In a recent chat with Ciana Glynn, Holistic Wellness Coach, Personal Trainer, and Founder of The Wellness Primer, she shared her invaluable insights for crafting effective fitness goals for the upcoming year.
Glynn offered her expert advice on initiating your fitness journey, outlining the process of goal setting, and emphasising the significance of establishing realistic objectives.
Read on to discover what she suggested to me for navigating the path to a healthier and fitter you in 2024.
- Where do you start when it comes to fitness goal setting?
There is a lot of noise in the fitness and wellness industry, so it can be overwhelming to know where to even start.
Firstly, I would recommend taking some time to yourself and actually thinking about what it is you truly want.
What do you want to accomplish with your health? How do you want to look and feel? Is there anything in particular that has been on your mind lately that you want to do but just haven’t yet? Next, write it all down.
There are many different goal-setting techniques to try, one of the most common ones is called SMART.
S be clear and specific on goal
M make it measurable with numbers
A be accurate as possible
R be realistic in specifics
T make a timeframe
Lastly, I would recommend using the right resources to help you along the way. Whether that is a pen and pad of paper to write out your progress + check in with yourself regularly, using a fitness or wellness app tailored to your desired goals or more personable working directly with trained fitness professionals to help you further reach your goal(s).
Using added resources will be a sure way to help you get off to a flying start on your wellness journey!
- Do you have any tips for setting fitness goals?
Write out your goals everyday. Did you know, by setting goals and writing them down, you are statistically 80% more likely to achieve that goal than by not writing it down at all.
Make a list of goals you want to achieve and write down everything. Writing out your goals is an important part of goal setting, and gets your subconscious mind to work!
Get specific with your goals. For example, if you want to lose weight, how much weight do you want to lose and by what deadline?
Being specific gives your mind more clarity on the outcome and provides structure to your goals.
Make your why strong enough. Sometimes we may want to achieve a goal but our motivation is not that strong to follow through.
Prioritise what exactly you want to accomplish and make your why strong enough. On the days you may want to give up, remember your why.
This will help you to keep striving forward towards your end goal.
Visualize what you want. Visualising what you want goes a long way in goal setting. Envision yourself already accomplishing this goal and how you will feel when you do.
Don’t be afraid to ask for support from a reliable person who can check in to ensure you’re working on your outcome. It could be a spouse, friend, family member or trained coach.
Someone who can be that accountability buddy you need for added support.
Consistency and self-discipline are key – keep going!
- Why is it important to set goals?
We all have areas of our health we want to improve so setting goals and following through can help us become one step closer to reaching the potential we desire.
Setting goals is all part of the process. If you don’t set goals, how do you know where you’re going? Having no goals in mind is kind of like driving around in your car with no final destination.
Studies show that people who set goals are more successful in accomplishments than those that don’t.
Whatever it is you want to achieve in life, you need to set goals in order to do so. Goals can provide focus, allow you to measure progress (a big element in fitness), help you feel a sense of accomplishment when you achieve your outcome and boost your self-confidence.
Whether it’s health, fitness or life goals in general, big or small, think about what goals you want to achieve, write them down and take action.
- Why is it important to set realistic fitness goals?
Setting fitness goals can be hard at the start, however, once you write out exactly what you want and be specific, you can realistically work out a plan to get there. “Every baby step leads to big results”.
Setting realistic fitness goals is important at the start so that you can build yourself slowly. If you set unrealistic goals from the offset, it may not be sustainable long term and you will end up feeling disheartened towards your current progress and struggle to maintain consistency.
An important point I like to tell my clients is to always lead with self-care and don’t beat yourself up if you are slow to see the results you’re after. Stick with it and stay consistent with your training, diet and sleep. The results will come!
- What is an example of a fitness goal?
Your goal could be simply to move a little more and get 5-10k steps in every day. Everyone’s fitness goals are unique to their desired outcome.
Your fitness goal could be for example – to lose weight, so you might set a goal to lose 1lb a week every week for the next x amount of months, or perhaps you want to build more muscle and get stronger, or get those abs of your dreams, No matter how far you get with your goals, remember that progress = happiness. So just keep moving forward.
Decide to take massive action, get excited and try to enjoy the process along the way!