No matter what you’re trying to achieve, the outcome is seldom good when the first step is missed or skipped.
Every year millions set out to lose weight and build a body that looks and feels better, and makes them happier about themselves and their lives.
Unfortunately, most fail to achieve their goals, and few of those that manage a degree of success maintain what they have achieved. Not only that, but most have tried and failed more than once before.
With such a low success rate, you would think losing bodyfat and getting in shape must be extremely difficult, but it is not. For most, it does not require extreme measures or a superhuman effort.
In fact, from a technical standpoint achieving a level of leanness and fitness that would make most people happy is simple. I know this, because I have helped many with little or no athletic background or nutritional knowledge to pull it off.
Don’t get me wrong. It does take some hard work, dedication, and consistency to change your body significantly. It also takes a certain amount of ongoing effort to maintain it.
I’m simply saying that the reason most people fail isn’t that it’s too hard for them. In most cases, they fail because they skip a critical step in the process and that leaves them unprepared to do what is necessary.
In a nutshell, that step involves understanding and accepting that the way your body looks, feels, and performs right now is a result of the lifestyle choices you’ve made.
In other words, if you’re not as lean, strong and fit as you’d like to be, its because you’ve chosen to live a lifestyle that doesn’t permit it. You are not overweight and out of shape because of bad luck, bad circumstances, or anything anyone else has done.
You and you alone are responsible for the condition your body is in right now. Even if the decline towards your current state began following an illness or injury that made it harder to stay lean and fit. You chose not to adjust your lifestyle and do what was necessary to restore your body once your health permitted.
Before you waste time and energy getting angry at what I just said though, humor me and think about what it really means for a moment.
If you are solely responsible for the body you have today, and that body is a result of your lifestyle choices, it also means that you are the master of your own body and have the power to change it. All you must do is learn to make different choices. Furthermore, nobody can stop you from doing it.
Simply put, lean fit people are that way because they have chosen to live in a way that supports that kind of body. If you want to have the body, you must to a certain extent live the lifestyle. Until you can understand and accept that, it will not matter what else you do. You simply won’t be able to build the body you want or maintain it for very long if you do.
If building and maintaining a lean fit body is important to you, the first step to achieving it is taking responsibility for the consequences of your choices, and for learning to make different choices that will have consequences more to your liking from this point forward.
If you are ready to do that, then you are also ready for the success that will follow. Whether you are knowledgeable enough to do the rest on your own or need to seek help is another matter, but do not skip this important first step.
