more functional body is a tool. It is not a tool that we should abuse but we should learn how to leverage it in order to improve areas of our lives. We must avoid getting deeply enmeshed and obsessed about building better bodies and  be able to incorporate practical, time efficient methods as a way of exercising tolerance, patience and willpower for long term progress. More often you find that people may devote many hours of their day to building their bodies at the expense of personal relationships, career and other important areas of self development. It is essential that we strive to continually use physical culture as a means to an end; pursuing our fitness goals with this principle in mind will lead to radical and dramatic long term progress.

Three Months To Physical Transformation: Why You Should Create A Timeline to Achieve your Fitness Goals

The Importance of Specificity

 Systematic progression creates the basis of development. Whether you are building a house, starting a business, studying to earn a degree or building a stronger, healthier body; the ability to make progress incrementally over a period of time is the primary driving force of growth and development. Your ideas, concepts, the plans that you have laid out and your vision for what you want to achieve cannot be effectively implemented without first laying out a solid foundation; that is to incrementally progress towards achieving your goal over a set period of time. More often than not, when we decide to make that change in building a healthier body; we do so haphazardly; without a plan, without setting deadlines on when you want to lose that 10lbs of fat, build that 5lbs of muscle; add 30-40 pounds to your lifts or a combination of the three. The result of this is that we progress....temporarily; before you know it you lose track of your goals and enter a state that you find yourself constantly renewing your gym membership to work like a hamster running a wheel. 

We force ourselves in a state of stagnation because there is little specificity in going in the gym and performing the same routines year in and year out; while adhering to the same eating principles you have followed since day 1. Most people fail to achieve their long term fitness goals for the sole reason that don't set reasonable short term goals. Setting short term goals and working according to a  timeline allow us to become more reasonable and realistic in what we want to achieve in the long term. That is because the culmination of short term goals WILL lead to further achieving long term goals. This also allows us to be more specific in what we do in order to achieve those goals within the set time frame. We then eliminate unnecessary methods and incorporate strategies that are advantageous to better able us to achieve those goals within the established timeline.

Defining Goals

There is a huge disparity between what can be achieved with 2-6 months as opposed to 3-5 years. The more specific and objective you are in what you want to achieve within that 3-5 year time span, the easier it will be to establish short term goals. It is essential that short term goals interact with long term goals.  It is realistic for someone who has just started out to progress from being able to perform 1 pushup into being able to do 15-20 within a 2-3 month timeline; however it is not possible for that person to progress from 1 to 100 within that time frame. Therefore, being able to perform 100 consecutive pushups is a long term goal; while working up to 15-20 is achievable within the short term. Over periods of 2-3 month intervals this person may slowly progress from being able to perform 15-20 pushups to 40-50, eventually 60-70, 80-90 and finally; 100 pushups. 

Using a progressive approach, you are able to achieve any goal as long as you are clear and objective in what you want to achieve in the long term. It is also important to note that the more clear and vivid your mental imagery is of you achieving a specific goal; the more realistic it is and the more likely you are to achieve it. If you can clearly see yourself losing 3 inches off your waist in the next three months following a specific dietary strategy; the more likely you are to do so. The less you wish, and the more you want will reflect how achievable a goal is. If you can clearly visualize and articulate the processes required for you achieve your goals within a specified time frame, the more reasonable and realistic it is as a goal.

Why Three Months Is a Reasonable Time Frame To Elicit Significant Progress

Most total body transformations take as long as 12 weeks. The participants are often able to make radical and lasting changes to their physiques within the dedicated time span. Some are able to drop up to 15-25 pounds of bodyfat while also adding noticeable lean body mass in the process. While some may be going to the gym for years; they often never see this type of progress. In fact a lot of gym goers remain the same since the day they started. Listed below are some of the reasons why body transformations are successful within a three month time frame:

Objectivity: This is often an overlooked factor in that most fitness goals are vague and off point. If you are to participate in a transformation program lasting three months, you will know exactly what you need to do in order to meet your goals at the end of the timeline. This then forces you to work towards more reasonable and achievable goals.

Consistency: Knowing that you have 12 week time limit to achieve your goal, you will be inclined not to miss even a single workout as that may push you behind schedule. People who participate in transformation programs are required to meet their deadlines; as such every effort to show up is mandatory. The casual gym goer may not be faced with this type of pressure; thus it allows for some degree of inconsistency.

Time Period: Twelve weeks is a reasonable time period to achieve most goals. Most people; especially starting out are able to develop adequate adaptation to their workouts; thus allowing them to progress more rapidly within the realm of specificity. As illustrated previously; an individual can progress from performing just 1 pushup to being able to do 15-20 consecutively. The same concept can be applied to body composition. For a beginner to add 6-7lbs of muscle while losing 10-12lbs of fat within the first three months of consistent, progress driven training is possible.