The One Thing Needed to Crush Your Goals

Mindset: Start With The Little Things

The billionaire and the beggar both have 24 hours in the day. Will you choose to use this time to better yourself?

How many of you come into the gym with the mindset that you’re going to hit a Personal record that day? Or how about a goal to lose 30 lbs in the next 6 months? Maybe you want to be healthier for your kids and live a long life. Whatever it may be, most of us have goals in mind when we step into the gym. But we all know that won’t happen in just one day, week, month, or sometimes even a year. It’s the little things that add up over time that gets us to our end goal.

Your life comes down to millions of 5-second decisions made day after day. The way society is today, it’s easy to be on autopilot. It’s easier to be comfortable than it is to make difficult choices. But try putting yourself in the driver seat for all those 5-second decisions, and take back your accountability. That’s when everything in your life will start to change.

Our minds are designed to stop us from doing anything that may hurt us. When a difficult situation presents itself, our brains want to stop us. The brain wants to keep us safe and keep us alive. Biologically, this is a primal trait – it’s hardwired. But in order to change, to build on your fitness, become a better parent, spouse, employee, or leader, you’re going to have to do things that may be difficult or scary. It’s less stressful to take the easy way out.

Your goal may be to lose weight, but you know that every once in awhile you like to have a cheat meal (Hey, don’t we all?). Take the example of having a cheeseburger and fries one Saturday afternoon. At that point, you don’t feel bad about having a pint of ice cream since you view the meal you just had as unhealthy and your day already shot. Then maybe you attend a family gathering and you’re offered cake and reflect on the choices you already made and keep the ball rolling. You take the cake. You see now how a lapse in one decision led to a lapse in three?

Here’s another example. You arrive at the gym to see the workout is Fran. You have done Fran several times over your CrossFit career, but have never done all the reps unbroken. Have you tried? Or did it start to burn too much so you set the bar down? Why not go for those extra 5 reps to stay unbroken on thrusters? Yes, it may be painful, but you’re pushing the “limits” you set on yourself. You’re making yourself better by making that one small decision to try.

Your decision to try Fran unbroken was successful. With newly built confidence, you decide not to pace on your rowing intervals your next workout. That decision lead you to hit a PR pace on your splits. The ball continues to roll. These may be very small decisions, but over time they add up to make you a better athlete and overall get you closer to the person you want to be inside and outside the gym.

What makes people more successful than others? They understand that all decisions matter, especially the small ones and the decision to try. They are present in the little things. Because getting the small things right will help the big things just fall into place.

We can’t control all the events that happen in our lives. But we can control how we respond to them and we can control where we put our focus. Deciding what’s important to us and WHY is all we need to do to make our goals happen.

Get comfortable with the uncomfortable. Take ownership of your mission and goals one small decision at a time.