» Keep Your New Year’s Resolution By Setting Goals

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Cold water immersion (a.k.a., “ice baths”) has become a popular method amongst exercise enthusiasts and athletes to enhance recovery after an intense training bout. The strategy involves exposing either the trained limb or the whole body to very cold liquid temperatures. According to p...

Brad Schoenfeld, Ph.D, C.S.C.S., is an internationally renowned fitness expert and widely regarded as one of the leading authorities on body composition training (muscle development and fat loss). He is a lifetime drug-free bodybuilder, and has won numerous natural bodybuilding titles.

Exercise

January 1, 2010

Keep Your New Year’s Resolution By Setting Goals

Happy New Year!

Yep, another year has come and gone. And with the turn of the new year, I’m sure many of you have made a resolution to get into shape and/or lose weight. If so, great! Deciding to do something is the easy part. Unfortunately, the majority who make fitness-related resolutions stop working out within a few months. So how do you go about ensuring that you don’t become a fitness statistic? Set goals!

Those who’ve read my books know that I’m a huge proponent of setting goals as part of an exercise program. In fact, it’s the first thing you should do before ever setting foot in the gym. Setting goals is the best way to stay focused on why you’re expending all that sweat and effort. It helps to maintain motivation over the long haul, and has proven to increase exercise adherence.

Here’s a short course on making sure your goals are up to speed. With respect to setting goals, I advocate the SMART acronym. Namely, goals should be Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Timely. Break down long term goals into shorter term goals of four to six weeks. Once you accomplish your short-term goals, set new short- term goals. And once you accomplish the long-term goal, set a new long-term goal and again break it down into shorter-term goals. Finally, make sure you write down your goals. Committing goals to paper makes them more tangible, and has been shown to promote a greater sense of obligation to follow through and accomplish them.

Stay Fit!

Brad

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