New Years Resolutions... Make them stick!

So it's that time of the year again, Christmas is over, we're sitting in front of the last few festive movies following the annual New Years Day's walk. There are only two days to go until I am back at work when the inevitable question will arrise, 'what's your 2010 New Years resolution?'

Just like most people I set personal, family and professional New Year's Resolutions but why do some stick and the majority never happen? This is actually a question I continually ask myself throughout the year when I see clients achieve and even surpass their goals, while other clients go through the same system and coaching models but do not even get close to their goals.

So why do some people succeed and others do not?

After working with hundreds of customers over the years i can now tell you within 5 minutes of meeting someone who will achieve their goals and who will not. People that are successful display very similar characteristics in their response to particular questions.

Without going into the ins and outs of a first consultation the one major characteristic successful clients display is a deep routed desire/want to succeed. This sounds incredibly obvious but it is not uncommon for me to come across people that say they want to achieve something but are simply not prepared to make the necessary changes to achieve success.

These are typical questions/responses I hear from successful and non successful client's week in week out:

Me = What do you want?

Successful person = To lose body fat

Non Successful person = To lose body fat

Me = What do you think you need to do/change to achieve this?

Successful person = lifestyle, food, exercise

Non Successful person = Same or just one of these elements

Me = Excellent. This is the lifestyle, food, exercise programme I believe you should follow based on the results of your assessments...

Successful person = Ok. Let's talk about how I can fit this into my life to make it work because I really want this!

Non successful person = Ok. I really want to lose body fat but i still want to drink wine of an evening and cereal from breakfast. I can't possibly eat what you are suggesting for breakfast!

Even though successful people and non successful people have the same goals and normally understand the basics about what they need to do to achieve their goals, when it comes down to the methods they are not prepared to go through a process of change. What non successful people are actually prepared to do and what they want to achieve are two completely separate things!

Is it really that hard to stop eating sugar, grain and refined carbohydrates, and start eating more veg, fruit and lean meat? Come on... It's absolutely pathetic to think that human beings, the most intelligent living beings on this planet are that useless that they can't reframe from eating certain foods like sugar, gluten or dairy. This simple act leads to so much unhappiness and ill health it is not worth it!

When you set a goal like dropping body fat you have to be 100% prepared to make sacrifices and go through a period of pain (in a detox way; headaches, cravings, low energy etc) before you can start achieving the benefits of a lifestyle change.

The bottom line is you have to be 100% committed (90% will not do!) to truly achieve your New Year's Resolutions! You have to live a life in line with the person you want to become.

Change nothing, nothing changes, it is that simple. Make the necessary changes and be prepared to live it through (even when you really don't want to and you have lost interest). Results will come to those that commit and see it through. No one deserves to achieve anything they do not work hard to get and those that achieve success becuase of hard work are respected by everyone and deserve their happiness!

Exercise smart to build a better body

Before beginning my body transformation journey I was a triathlete. Over the years I was lucky enough to compete for Great Britain in New Zealand (World Champ's) and Switzerland (European Champ's). As you can imagine training for triathlon requires a lot of training time and not surprisingly most of this training is spent doing steady state and long interval based training up to 20 hours per week.

What amazed me at the time was, despite training for 15-20 hours per week every week for 3 years, I was never ripped (defined) and retained a high level of body fat. What I didn't know then was that this type of training, coupled with a high carbohydrate diet is a bad strategy to lose body fat and get ripped! As a triathlete I was never below 16% body fat and was as low as 66kg in weight. I was basically a skinny fat man.... Not a good look!

I am now in the best shape of my life and only train 4 times per week for 45-55mins at a time. All my training is spent in the gym lifting weights. However, I do not lift for lifting sake I monitor every workout so much so I could tell you the exact exercise, rest period, target rep range, sets, weight lifted and actual reps I have completed for every workout for the last 12 months. Geeky I know but it worked! I am now 77kg and 11.6% body fat.

If I new what I know now I would have never trained for so long to try and achieve a perfect body! You really do need to train hard but smart to build a better body (male or female), which means lifting weights. Don't worry ladies you will not get big and bulky. If done correctly you will achieve and lean, toned body, which is simply not possible with steady state cardio. FACT!

Eat Like a Caveman

One of the keys to dropping body fat quickly was my discovery of a Palaeolithic eating plan. The concept behind this way of eating is not based on new research (well not in the purest sense), or new fad diets but instead on a way we, as human beings are genetically designed to eat. Even though our foods have changed a lot over the last 10,000 years our genetic make up has not change at all from that of our Palaeolithic ancestors.

I first came across this concept when I studied the methods and ideas of Paul Chek and William Wilcott. Once I Applied these methods I started getting better results with my clients almost instantly. In the pursuit of finding an even better way I have recently moved closer towards the teachings of Charles Poliquin and within the last 6 years I must have read over 1000 academic journals and books. Combined with 6 years of applied practice and gathering my own data since April 2009 I can honestly say that this is most effective way I have come across to improve health and reduce body fat!

Following a Palaeolithic diet (Caveman) is not actually that difficult. You simply eat from the following 5 food groups:

1. Meat (lean)
2. Fish
3. Poultry
4. Fruit and Vegetables
5. Nuts and Seeds

I make sure i eat protein at every meal so never eat carbohydrates on their own and NEVER EVER eat processed food! All carbohydrates I do eat I try to always go for foods under 50GI and those that are packed with antioxidants.

I allow myself a cheat day once per week and by doing so find it very easy to follow these basic principles.

Check out the following video link to help you better understand why it makes sense to eat this way:

http://www.youtube.com/user/born2moveuk#p/a/f/0/uCFZoqmKf5M