How SMART Fitness Goals Keep You On Track

Exercise increases and maintains health and well-being, but we need to have goals and take action:

Here is an article excerpt:

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SMART = Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Time-bound...

SMART goals are different for everyone. They’re based on personal fitness levels and your own desired outcomes. Often, it helps to look at goals in the short and long term.

“In general, short-term fitness goals should be things you plan to achieve in the next six months or less,” advises Travers. “Anything longer than that is considered a more long-term goal.”

Changing your habits can sometimes be uncomfortable, but it’s worth it in the long run. Having a plan can help get you where you want to be and ease some of that discomfort. Here’s what Travers recommends when it comes to creating them.

Read the full article:

How SMART Fitness Goals Keep You On Track

Setting exercise goals can set you up for success. But not all goals are created equal. Find out how to work out SMARTer.

health.clevelandclinic.org

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Letter to Menoeceus says: "And for this cause we call pleasure the beginning and end of the blessed life. For we recognize pleasure as the first good innate in us, and from pleasure we begin every act of choice and avoidance, and to pleasure we return again, using the feeling as the standard by which we judge every good. And since pleasure is the first good and natural to us, for this very reason we do not choose every pleasure, but sometimes we pass over many pleasures, when greater discomfort accrues to us as the result of them: and similarly we think many pains better than pleasures, since a greater pleasure comes to us when we have endured pains for a long time. Every pleasure then because of its natural kinship to us is good, yet not every pleasure is to be chosen: even as every pain also is an evil, yet not all are always of a nature to be avoided."

Matteng My hunch is that for an Epicurean the "pain" isn't quite as painful compared to the Stoic, since there is an anticipation on the future well-being and pleasure that will result. The Epicurean is sensitive to the body and isn't in competition with anyone else, so maybe takes a little longer to achieve goals, yet does so without causing injury.

Godfrey How is your exercise regime coming along? The above article in post 1 mentions finding other people to help with staying on track (so that is why I am asking, but no need to reply at all if you don't want to). My own regime started well, but then because I haven't built the habit yet, I lost some of my momentum (I'm posting an article on that at the very end of this post)...so I need to set up "habit stacking).

But first here is something with regard to attention, focus, and concentration:

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Focus, attention, and concentration are often used interchangeably but there are differences that help to be aware of if you're looking to improve in any of these areas.

Here’s an example: You've decided to improve your health by going to the gym. That is, you've chosen to focus on your health. Focus is about intention. It's what you're choosing to attend to. It's where decisions are made. You choose something (or some things) to focus on, and exclude others.

Focus can be very high level, like deciding to prioritize your health, but it can also be choosing which body part to focus on on a particular day at the gym.

So this is focus: choosing where to put your attention.

When you get to the gym for the first time, you notice a LOT going on. There's music playing, people everywhere doing all sorts of exercises you've never seen before, and everyone's really fit and attractive. In other words, there's a lot for the senses to take in and it feels overwhelming.

This is where attention comes into play. Attention is the spotlight of the mind. It's what enables your brain to hone in on some stimuli while excluding others. Without attention, we'd be paralyzed due to overstimulation.

So attention is more about the general capability to focus on something. It can be short-term, like watching someone do a specific exercise for a few seconds so you can try it yourself later, or it can be more sustained like when you paid attention to the person giving you the tour of the gym when you arrived.

In truth, you're always paying attention to something at any given moment. Sometimes it's for a second, other times it's for a lot longer. But attention is something we all naturally have.

Attention can be divided into several types, including sustained attention, selective attention, and divided attention. These types reflect how we focus on continuous activities, pick out specific details in a complex environment, or manage multiple tasks simultaneously.

Now you're finally getting set up at the squat rack. You've loaded weights onto the bar and you're about to start your first set. But as you begin the movement, your mind wanders to all the errands you have to do after the gym. In this moment, you've got focus, and you even have attention. But you're lacking something else: concentration.

Concentration is a subset of attention. It refers specifically to the ability to maintain focused attention on a task or activity over a period of time, resisting distractions and maintaining mental effort.

Fortunately, you notice your mind wandering and you're able to pull it back to the task at hand, only to find yourself at the bottom of a squat, unsure what rep you're on. Your attention was divided, not concentrated.

So you bring your attention back to the exercise, now giving it your full concentration. You are now completely present. Your mind isn't thinking about anything else other than what you're doing right now. You no longer hear the music in the background or see people walking around. There's zero distraction. Instead, you feel into your legs shaking and your heart pumping. You sense your facial muscles straining and can hear the grunting sound as you push through your final rep.

If you think back to the different types of attention, concentration falls under the sustained attention type. Concentration is the most concentrated form of attention. It is the foundational skill to learning, to creativity, to communication.

Sure, you can exercise without concentrating, but to get the most value from your time spent doing so, concentration is critical. It means being fully present and fully engaged in where you are and what you've chosen to focus on. And if you've chosen to be there, you'd be doing yourself a disservice by not giving it your full, undivided attention.

Source: Reddit

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I found a good article on building new habits, and here is an excerpt:

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Why Habit Stacking Works Better Than Motivation

Most people try to build new habits through motivation alone — and most people fail. Research published in the European Journal of Social Psychology found that it takes an average of 66 days for a new behavior to become automatic, with some habits taking over 250 days.

Habit stacking works because it solves the three biggest reasons new habits fail:

• The cue problem. Without a clear trigger, you forget to do the new behavior. Habit stacking provides a built-in cue — the habit you already do.
• The decision problem. Every time you have to decide when and where to do something, you create friction. Habit stacking eliminates the decision by embedding timing and location into the formula.
• The willpower problem. Willpower is a limited resource. By linking a new behavior to an automatic one, you reduce the cognitive load required to perform it.

A study in the British Journal of Health Psychology found that people who used implementation intentions (the formal term for "if-then" planning, which includes habit stacking) were 2-3x more likely to follow through on exercise goals compared to those who relied on motivation alone.

Habit Stacking: How to Build New Habits Using Ones You Already Have | Good Life Goals