Be Honest With Yourself
Written By Cat Blatner
It’s all about execution.
Your coach can tell you what to do until they are blue in the face; but it is up to you as the athlete to take ownership of your actions and work towards your training and nutrition goals. People always want to hear advice about what will make them leaner, stronger, faster and just an overall better athlete. Maybe they want to chat about what to change in their diets or what they need to do to improve their lifts. When coaches offer them advice, it becomes very obvious who actually wants to improve and who wants the “magical pill to success”. Believe me, if I had that pill, I’d be passing it out to my athletes on the daily. Unfortunately, the road to success and achieving your goals doesn’t work that way.
Make this the year of a new attitude towards your training. Make this the year that you take ownership of what you need to do in order to achieve your goals. Be honest with yourself and ask yourself.
Do I really want to get better in this area?
Do you really want help? Is it that important to you? Or does the sound of getting better at pull-ups just sound cool for now but practicing them every day is just too much time spent at the gym?
Am I willing to take the necessary steps towards success even if it doesn’t sound fun or convenient?
Depending on what your goals might be, you might have to give lots of time into the execution of achieving these goals and you might need help from a coach or friends along the way, which is totally normal and even advised. We’ve all heard the phrase ”where there’s a will, there’s a way”…but you need to have the will to go, even if the path to success is super long and challenging.
When I ask for advice, am I looking for a quick fix or am I ready to change?
Here’s an example: Let’s say your goals are to be a competitive athlete (i.e. Qualify for Regionals) and right now you spend your weekends eating junk foods or drinking yourself silly. Looks like it might be time to reassess your lifestyle outside of the gym. If you decide that you won’t give up your current lifestyle because you “work hard and want to play hard,” I can tell you right now that you will most likely fall short of your stated goals. Success in the sport requires much sacrifice and it’s important that you are honest with yourself about how far you are willing to go. Maybe competing in the sport isn’t actually as important to you as you thought it might be. Time to self reflect to find these answers and make a change where change is necessary!
After answering these questions, you can determine whether you are truly committed to achieving your set goals or if you need to reassess what you really want. When reassessing your goals and how to reach them, consider if you need the help of a coach or accountability partner to get there. Don’t have the benefit of private coaching sessions with one of the Invictus coaches? Contact us to hear some ways we can help you reach your training and nutrition goals if you don’t live nearby.