“Don’t confuse effort with results.”
I can’t tell you how many times I have heard that statement from my father while growing up. It always ruffled my feathers a bit, but I understand its premise.
In athletics, just because you played hard doesn’t mean you get the gold medal. In life, just because you nailed your interview doesn’t always mean you get the job. In school, studying hard doesn’t always equate to getting an “A.”
I can go on and on with examples of where it applies, but there is one example where it doesn’t.
When you make the decision, whether big or small, to improve your quality of life, you win.
It is a matter of fact. The day you decide to wake up early and go for a walk to increase your step count — boom, you win.
When you decide to make the jump and hire a personal trainer to hold you accountable for working out — boom, you win.
The day you decide to start watching what you eat — boom, you win.
Again, I can go on and on with examples of what you can do with little amounts of effort that yield great results. The result is that your life improves significantly in terms of how you feel and look.
My friend Mary is 76 years old and coming up on her first anniversary at Heyday. She is one of my favorite clients.
She is tough as nails and has committed herself to being a “gym rat” in her later years. She has a fantastic sense of humor and works out in the gym two hours a week. I can’t begin to tell you how much she has changed in just 96 hours of effort over the last 48 weeks.
Actually, I can.
She has improved her overall strength, the highlight of which is she can now bear crawl over 25 feet — a feat she could not perform a year ago when she could barely surpass four feet before keeling over, exhausted. She can also perform 20 continuous bodyweight lunges without falling over. If you think that’s easy, give it a go.
Mary initially came in with the aspiration of just feeling better. Needless to say, mission accomplished.
Now, with all this being said, all you — yes, you reading this — have to do is make that little decision to improve your quality of life. Remember that it doesn’t have to be big changes — little amounts of effort over long periods of time yield big results.
Stay consistent, phone a friend, or, my personal favorite, join a gym. spt
