Get ready and stay ready

I’ve been thinking lately about how important it is to get yourself into a healthy state and keep yourself there. I often remind our members to “get ready and stay ready”. This phrase emphasizes that we are working on getting to the health and fitness goals that we have set for ourselves, but once we get there, the work doesn’t stop. Once we meet our goal, then we work to stay ready. When we stay ready, we can handle anything life throws at us.  

Get Ready 

Let’s take a few minutes to break down what the “get ready” phase looks like. While we all have different starting points and different levels of potential, “getting ready” means we are working to be the best we can be to serve our families, co-workers, friends, and communities to the best of our abilities. As we know, our physical health impacts our physical, mental, and emotional abilities to be our best selves. So when I say “get ready”, I am implying that we need to put in the work on our training plans and toward the goals we’ve set. 

Getting ready entails getting our body weight, muscle mass, body fat mass, body fat percentage, strength standards, and so forth to the ideal levels that we’ve determined with our coach. If you are training hard and adapting your plan as needed with a coach, at some point you will hit those numbers. Once you are there, then what? Well, I believe that that is when the fun really begins. 

Stay Ready 

So, you hit all of your goals and you may be tempted to say “Ok, that’s it. I did it.” But this is where I challenge you to now focus on staying ready. What are you staying ready for? The answer is anything that life throws at you. It could be a friend asking you to help them move some furniture. It could be your pregnant wife calling you with her minivan stuck in the middle of the road and she needs you to push it 4 blocks to the mechanic in the rain (yes, that just happened to me a few weeks ago). It could be that your grandchild took off running and you need to catch them. It could be that your son or daughter calls you and wants you to join them on a challenging hike in a national park. It could be an athletic competition you’ve always wanted to accomplish like a marathon, triathlon, or pickleball tournament. Whatever it may be for you, I want you to feel empowered, strong, and confident that your body and mind are ready to handle the challenge. This is why we train hard and continue to keep training, even once you accomplish all of the goals you’d initially set out for yourself. Inevitably, life will still continue to throw things your way - whether they’re fun, exciting challenges or unexpected turns. 

Practical Examples

As I was thinking about this concept, I could not help but think of my own life and the crazy season that my wife and I are in with three kids who are two and under. Becoming a parent has made me see firsthand that there are going to be many times throughout life that it won’t be easy to get workouts in. This could be being a young parent like myself, it could be taking care of your parents in their old age, it could be an injury you are recovering from, or many other things. After owning and operating Rise for several years now, I have come to realize that for almost all of us, there will always be something in our lives that can serve as an excuse (oftentimes a valid one!) as to why it’s tough to find time to exercise. 

I realized that I’d spent years and years getting myself ready with fitness and nutrition, and because of this, it’s become really hard to break a good foundation. So now, as I have entered a tougher stage of life regarding my schedule and availability to train, I know I am able to “stay ready” even though I can’t put in as much time in the gym as I used to. If I can strength train 2-3x per week, walk daily, eat clean, and try to get a bike ride in here and there, I know I can still maintain a high level of fitness because I put the work in to build and maintain a strong foundation. Now, trust me when I say that this is easier said than done. Keep an eye out for next week's blog, where I’ll dive into why I ended up hiring a coach to help me stay accountable.

When you maintain a high level of fitness, you will gain confidence that you can accomplish things that are thrown at you. I recently signed up for a triathlon and can go into it confident because of the foundation of fitness I have. I know I can handle biking and running, and now I am able to focus on a weakness of mine which is swimming. When you get ready and stay ready, you can focus your preparation for something like an impromptu triathlon because you aren’t starting from ground zero.

So, keep pushing yourself in the gym to accomplish the goals you have set out. Keep stacking up training session after training session and continue to put the time in every single week. The longer you continue with these healthy habits of training and nutrition, the harder it will be to break them when life inevitably throws you something challenging.

Let’s go get ready and stay ready! 

If you need a hand with getting ready or staying ready, sign up for a free fitness evaluation here and we would love to help.