Don't 'Weight' To Celebrate
As we navigate our way along our health and fitness journey, we need to celebrate the little things rather than waiting until we reach our end goal.
I was sitting on the beach with a friend watching our kids play in the water. She was talking to me about her new diet, and her goal of losing 10 kgs by next summer. She said she couldn’t wait until she reached her goal weight and would be able to go swimming again.
Before I go on, I acknowledge that not everyone is comfortable in swimmers and that is completely understandable. However, my friend really wanted to go swimming but didn’t think she should until she had lost the weight. She had put a part of her life on hold, waiting to achieve her goal, when she should have been focussing on continuing to live her life to the full while working towards her goal.
Our health and fitness goals are varied and far reaching. If you are starting from a base of no exercise at all, simply turning up to training is a great achievement. Others may have the goal of running 5km or running a marathon. Some of us may want to shift 1-2kg, while others may want to lose 30kgs. These goals are all fantastic. However, if we wait until we lose the whole 30kg before we celebrate, we will quickly lose motivation.
No matter what your ultimate goal is, the best way to stay motivated is to celebrate the little milestones along the way. If you’ve struggled to stick with a fitness program and then turned up to training twice in one week - celebrate! If your goal is to improve your strength and just did your first push up on your toes - celebrate! You ran 500m without stopping - celebrate! You didn’t eat chocolate after dinner - celebrate! You got 8 hours of sleep - celebrate! You lost your first 1kg on the road to your 30kg goal - celebrate!
Any activity you do (successfully) will give you happiness, if you allow yourself to acknowledge your victory. By recognising and celebrating our small wins, we feel successful in our endeavours and it gives us a reason to keep going. If we keep pushing towards the bigger goal without ever acknowledging the little wins, we will lose heart and give in.
In her 2018 TED Talk, educator Mehrnaz Bassiri explains how we are losing sight on the small victories: “We’ve started to measure our progress on an oversized scale. By changing our perspective and appreciating human-size, human-scale achievements, we can move toward our goals……. By celebrating small wins, we allow ourselves the pleasure of living.”
Don’t miss out on life while you are working towards a greater weight loss, fitness or health goal. Celebrate every achievement along the way, as it’s all a part of the awesome journey that is life.
By Angie Black
ANGIE BLACK
BLOG CATERGORIES:
