A Goal… A Plan… Action… Success!

We’ve all heard this much overused and cliché statement: “If you fail to plan you plan to fail.” A funny thing in life is that the more we hear something the more we tend to overlook how significant it really is. So, using the wisdom of this statement let’s take a look at why its important to have goal and a plan, especially when it comes to the topic of your own personal fitness.

A very important thing to realize is that most of us just don’t know ourselves well enough to go to the gym without a plan and be effective in what we’re doing. Once you’ve been working out and having success in the gym for several years you might be able to just go to the gym, wing your workout, and still have some success. But even then, it probably isn’t the best thing to do. If you’re just beginning, or even if you have been going to the gym for a while now, you’ll likely achieve more if you actually have a plan.

For our purposes, a plan really consists of two different things. First, you have to have a set goal that you want to achieve. A plan is useless without a desired outcome. So that’s step one: decide what you want to accomplish. Are you trying to gain mass? If so, how much overall mass are you going for? Are you trying to lose weight? What is the weight goal that you’re shooting for? Clearly define your goal.

Second, you have to develop a plan that you can follow. So the question with this very important step is this: what do I need to consider when making my plan? Well, the two main components to consider at this point are your workout plan and your nutrition plan.

For your workout plan, first decide what day and time do you have available to work out. What is the best: morning, afternoon, or evening? Well, in all reality, you should first consider what time of day works best for your schedule! If your schedule doesn’t give you time to work out first thing in the morning, then by all means don’t work out first thing in the morning. Find another time that works best for you! That way you have a much better chance of actually sticking with your new plan, which at this point is probably the most important thing from a psychological standpoint.

For your nutrition plan, for this article’s purposes we’ll keep this pretty simple. Granted, it is a little bit more complicated than this, but if you want to gain weight or mass, then you need to consistently eat more calories than you naturally burn each day. And if your goal or plan is to lose weight then you need to be consistently eating a little less than what you burn each day. As far as what you should be eating, its safe to stick with a standard 40% protein, 40% carbs, and 20% fat diet. You can find more details about what specifically you should eat in plenty of other articles and books out there, but unless you have a plan for what you want to accomplish, it really doesn’t matter because you’re won’t be moving in the direction of any set goal anyway.

If you take one thing from this article, please take to heart the fact that unless you have a goal and a plan, you really aren’t going to see the results or the success that deep down (or maybe not so deep down) you really are hoping to achieve by going to the gym and trying to eat well. Set a goal first, then develop your plan to reach than goal, and then most importantly stick to that plan! A plan is only good if you actually execute it. Here’s to your success!

By: Dan Patterson

Article Directory: http://www.articledashboard.com

About the Author:
Dan Patterson is an editor of BodyFitnessInfo.com, a website that offers free information to help you reach your goals and hopefully achieve a level of lifetime fitness.