(Part 3) How Training Can Change Your Life
Time to train! The real life approach to doing.
This is Part 3 on how training can change your life. If you haven’t read Part 1 and Part 2 first, I strongly recommend them to help you nail down a solid plan before reading this one.
Time to Start Doing - Follow Your Plan and Collect Useful Feedback
It’s important to realize that the “Do” in the Do + Collect Feedback step of the training cycle is the most important aspect of whether you make progress or not (this is why the “Do” is a gold color on the Training Cycle Visual).
Along with that reality, without this Do + Collect Feedback step both the Planning and Reflecting Steps break down to offer you no meaningful use of your time.
Two sides of the same coin:
You won’t know how effective your plan is without giving it an honest try
You won’t have meaningful metrics to reflect on if you don’t follow the plan
Try not to switch programs before you have completed what you’ve planned (aka program hopping) and follow your program to the best of your ability.
Over time, both the Plan and Reflect steps are used to make your Do + Collect Feedback step more likely to produce better results with less wasted time.
So with all that being said, it’s time to take off your performance coach hat and put on your trainee one. It’s time to train!
It can be tough, but it's crucial to stop planning and direct your energy and focus on following through with what you’ve planned to the best of your ability.
In this step there are 2 key components:
Do = show up and follow your plan to the best of your ability
Collect Feedback = record any metrics that are useful to help you gauge effort and progress
The rest of today we will dive into what it looks like to execute the Do portion of the Do + Collect Feedback.
Real World Doing - Mindset
Before we get into the what ifs, let's establish that there is a mindset needed to follow your training plan regardless of how easy you feel it will be to follow.
Hopefully you have established a plan that is indeed very realistic for you to start following right now. You will then still have to prioritize these sessions high enough that they are not optional in your mind.
If it’s important enough to you, it will get done. If you classify your training in your mind as a luxury, chore, or anything that’s optional you put yourself at a huge disadvantage to successfully establishing it, and the results from it, as a part of your lifestyle.
Your priorities will have the biggest effect on what you actually do.
If you want to gut check yourself on this, look back on what you spent your time doing each day of the week and look back on what you have spent money on or invested into over the past month (or year).
How we spend our time and money (or not spending money) closely represent what we are prioritizing.
I have no desire to tell you what you should prioritize, I only wish for you to be aware of what you are prioritizing so then you can decide if you’re happy with how those priorities align with your values and desires.
Once your training is a high enough priority and you are making a true effort to consistently show up for your training sessions, you can then gauge if your training plan is a good fit for your schedule and effective for you right now.
If you over-shot and you have to regularly miss sessions on your current plan, you will know you need to reduce the amount of days or time required in your planning phase for the next training cycle.
Real World Doing - Effort
Now assuming your training is a high enough priority, giving and honest effort is the next important aspect of successfully doing.
Giving an honest effort means you give what you have that day and ideally in accordance with what your training plan is asking you to do.
In Part 2, I described my effort approach to my weekly training schedule
“I approach the speed day with high effort and 1-2 of the full body sessions with high effort (depending on life and recovery that week).
I then approach 1-2 of the full body sessions with a feel good mentality and I use the 2 endurance/mobility sessions as active recovery days.”
This above is my effort plan baked into my training plan. It’s highly personal - based on what I have observed that my body can regularly handle, providing me with needed recovery and being able to give hard, progressive efforts throughout most weeks.
I like to classify effort into 3 categories:
High Effort = Pushing yourself to give a maximal or near-maximal effort with the goal of improving on your output compared to last time (only if you can do so without pain or technique breakdown).
Feel Good Effort = Still a tough effort, but not near maximal output and doesn’t leave you feeling physically/mentally drained after completing. You should feel good about the session and still have plenty of energy left to take on the rest of your day.
Active Recovery Effort = Maintain a relaxed state of mind and give an easy to moderate effort through less stressful movements. Ideally, you will feel noticeably better after the session having contributed to your physical and mental recovery through healthy movement.
Keep in mind:
You don’t improve from the hard work you put into your training sessions. You improve as you recover from the hard work you put into your training sessions.
So it’s helpful to have some idea of your effort plan to manage your expected effort throughout the week. This helps how you mentally approach walking into sessions.
When done right: you will feel excited to get after it on high effort days, look forward to working through your feel good effort days, and relieved to escape into your active recovery effort days.
Focus those high level efforts on the main things you're trying to improve. Even on a high effort day you may not approach all the movements with this mindset. After warming up, the primary movements you want to improve are best to work on with a high effort while you’re fresh.
Ultimately how you approach a high level effort day depends on your energy capacity, goals, and how your plan’s training splits are structured.
