this week there has been a bit of a vibe around the ideas of finding your motivation, making a start and tackling things one step at a time. i deliberately leave this opening line “vague” as it really does apply to anything you can think of.
that said, based on my own experiences, there is a lot to be said for focusing on your health and fitness first. even if you think you are a prime specimen at the moment, i’m sure there is room for improvement.
i say that health/fitness is a good starting point, because of the impacts i’ve seen in my own life. genuinely transformative and in many ways completely amazing and unthinkable just a couple of years ago.
back then i was a mess, and not just physically
try to picture, if you will, a body that was the result of many many years of heavy drinking, heavy smoking, eating all the wrong food (and in overly generous quantities to boot). certainly not a pretty sight, and definitely destined for a bypass procedure or two in the relatively near future.
but internally things were a mess too. i hated things like planning and goal-setting. years and decades of “failure” had taught me to mostly forget about ambitions and dreams.
life, it seemed, was composed of disappointment, struggle, working-hard-to-no-avail. themes that will all-too-familiar to many many people.
and those things really do kill you inside. they were killing me.
then something of miracle happened
the light bulb went on. the decision was made. i set out to fix my health and fitness issues.
that was it, that was the sole intent. get fitter. healthier. avoid heart attack.
simple plan really!
the chosen method (to become fit enough to run a marathon) was a little bit crazy. ok, a LOT crazy, but the plan was essentially simple.
there was no other agenda.
which makes what actually happened even more delicious
somewhere along the line, things happened.
switches were flicked, neural connections re-engineered.
a positive mindset started to form.
i realised that i could set out to do things, and actually do them.
planning became something “good” rather than something to ridicule.
goals became tangible artefacts that helped drive me onwards.
i got total clarity on what i wanted from life, and a clear vision of how i was going to achieve it.
it all came from getting fit and creating a healthier lifestyle
the energy needed to change other things
the positive mindset needed to start believing in goals and ambitions
the feeling of self-worth that you need in order to believe in yourself
all these things, and much much more, became available to me through working on becoming fitter and healthier.
which is why i believe that no matter what you are striving for in life, no matter what your current struggles, obstacles and barriers are, a solid foundation of health and fitness WILL provide the ideal starting point.
it will enable you to develop confidence, a positive mindset and an awareness of self that you have perhaps never had before.
and all these things will come together, and allow you to finally build the amazing life that you’ve always sought.
image courtesy of Micah_68