The Power of Habits: Unlock Lifelong Fitness Success

Over 40% of our daily actions and choices are habitual. They happen automatically, without much (if any) conscious thought. Which means that almost half of your life is happening before you realize that you could have chosen to do it another way.

Which makes habits – the good, the bad and the ugly – extremely powerful. If you can unlock that power, you can achieve lifelong fitness success.

What can you do to harness that power? Let’s dive in.

Understanding Habits and Routines

Habit (noun): a settled or regular tendency or practice, especially one that is hard to give up; a constant, almost automatic, practice acquired by frequent repetition.

Life would be cumbersome without habits. Imagine having to think about every little move you make? Wouldn’t get too much done…

Which is why habits form in the first place.

Habits form because our brains are hard-wired to seek efficiency. There’s real physiological change in your brain when a habit forms: new neural pathways form that allow you to perform a particular action without conscious effort. Essentially, your brain is creating ways to free up mental energy for other taks.

We’ve all got ’em. But how does it work?

How Habits Form

Turns out, all habits start with a 3-part “habit loop”: cue (trigger), routine (the behavior), reward.

The cue is a signal to your brain that triggers an automatic behavior. Then, you act/behave. Finally, your brain is rewarded in some way. It’s this reward that reinforces repeat behavior next time.

Habits are closely linked with environment. As long as your environment remains consistent, the action – be it brushing your teeth, pulling out of the garage or grabbing a handful of whatever food is on the counter – remains pretty much the same.

(…which leads us to the idea that changing your environment is one of the best ways to break or form a habit. But we’ll get to that…)

Habits and Fitness Goals

How does all of this relate to your fitness goals and achieving lifelong fitness success?

Imagine if making time to exercise felt as habitual as the need to make and eat dinner?

What if reaching for a piece of fruit was as natural to you as grabbing a pint of ice cream?

It’s possible.

By putting yourself in more situations in which you can be “cued” to react healthfully.

By having a plan in place to repeat the action/behavior daily, if not more.

And by attaching a small reward to that behavior.

For example:

Find a community of co-workers who are fit minded and spend your lunch break with them.

Put a post-it note on the refrigerator to remind you to eat 3 vegetables every day.

Create a favorite playlist that you only listen to while working out.

Building Effective Fitness Habits

My coaching method revolves almost entirely around forming habits. Slowly building a solid foundation of baseline habits and building, brick my brick, day by day, on top of that. When you form a strong foundation (for example learning to stop eating before you’re overly stuffed, drinking enough water throughout the day, moving daily), you set yourself up for lifelong fitness success.

These are some of the strategies I use with my clients to form new, powerful, unbreakable fitness habits:

1 – Start Small

Start by doing something that is so simple that you can’t imagine yourself not doing it. Something you can imagine doing every day for ever.

2 – Set SMART Goals

Studies have shown that people who set SMART goals are much more likely to achieve success. 90% more likely, to be exact.

SMART goals are:

• Specific – the who, what, when, where and how are clear and concrete.
• Measureable – you know exactly what defines a win and you can keep track.
• Attainable – this is something you can achieve in your current situation.
• Relevant – your WHY is absolutely clear to you.
• Time Bound – you’ve got a deadline or better yet, a series of progress milestones.

3 – Make it enjoyable

People are much more likely to do something again and again if they find they like doing it. For example, if you like to dance you might find that you have a blast and make friends at Zumba class. But if you have two left feet, that might not be something you gravitate towards liking.

4 – Schedule it as a priority

You make time for doctor’s appointments. You leave work early to go to the dentist. You schedule vacations months if not years in advance. Why? Because you know that these things are important to your overall health and happiness.

If you want to achieve lifelong fitness success, exercising daily, sleeping 8 hours a night and making healthy food choices should be just, if not more, important.

If you want to achieve lifelong fitness success, exercising daily, sleeping 8 hours a night and making healthy food choices should be just, if not more, important.

5 – Habit stack

Attach the new habit you want to form to something you already do. For example:

• do 10 body weight squats every time you brush your teeth
• add a protein to your plate every time you eat
• drink a cup of water every time you brew a pot of coffee

6 – Create a supportive environment

Your environment and habits are intricately linked. Change your environment, and it becomes much easier to change your habits.

You can do this immediately:

• Change the rhythm of your daily routine. Always reach for a snack when your butt hits the couch after dinner? Take a bath then go read a book.
• Update or change the tools you have readily available. Invest in some gym equipment.
• Seek out new communities of people and/or who you interact with regularly.
• Be strategic about what foods you have near you (or far away from you).

7 – Track progress

You should be able to measure whether or not you successfully completed an action. Whether it’s a once a day behavior – such as working out every morning, or something you do multiple times a day – like eating fruit:

• understand what a win is
• keep a tally

8 – Focus on consistency (not perfection)

Any effort – no matter how imperfect – can result in real progress.

You don’t have to jump from zero workouts a week to five to get results. Even one workout is better than none. Every meal doesn’t have to be perfectly on plan for you to reap the nutritional benefits.

Instead of focusing on perfection:

• use consistency to build confidence
• follow the 80/20 rule: staying 80% on plan gives you a bit of wiggle room for indulgences and unplanned days off
• try to do a bit better/healthier/more/less than you did yesterday

Forming healthy habits is a powerful tool that when put to use properly, guarantees that you unlock lifelong fitness success.

Know – deeply – what your WHY is. Keep it simple. Get consistent.

For support and accountability in establishing powerful fitness-related habits, click here. Book a Strategy Session (free) to get started on your journey to lifelong fitness success.