Are you always waiting for the ‘perfect time’ to get started on new projects?  To learn a new skill?  To eat better?  To exercise more?  If so, here is something to think about…..

When I get a different job.

When things are less busy

When I find a workout partner

When I lose 20 lbs

When I get back into the right routine

When my fridge is full of the right foods

When I feel less awkward in the gym

When I find the right equipment

When the holiday season is over

When the kids are back at school

When I’ve eaten all the rubbish in the cupboards

Tomorrow.  Next week. Never.

Human beings are always waiting for the ‘perfect time’.  But why?

For many, it’s a great distraction and justification.  It helps us to avoid the real and risky work of doing.

For others, perfectionism and avoidance serve as a strong armour against potential embarrassment, criticism, and failure.

We try to perhaps protect ourselves from failure by not doing.  But isn’t that failure in itself?

So unfortunately, this may be what keeps us from growing, thriving, being who we know we have the potential to be.

That’s why all-or-nothing thinking – “if I don’t do this perfectly then it’s awful” – rarely gets you ‘all’.  It may get you ‘nothing’.

It is better to get out there and ‘do’, fail, learn, get better and carry on.  A coach I know loves the phrase ‘RPB – Relentless Pursuit of Better’.

What are you doing today to be better than you were yesterday?

The ‘relentless’ part I like to think as referring to sustaining the process of being better, being unremitting, being focussed, overcoming obstacles, being driven towards an agenda and being consistent.

There is no Perfect Time and there Never will be

So there may be a time where everything comes together and you get that buzz of a fab workout in the gym, you have beaten your run time by 2 minutes in your brand new trainers, you’ve made yourself the most amazing, healthy and nutritious dinner and it tastes fantastic, but those magic moments don’t always happen and most probably happen very rarely.

A single perfect moment is a very very very small part of the whole thing.

You have to make these moments, you have to make them happen.  This frustrates us, of course.  We think ‘Everyone else’s moments just…come to them.  Everyone else has enough time.  Enough money.  Enough motivation.  Enough information.”

But if everyone feels like this, can this be true?

This is how it is.  There is a ‘perfect moment’.  There is ALWAYS a ‘Perfect Moment’.

THAT PERFECT MOMENT IS NOW!!!!

That is all you ever have.  Now!

Just start at the beginning!

All you have to do is make a start.  One moment will then stack on top of another and before you know it, you’ll have arrived at your goal.

“But I can’t!!” you say.  “I can’t get started, that is the problem”.

No, it’s not.  If you can’t get started, you’re just jumping too far ahead.

Maybe starting for you should be:

1. Walking to the fridge and picking out a handful of berries to eat.

2. Making a shopping list of good foods to go get tomorrow morning

3. Booking yourself in for a fitness assessment

4. Buying some new trainers

5. Writing out a 6 week training plan (or getting help to do so).

Starting means initiating action.  Starting means committing to a choice of some kind or another.  As long as something is moving, that’s  a start.

Push through.  Embrace Resistance.

Many people starting out assume that because they feel resistance, they have failed, or they stop at this first resistance.

Maybe they cook broccoli and over do it and they say they just can;t eat vegetables.

Maybe they forget their printed list of exercises on the table and can’t workout when they get to the gym,

Maybe their legs ache when walking uphill, they assume that they are not ready to climb that hill.

Maybe they have a day where their training feels like a hard slog.

Unfortunately, that’s just how it feels, sometimes.

Starting will often feel like resistance, at least at first.  Give it time, push through it, it will change sooner than later if you keeping pushing through it.  If you stop, you will only have to face those same resistances again and again.

Get Support.   For now.

We can start – and stay moving – on our own.  But it sure helps when someone (like a coach/trainer) gives us a push or a pull.

Someone else can prevent our procrastinations, and our all-or-nothing trance with a gentle nudge, someone else may know a better way to start and keeping moving.

For a while, we can affix ourselves to this someone else, for motivation, encouragement, information, and for accountability.

So don’t wait for that ‘Perfect Time’

• Revise your expectations
• Make the time – carve it out of somewhere – there is time, you just need to manage it
• Just start – find something small to do right now to better yourself, to get started.
• Do something, anything
• This moment of starting will be the hardest, but resistance will weaken
• Expect resistance – it’s normal, be prepared, be organised, push through it.  Resistance means you have started not that it’s not working
• Get support – whether it’s a friend, family member, workout chum, group or a coach/trainer, find someone to fire you up.

Want some help getting started?

If you want help figuring out the best course of action, where to start, how to start, what to do then contact Richard Green PT NOW!  – rich@richardgreenpt.co.uk.  Nutrition is a great starting point and Richard Green PT is selling his extremely successful 30-Day No Sugar Plan Now!  Get it and Get Started.

Richard Green PT offers one to one Personal Training, Group Training, Outdoor Boot Camps and  Nutritional Advice.