Goals Versus Habits

"A goal creates achievement, celebration and good vibes on the day it is ticked off. A well tended habit creates consistent, incremental and exponential success over a lifetime."

- Peter Shallard

http://www.petershallard.com/why-you-should-forget-your-goals/

I have worked with people for many years to figure out their goals, and then work to accomplish those goals. And I have spent decades pursuing my own goals. What I've learned from all my experiences is that habits are far, far more important than goals. And our goals are truly MOST effective, when we use them as motivation to establish consistent HABITS. 

When I set myself a goal to do an Ironman triathlon, the fear of that ambitious goal caused me to get my butt out of bed and train every morning. For four entire years. During those four years, I tracked all my workouts, I totaled all my mileage and training hours and heart rate intervals. Yes, I spent a lot of time exercising/training, but I also spent a lot of additional time PLANNING my exercise, and setting up tools to establish consistent habits. When I crossed the finish line of my first Ironman, it was somewhat anti-climactic, primarily because I felt that I had already accomplished what I set out to do, way before I crossed the finish line. I had become healthy, fit, and strong, during those four years of training. Every morning that I got up out of bed to run or bike was a success for me. The goal almost became an after-thought, because it was the actual habits that had changed my life.

Goals are useful if they lead us to design and implement good habits. But habits are what actually create change in our life. Habits are what actually create and generate the life that we want.

Whenever I coach people, I try to work with them to establish habits that will establish consistent patterns in their life. Some people understand this and embrace this, while other people resist this. Many people understand this concept intellectually, but are not ready to actually commit to new habits. These are what I call FLAKY people. There are a LOT of flaky people in the world - people who like to talk about their goals, but are unwilling to establish good habits.  I'll have another entire post to share soon exploring this flakiness.

I don't want to be a flaky person. And I want to exercise more consistently for the rest of this year. Since I don't have an Ironman goal to motivate me, I need some other motivation and accountability. Therefore, I'm going to commit to post my daily exercise on this blog every day for the next 60 days. I'll post my workout after it is complete and if I miss/skip a workout, I'll post that too. This should keep me accountable to people other than myself. I'll consider this an experiment in public accountability.

My goal is to exercise 6 days a week, with a combination of cardio workouts and CrossFit workouts - at least 3 CrossFit workouts a week. My target will be 6 hours of exercise per week.

Of course I'm starting this commitment today, when I'm "on vacation" at a luxury resort, without any running shoes or exercise clothes. I did get a full body massage, which I'm going to categorize as preparation work, to get ready for more regular training. I heart massages.

So officially: no workout today *** since I don't consider golf to be exercise.

The habit experiment starts today.