If you’re just trying to improve your health and physical longevity, showing up consistently to complete your sessions with a mix of feel good effort and active recovery effort will be enough to get the value you want from your training.
Real World Doing - Adaptability
My effort plan works great for me when I have a normal week. However, there are real life variables that come into play when I have an overly stressful week of work objectives, my daughter gets sick, I get sick, I don’t get good sleep, events out of the normal routine pop up, or anything else (good or bad) that diverts my time and energy.
This may turn my planned high effort day into a feel good day or active recovery day in order to help me manage the overall stress load of that week.
The other half of giving an honest effort is you give what you have that day.
If what you have to give that day isn’t up to par with what your effort plan is asking for, it doesn't mean it's not worth doing still. Deciding to still show up and do what you can will help you build a self-identity of someone who follows through on what they say they’ll do (a super valuable identity for training and life).
If you truly don’t have the time or energy that day then go ahead and skip it or prioritize more sleep that will serve you better in place of your session. The key word is truly: and more times than not, if you’re honest with yourself, you will have some amount of time or energy to show up and do something.
This is a mindset that allows you the resiliency needed in real life to consistently work toward the progress you desire. It’s part determination and part self-compassion. When you exercise your self-compassion you follow it up with determination to get back on track as soon as possible.
There’s a quote I really like from author James Clear’s weekly newsletter. I think it’s a great concept for trying to be your best while living a full life.
“In theory, consistency is about being disciplined, determined, and unwavering.
In practice, consistency is about being adaptable.
Don’t have much time? Scale it down.
Don’t have much energy? Do the easy version.
Find different ways to show up depending on the circumstances. Let your habits change shape to meet the demands of your day. Adaptability is the way of consistency.”
The only further idea I would add to this great quote is to challenge you to be disciplined, determined, and unwavering until you can’t be…then be adaptable.
When to be adaptable:
We’re coming back briefly to priorities.
You are not wrong, or bad, or less of an excellent person if your training isn’t one of the top 5 priorities of your life. Most likely it’s not and it shouldn’t be.
In a “real life” you probably prioritize some or all of these things above training (among others):
supporting and spending quality time with your family
showing up for your job and putting in the work (ideally with passion and ambition) to support yourself and others financially
managing your home upkeep and seemingly endless chores
spending time on hobbies that make life a little more worth living
spending time enjoying your sport or active interests
spending time trying to improve your sport
spending quality time with friends you enjoy being around
dedicating time to grocery shop, making meals, and eating
showing up for friends or family who need you in certain seasons of life
Understandably, you cannot always predict how your day or week will go. Certain higher priorities may take up more time than usual and this has a downward squeezing effect on the time and energy you have for lower priorities.
While I hope training is on your priority list because of its amazing power to improve your health and add to your effectiveness of your higher priorities, I concede that when those higher priorities require more of your time and energy it’s then time to be adaptable.
When you experience certain seasons of life that require you to be frequently adaptable, you’ll want to make sure you also scale your expectations of training results appropriately. Keep doing what you can, enjoy feeling good from soaking up the benefits of deliberate movement, and enjoy any unexpected progress you may still make.
By breaking down Doing into these 3 progressive components and clarifying what that really looks like in your life, you greatly tip the scales in your favor that you will actually follow through on your plan to the best of your ability.
Running the 3 progressive steps of doing through your life filter:
Mindset - Is this a high enough priority in my life? Why is this important to me?
Effort - What kind of effort can I expect to give throughout the week to serve my goals while managing my recovery and energy for everything else?
Adaptability - When higher priorities squeeze my time and energy, how will I adapt to do what I can and then get back on track as soon as possible?
Wrapping up today I want to lay out the action steps as they continue to unfold:
PLAN
Identify meaningful activities, experiences, or specific abilities that your physical training can impact for the better.
Come up with 3-10 KPIs that you can track and reflect on to gauge relevant progress.
Find or build a Training Plan that aligns with your KPIs and you feel confident you can follow right now.
Clarify your Plan of Action so you know what days, times, and location(s) you will follow your training plan. Boost the effectiveness of this plan by answering:
How can I make it as easy and fast as possible to regularly get started working through my training plan?
Is there anything I can add to my training sessions to make them more enjoyable?
DO + COLLECT FEEDBACK
Stop planning and show up to follow your plan to the best of your ability.
Consider how your mindset, effort, and adaptability are impacting your ability to Do. Run them through your life filter when useful.
Next week we’ll complete this Do + Collect Feedback step by clarifying what useful feedback is and how we can go about it as painlessly as possible.
Thanks for reading!
Brian