GOALS OR NO GOALS

Still thinking about things on the training front and rather than stress about "I should do this" or "I should do that", I've decided to set myself one simple goal:

MOVE FOR AT LEAST 30 MINUTES AT LEAST HALF OF THE DAYS OF THE WEEK.

Thats something on 4 days of the week and more if I feel like it (which I probabaly will). But if my schedule gets tight on the weekend then I can miss a day and thats ok. Unless I start doing work at home again in the evenings, I should be ok for my morning sessions. Anyhow I dont want to miss them because even though its hard getting out of bed in the colder weather now, I do feel so good when I've completed my workout for the day.

Today I ventured into my studio and did another piss arse legs session. I say piss arse because my legs are not strong and I'm still dealing with all sorts of pains but my goal is to slowly work up from the baby weights to something half respectable - not to impress or anything but to get some strength back into my glutes and even my quads.  Yes I was doing this a few weeks ago but then I hit a bit of a slump and blew off my training so progress has been slow.

Anyway, enough micro-deatil and now for some bigger picture stuff. My thoughts today have been around goals and ambitions and I'll keep the focus on those relating to health / fitness.

Apart from 2 biggies that really meant something to me (competing in 2007 and doing the HM in 2010) I've found most other goals have left me a bit frustrated, disillusioned and motivationless (hows that for a cool new word??) When I look at why, I now realise that my goals have clearly fallen into 2 categories. There is the one where the outcome is something that challenges me and I "just have to do it". The motivation comes from within to achieve that goal and I'll usually do whatever it takes to achieve it. They are the good get-your-arse-into-gear-goals that make a difference.

On the other hand I've made thousands of goals to do this or do that, but their purpose has been to spur me into action and to provide the motivation to do whatever. And without fail a good 80 - 90% of those have just fallen by the wayside and not had that effect at all. Unless the desire comes strongly from within me, making a goal statement, for me is pretty much useless.

Maybe thats why sometimes I achieve more by just letting go of the pressure to achieve and going with the flow. I'm a firm believer that on the whole I make good choices and decisions that give me good outcomes and I dont need a set of defined goals to drive me each day. (And yes that is SO against all the stuff written by the majority of self help gurus out there, but hey, its ME).

:-) M