4 Simple Steps – How to Maintain Momentum toward Your Core Fitness Goals when Life Throws S#*t Your Way

by admin on August 27, 2010 · 0 Comments
in Fitness Misconceptions, Fitness Psychology

We all like to find routine in our lives. It helps us to gain a sense of certainty in the things that we do. Often however, life doesn’t work that way. Whichever way we choose to look at it, interruptions happen. I used to hate interruption in my life, as it often took me long to get back into my routine and back to the feeling of progression. But after many years of battling with life’s chaotic intrusions, trying to find fool-proof plan after plan to eliminating them, I realized that my battle was futile. Soon after, it didn’t take long for it to dawn on me, that I had to find a way to stick to doing the things that were important to me (maintaining a certain routine) while being out of routine. I now see interruptions as life’s way of stirring things up a bit when we get too dull to notice that we need the balance of spontaneity in our lives. Something that makes things feel fresh and exciting.

4 Simple Steps – How to Maintain Momentum toward Your Core Fitness Goals when Life Throws S#*t Your Way

You really wanna be going around the same ol' routine track?

Don’t get confused here – I still don’t welcome interruptions into my life with open arms. But I understand that they are necessary, and I eventually am able to use these “spanners in the works” as fuel for my growth, and you’ll soon understand how you can too.

Understanding Interruptions and their Purpose in Our lives

I like to use the general term “CHAOS” for the interruptions that happen in our lives. After all, interruptions do really make us feel chaotic inside, right? If you’ve read any of my other articles, you may have figured out by now that hold a belief in that we become our truest potential, our “greatest” as we approximate balance in ourselves – which ultimately reflects in our lives. For example, gaining a balance of muscle symmetry gives us our greatest strength and muscle efficiency potential; gaining a balance of strength and flexibility gives us our greatest strength and power potential; gaining a balance in the types of exercises we perform gives us our greatest level of fitness and athletic potential (in my ebook – better, fitter, faster, stronger and detailed step by step progressive DVD instruction in the TACFIT Commando package).

The Balance between Chaos and Order

From this perspective, it becomes clear that balance is essential for us to become the best we can be. And there is no exception to this rule, even when it comes to the balance of chaos and order in our lives. ORDER is the general term I like to use for all the moments and occurrences in our lives that feel negative. When we are ordered, things feel positive in our lives because things feel predictable, and things work! When we have order, we don’t want s#%t to come along and f*#k things up. We like the way things are. But life isn’t interested in stagnation, and neither are you in truth. You just think that you are because life feels easy and comfortable from here. So the universe – or you – depending on what you believe, comes along and throws a spanner in the works. It’s life’s way of waking you up to your next level of growth. It’s the lightning storm that ignites a fire in the forest so that the burned trees can provide nutrient soil for the forest to grow thicker and stronger. CHAOS IN YOUR LIFE IS YOUR NUTRIENT SOIL. If you didn’t get that the first time, you may want to read over these last few lines again.

How to Use Chaos as Your Nutrient Soil to Grow

Usually when chaos happens in our lives, the first thing we tend to want to do is get things back into order. Naturally, we try to get negative crap out of our lives, rather than welcome it in. And it makes sense. I don’t know anyone who volunteers to be in the line of a firing squad. As said, I know that it is essential in my life for my own personal growth. But that still doesn’t mean that I at first welcome it with open arms. If there is one thing that I do different from most people – it is that I prepare for it, and then have the insight to see its necessity in my life.

Preparing for Chaos

It's Chaos.. Here to save the day!

Written words about chaos have been documented over and over, again and again, book upon book throughout history. You can find it in the autobiography of the greatest people ever lived; it in quotes about success and triumph – and isn’t every story really about that. The stories you would ever have heard, right from your first bedtime stories, to the stories of your idols – they all tell a story about overcoming adversity – chaos. You see, we all have to go through it to get to our goals, our dreams. No one escapes going through it. Cinderella, Snow White, Luke Skywalker, Neo – they all had to go through chaos to achieve their dreams. Yet most of us seem to think that as soon as chaos happens, we have been given a legitimate excuse to quit, or it’s a sign from the universe to stop, or it’s validated by this or that. If you haven’t used them yourself, you’ve probably heard them all from others.

Expect the Best – Prepare for the Worst

-Tito Ortiz – UFC lightweight Champion

A “Never Give Up” Attitude is required for Success

Most people would have heard in some form or another – that in order to succeed, we must develop a “Never Give Up” attitude. This is absolutely so. But what I am about to tell you next, you may want to pay special attention to, because chances are you have never heard it before.

To gain a “Never Give Up” attitude, we must give ourselves permission to temporarily give up. Look closer at the journeys of all your heroes and heroines, and you will see the common thread. BEFORE USING CHAOS AND DESPAIR AS OUR FUEL TO FIGHT, WE MUST FIRST ALLOW OURSELVES TO BE IN OUR NEGATIVE FEELINGS.

You Must Give Yourself Permission to Be Negative

This is so important, yet it never gets mentioned. Before Luke Skywalker decides to go with Obi Wan Kenobi in the original Star Wars, he goes through self doubt, fear, anxiety – he gives up. He doesn’t dismiss his fears and take immediate action in the face of his darkest moment. He acknowledges them and allows himself to feel defeated in that moment.

Luke in one of his many moments of temporary defeat

It’s ironic really, that the very cause of people’s wallows in depression and despair – lays in their inability to allow themselves to go there. We have been taught to avoid negative thoughts and feelings at all cost – to adopt a positive attitude to life. But all things being balanced, negative feelings are just as necessary in life as are positive feelings. When we are feeling negative or down, the problem often only persists because of this:

WHEN YOU DON’T ACKNOWLEDGE WHERE YOU ARE, YOU CAN”T POSSIBLY MOVE AWAY FROM WHERE YOU ARE – BECAUSE YOU ARE LOST. If you didn’t get that the first time, read over this last line again.

Allowing yourself to sink as low as you truly are – is crucial to finding your way out of there. Similar to a finding where you are on a map, if you don’t take the time to find out where you are, then how can you possibly expect to find your way out. It’s important that you take as long as you need to experience your emotions fully. Because the sooner you give yourself that permission, the sooner you will be able to get out of where you are. Our darkest place is not nearly as scary as our imagined fears about darkest place.

So next time your feeling like things are getting too tough to move forward, rather than try to plough on though, try the following steps instead. I guarantee you’ll be moving with new stead toward your goals and dreams in no time.

4 Simple Steps to Maintaining Momentum

Step 1.

Give yourself permission to just sit and breathe for a few moments. Find presence in your breath so that you can feel where you are at in the present moment.

Step 2.

Allow yourself to feel your pain, anger, depression, fear or whatever negative feeling it may be to full extent. Talk out loud and curse yourself or the Universe if it helps.

Step 3.

Stay in the feeling for as long as you want – but don’t move. As long as you want to stay with the emotion, you have to stay where you are physically.

Step 4.

When you are ready to move, you may only move when you have resolved what you will do to act constructively upon your emotion. You don’t have to resolve your negative feeling. Use it as fuel for your fight. Life will take ensure you move away from the negative automatically.

Note: If you aren’t willing to find constructive action out of your feelings, you can stay and wallow for as long as you wish, but you must stay where you are physically. Trust me – the frustration of staying put alone will be fuel enough to move you forward before not too long.

If you have any tips, suggestions, or a great formula that works for you, please leave a comment and share them so that other reader can become inspired and benefit from your success