Don’t Let Summer Slow You Down
If you treat June like it's Friday afternoon, then you can’t be surprised when September feels like Monday morning.
Summer can be an especially difficult time of year to stick with your fitness plan. Kids are home from school, time gets filled with vacations and activities, life picks up and gets in the way.
Giving up now is going to make it far more difficult to pick back up come fall. Not only will you miss out on weeks of potential progress, but it’s also possible to regress from where you are right now. Instead of losing 5 or so pounds, you might put on 5-10 lbs. That can be a 10-15+ lbs swing in just a month or two!
Think about it this way:
Basically every night, my wife & I do the dishes before we go to bed. We really don’t want to. We’d prefer to go to bed (especially after the never-ending negotiation that is bedtime with three toddlers), but we do it because it makes the morning so much smoother.
Because, on the rare occasion when we decide to leave them for the morning, I come downstairs, see the pile in the sink, and get pissed (like I did on Monday morning - dang it, past Jeff). It starts my day off on a crappy note and the rest of the day I’m playing Tetris with dirty dishes and wishing I could slap my past self through the time-space continuum.
If you have fitness goals, waiting until September is only going to make things harder. It takes time to build habits and, even if you don’t get crazy results over the summer, imperfect action is better than inaction.
And you’ll be set up way better come the fall. You’ll be more comfortable in the gym for when it gets really busy, you’ll have an idea of what changes you need to make to your nutrition, and you’ll be motivated because be proud of yourself for not falling into the same trap as every other year.
When we walk into work on Monday morning and everything is all set and ready to go, we almost always have a great week. When we mail it in on Friday afternoon, we spend the whole week playing catch up, it feels way harder than it needs to be, and we curse our past selves.
The key to sticking with a fitness & nutrition routine is simple: make success easy. The success of your fall fitness goals is decided in June. Want to actually stick with your routine this school year? Start now.
It’s a game-changer to be able to say “yes” to rolling around on the floor, chasing them around, or throwing them around in the pool without needing a break.
Believe me. I did this with my son Levi for hours as he said “again daddy, again daddy”. The joy my kids get from these simple moments of attention is something I never want to take for granted. (p.s. If you want to see the full video it’s pretty cute. Just click this link)
I don’t know about you, but I want to be the dad who shows up as the best version of myself. I’m not always the dad I want to be, and there are times and even full days when I fail hard. But I’m giving it my best shot.
If I don’t have the emotional bandwidth, that’s one thing. But I won’t let being physically tired or incapable be the reason I don’t do something with them.
My client Jeff is doing the same thing. Before working together he had no energy, would fall asleep on the couch at 8 PM, and needed several medications to keep his diabetes under control. Now, he send me messages and photos like this while he’s on vacation with his kids and parents:
“HOLY SHIT, my energy levels with the kids are SO much better. I really have become more dependable. Thank you for everything Jeff.”
He’s also lost 15 lbs and, even cooler, has been able to stop taking some of his diabetes medications as a result.
“If you are looking for a fitness, nutrition, and lifestyle program that can be done from anywhere, reach out to Jeff. I just wanted to share my great experience for others to take advantage of this life-changing program.”
It’s time. You deserve this and you can do it.
I’m here when you’re ready.
If you’re feeling the summer slow down and need some help figuring how to rebuild your momentum, I recorded a whole podcast episode on building positive momentum.
