The other week I touched on why we always want what we can’t have and how our mind can play games with us.
I noted that we are very goal orientated and we constantly need a carrot dangling in front of us to push us, make progress or give us some sort of purpose in our lives.
In line with our craving to have goals and tasks to work towards we also like to put time constraints on them too. Either by our own choice or by someone else’s.
When you think about it our whole lives revolve around time and therefore some sort of deadline.
We have a deadline for sleeping and that parameter is set through the amount of sleep we require to function. We facilitate this through an alarm.
We then have deadlines on our journeys to work or school.
We have tasks throughout the day that require completion – more deadlines.
Throughout the week and on weekends we make arrangements to catch up and meet with friends and family. All organised by time and therefore more deadlines.
We set dates for weddings, holidays and projects. Deadlines all of which require adherence to.
Everything we do has structure through time and therefore has a deadline.
Funny that. As I’m actually writing this I’m thinking I have a deadline too to get this done by. Better keep writing…
Nowadays with so much information to digest, people to respond to, jobs to be done, money to be made, we keep pushing the boundaries and our limitations by trying to cram in 100 different things into a short space of time that has somehow enslaved us.
All with deadlines.
The consequences of missing these deadlines vary a lot though and a lot of it is placed on the importance of them.
The end result whether it’s successful or unsuccessful can also dictate our emotions and behaviours.
Deadlines create panic, pressure and anxiety on one hand. However on the other they create motivation, drive and focus.
What I do wanna talk about is the relationship between your health and fitness goals and deadlines.
Now in some cases this doesn’t apply to any of you who are professional athletes getting paid the big bucks and/or working specifically on a craft that requires perfection by a certain time.
However the point I want to make is relative to everyone on all sorts of different levels depending on what stage of your life you’re at.
Back to my point.
As I said, because we’re all obsessed with deadlines and live a very structured and routine life, there’s a time frame put on everything.
We’re just so used to creating structured routines for everything we do in our life, our fitness goals inevitably fall into that trap as well.
This is exactly what i want to focus on so let me put things into perspective.
The average life expectancy of someone that lives in Australia is 83.
Work out how old you are right now (some of you may need a calculator) and subtract that from the number 83.
This number should be your new timeline for your health and fitness goals.
Forget about the 8 week ‘I’m gonna change my life’ bullshit. Let it go.
Granted some will live past 83 and some won’t make it but it’s important that you get your head around the fact that when it comes to setting deadlines on your health and fitness goals, quick fixes should be out of the question.
Definitely celebrate milestones and achievements along the way but the bigger picture is the most important thing here.
So in summing up. When it comes to your health and fitness goals and deadlines my advice would be…
When you’re dead. That is the line.
‘’If you have a body, we can help you’’
Ben
Infinite Fitness Peninsula
