​The Importance of Consistency
The Importance of Consistency
I've mentioned in a previous article that the main reason I achieved my transformation was that I was consistent. Telling people that being consistent is key to making progress and achieving their goals isn’t exciting, but it is true, and it's the thing the vast majority struggle with and is the reason they don't reach their goals.
Training is a marathon, not a sprint.
It takes time to build strength, lose fat, gain muscle and get fitter. Ignore any trainer, articles or adverts that say something like “gain 10-pounds muscle in 4 weeks". While you will get quicker results when you first start training, to achieve anything that’s impressive will take time and consistency.
Think long term and come up with a plan that you can stick to.
Doing a little consistently beats doing loads of work in a short time and then having breaks.
Lots of people train hard for a short period, but then they stop training. I regularly see people post on social media about this hardcore training program they have started. They talk about how many days they are going and how sore they are. Every time they end up either getting hurt or giving up as it's too much.
The stop-start cycle continues and they never make any progress. Training hard is important, but problems arise when people allow the intensity to interfere with consistency. No single workout, no matter how good it was, matter that much. Instead, what matters is putting in consistent work and making improvements over a long period of time.
Doing something is better than not doing anything.
Everyone will have days where they don't feel great. It's a part of life, but it’s still better to go and do something. You'll often surprise yourself and end up having a great workout. If you haven’t got time to do your full workout, still go and get a shorter workout done. In the past, I've had workouts where I just did the main lift and the left. It all adds up.
Another thing I've done with some clients is cut training down to two days a week during busy periods. I have done it myself for short periods. I have two articles on this here, one about my personal experience with training twice a week. Another with the results of one of my client's results after ten weeks of only training twice a week. It's not ideal, but it's much better than stopping training. Far too many people will train for five weeks and then take five weeks off because they have stuff going on in their life, or they were too ambitious with what they thought they could commit to. They then come back and have to start from the beginning again. If they had gone down to two days a week, and everyone can find time for two days a week, they would have continued to make progress.
Training is a marathon, not a sprint.
It takes time to build strength, lose fat, gain muscle and get fitter. Ignore any trainer, articles or adverts that say something like “gain 10-pounds muscle in 4 weeks". While you will get quicker results when you first start training, to achieve anything that’s impressive will take time and consistency.
Think long term and come up with a plan that you can stick to.
Doing a little consistently beats doing loads of work in a short time and then having breaks.
Lots of people train hard for a short period, but then they stop training. I regularly see people post on social media about this hardcore training program they have started. They talk about how many days they are going and how sore they are. Every time they end up either getting hurt or giving up as it's too much.
The stop-start cycle continues and they never make any progress. Training hard is important, but problems arise when people allow the intensity to interfere with consistency. No single workout, no matter how good it was, matter that much. Instead, what matters is putting in consistent work and making improvements over a long period of time.
Doing something is better than not doing anything.
Everyone will have days where they don't feel great. It's a part of life, but it’s still better to go and do something. You'll often surprise yourself and end up having a great workout. If you haven’t got time to do your full workout, still go and get a shorter workout done. In the past, I've had workouts where I just did the main lift and the left. It all adds up.
Another thing I've done with some clients is cut training down to two days a week during busy periods. I have done it myself for short periods. I have two articles on this here, one about my personal experience with training twice a week. Another with the results of one of my client's results after ten weeks of only training twice a week. It's not ideal, but it's much better than stopping training. Far too many people will train for five weeks and then take five weeks off because they have stuff going on in their life, or they were too ambitious with what they thought they could commit to. They then come back and have to start from the beginning again. If they had gone down to two days a week, and everyone can find time for two days a week, they would have continued to make progress.
Consistency is the key to achieve your fitness goals and should be your main priority.