Are you putting something off? Yes? It can't be important enough to you then! Get motivated.

Start! Understand what you want to achieve, plan the steps and stick to it!

This article describes the processes I follow with myself and my clients to really identify and understand what motivates us to start doing something. To do whatever is required to achieve something that is really important to you. If you don't know why you are doing something, connect what that will make you feel like, then you are just not going to do it, simply, you may start but you will stop, you will find an excuse to fail. Now I don't want that, do you?

Of course as a Personal Trainer I am going to focus on Health, Exercise and Wellbeing, but the same principles can and should be incorporated into every day life and the challenges that everyday life brings.

Nothing is Impossible! Connect your goals with your emotions, see what you can achieve!

Motivation and Goal Setting

When I first speak with a client, I want to know all about you. I want to understand what motivated you to speak with me or another professional. I want to know why?

I often hear, " I want to be fitter", "I want to lose some weight (fat)" or " I want slimmer arms" (the dreaded Bingo wings!). Thats a good starting point, but is it the real reason? Really ask your self a few more questions.... Why do you want to lose weight (fat)?, Why do you want to feel good in your jeans? and and keep asking why until you get to the real reason. Try it yourself, right now.... (preferably exercise related but it works whatever your goal).......got the answer? Now write that down.

Now ask yourself when you have got that REAL goal... HOW WILL ACHIEVING THAT MAKE YOU FEEL?

Imagine now, you, after achieving that goal. Go on, no-one is watching! Close your eyes, see it, how do you look? What does it feel like? Just look at the smile on your face! Wow! The reactions of others around you...., your nearest and dearests, experience this in your mind all of those emotions. Powerful, isn't it? This visualisation practise is used by the very top athletes in the world ...this is how they win Olympic Medals.... (a bit more to it than this brief article) but now your for free!

That is where your motivation comes from, not "I want to lose some weight" but for example "I want my daughter and the whole family to be proud of me! How brilliant I look, how confident I feel, .....I want to feel happy, proud and confident at my daughters wedding in 12 months time... looking fantastic when I walk her down the aisle"....would that motivate you to do what is required to feel like that? Well that example might not. but your own personal motivation will. So find it... you need it to start your journey!

Now you have your real Goal, now you need to have a SMART(ER) Plan, otherwise its just a wish!

Knowing what you want and why is the first step. But how do you get there? You need a plan, this is where people fail everyday... that's only because they don't know how to plan. This is where I will help you. I give you the plan, I keep you on track, I remind you when needed of your motivation, why you started the process in the first place... but it starts with a SMAR(ER) plan

What is a SMART(ER) plan? S.M.A.R.T. (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time-bound) goal process, it is a way to organise everything you need to do to achieve your goal.

Specific

Make sure your goals are precise and stated in performance terms. For instance, if you want to lose weight (I say Fat, not weight...for the feeling of being proud walking down the aisle with your daughter), your specific goal might be "to lose 30 pounds of fat in the next 40 weeks."

Measurable

A goal is measurable when it is easy to determine if it has been accomplished. The Fat loss goal listed above is easily measured. 40 weeks from now you will either weigh 30 pounds less or not.

Achievable

One of the biggest mistakes people make while setting goals is that they set unattainable goals. Goals should be set high, a challenge, but they must also be realistic. A goal to lose 20 pounds in four weeks is both unrealistic and unhealthy. Make your goals challenging, but attainable. This is where a certified Personal Trainer (like me!) designs the unique plan for you to meet this goal carefully designed to the specific timescale.

Relevant (Realistic)

Your goals should be important to you (close your eyes again and imagine how achieving your goal makes you feel). If it's not important or has some emotional connection, it is not the right goal, believe me!

As a Personal Trainer, I use this emotion to help my clients achieve, no magic wand, just planning (and some know how!) and hard work. At the difficult times (there will be some when you question yourself) a positive reminder of why you are doing the particularly hard exercise, or the increase in weights, is the motivation you need.

Don't set a goal just because your friends, family members or exercise partners have set that goal. Your goals are your motivators (and mine also when we train together), they are personal, they get your heart racing thinking about them. So make sure they are really important to you. I

Time-Bound

Make sure each goal has a specific time frame for completion. This allows you to easily determine if it has been achieved. It also increases the likelihood that you will accomplish each goal since you know the clock is ticking. For example, the goal "I want to lose 30 pounds of fat in 30 weeks" has a time frame.

Evaluate

It is really important that you revisit your goals and confirm them. By evaluating your goals every day, or other day you’ll be much more likely to achieve them. Why is that? Well, long-term goals (and also goals that are 3 months or 6 months out), can easily be ignored if they aren’t evaluated every single day.

This is part of my role, making sure that you evaluate your goals and you make the evaluation of your goals habitual. Don’t ignore this all-important step. Your mind has a very clever way of allowing you to ignore your goals by pushing you into emotion-numbing behaviours when those goals aren’t closely evaluated. Your Personal Trainer won't (or shouldn't) allow that to happen, in fact many of my clients don't realise that I have re-affirmed their goals, thats because I am a woman and like to have a conversation!

Readjust

The final step in setting goals with the S.M.A.R.T(E.R.) method is to re-adjust your approach. If, for example, you find yourself pursuing a goal but continuously hitting a brick wall, we need to readjust your method and techniques. For example, when a pilot has a goal of flying from Leeds to Tenerife, she/he has to constantly evaluate the progress and readjust the approach to ensure that it reaches its target. The pilot constantly evaluates and readjusts the path due to wind direction until it arrives on time in Tenerife. You should be doing the same for your goals, or you can easily miss your target.

Readjust doesn’t mean that you have to throw your goals out and start all over. What it means is that you have to try different approaches until you find yourself getting closer and closer to your goals. That’s why constant evaluation on is so important. If you don’t evaluate you can’t measure your progress. Everyone is different, some things work for one and not another. It is this "fine tuning" that gets the results....it is this knowledge and skill I, as a certified Personal Trainer am paid to provide (amongst a host of other things!).

I would be happy to discuss this, your own personal goals and how you can achieve them with a SMART(ER) Plan.

If you contact me and tell me that you have read this article, I will invest One and a half hours with you! I will get to know you, really understand you and agree with you your Motivation and your SMART(ER) goals. I will evaluate your current position, your capabilities and take you through some exercises.

FREE! Absolutely no commitment from you, apart from being open, honest and true to yourself.

I hope you enjoyed this, because it's very personal to me. I really want to help as many people meet or surpass their goals! So what are you waiting for? Start now!

Contact me by e-mail: Dannidobsonpt@outllook.com

Call/Text 07811 888394

Facebook @Dannidobsonpt

Insta and YouTube coming soon!

Danni X