There’s an old saying that if you give someone an inch they will take a mile. This is especially true when you are dealing with yourself. This principle is relevant to all areas of our lives: nutrition, working out, work, everything. It begins with just surrendering a little bit.
When you’re working out maybe your chin didn’t get all the way over the bar, but it got mostly over the bar. Maybe you didn’t get the medicine ball all the way over the line, but you tried really hard. This is the top of a very slippery slope. Next time it gets a little bit easier to start counting the reps a little bit lower. Then the wallball target starts getting shorter and shorter. Soon the workouts are not what they should be and neither are the movements. It gets even easier when it comes to not working out at all. When you miss one, it is easy to miss two, then three, then four, and then you are not going at all.
Nutrition is the trap that I get caught in the most. After I had one reese’s cup, it’s really easy to have another, and then since I have already screwed up my night why not just go all the way. Then you’ve ruined the next day, and so on and so forth. Then who needs clean food, I have all the junk food I need.
How can you avoid this pitfall? Give yourself boundaries and rules and stick to them. When you are doing pull-ups get your chin over the bar every time, all the time. Don’t let yourself miss that workout even though you hate all the movements. Don’t cheat even though you really really want to. What do you guys struggle with the most?
Elisabeth improving her core! Click here to check out more pics on Flickr!
