Have clear goals.

Identify and don’t tolerate problems that stand in the way of your achieving your goals.

Accurately diagnose the problems to get at their root causes.

Design plans that will get you around them.

Do what’s necessary to push these designs through to results.

What do you think? No-brainer?

What does having clear goals mean? I have a goal to get six-pack abs, but is that a clear goal? No. It’s a goal without a time box. If it were “I have a goal to get six-pack abs by Dec 31, 2020 6PM”, that would be a clear goal. Having a goal is not enough, what if you have the clear goal in mind but you don’t stop eating cupcakes and drinking soda every day. What if you don’t start doing the right workouts, take the right nutrition. Having clear goals is not going to automatically get you the six-pack abs, so then what else needs to happen?

Identify the problems. Solving problems is not limited to math class. Once you have set a clear goal, identify the problem(s) that stand in the way of achieving the goal. It’s the diet and the workout routines. that are not aligned with the six-pack goal.

Once the problems are identified, understand what exactly is causing these problems. Are you clear on which foods to eat and which to avoid? Are you clear on how much quantity to eat? Are you clear on what nutrition to take? Are you clear on which exercises to do to strengthen the core? Are you clear on how long or how many reps to do? Are you aware of which workouts are not recommended? Diagnose and get to the nitty gritty of the identified problems.

Once the problems are well understood, design a plan to get around them. May be it is the late night craving for an ice cream or skipping the hard workout routine. Design a plan to work around late night snacking. Keep healthy snacks at hand in case the craving kicks in. Avoid buying cakes, ice creams and other sugary snacks. Cut it at the source, once it is in the pantry it is harder to resist. Keep it away from sight, out of sight out mind can help. Skipped a training day, get back on track immediately. Don’t expect six-packs abs by walking 5 miles every day. If you want six-pack abs, you need to follow the recommended routines very strictly.

If you are not seeing the results, go back to Step 1 and rinse and repeat until you get the results. Don’t give up, don’t get distracted, don’t imagine progress, don’t be tempted, keep the focus or give up and go home, it’s better than pretending.