Category Archives: empowering

Eight

Writer Walter Elliot once wrote, “Perseverance is not a long race. It is many short races one after the other.”

I have said this many times during my personal training and therapy sessions, but I needed to remind myself of this today when I discovered a startling statistic held by my family and I.

Since October we have lived and slept in eight different houses, caravans, apartments and hotels without having a permanent home.

These include a caravan in Filey, a hotel in Manchester, a house in Malton, a house in Leeds, an apartment in Porto, an apartment in Palhais (Portugal), an apartment in Coimbra (Portugal) and an apartment in Sertá (Portugal.)

And with a VISA appointment due later this month that takes two days, we will be staying overnight in Leria. Thanks for that 52%. Hopefully your Sunlit Uplands are going well for you.

To be honest, I’m absolutely sick of traveling and living out of a suitcase. Tomorrow night, for the first time in 5 months, we will be staying in our own home.

Lou and I have been concerned about how the boys will cope but they have, for the most part, been absolutely brilliant. Micro managing this part of parenting has been extremely difficult though. After all, we would not have continued with this journey if the boys had not been fully in agreement with it too.

We, as a family, had to persevere. From caravan to house to apartment and hotel room. Each one a short race of its own. But that’s all each one was. A short race.

So what’s my point?

This is important to remember. You have a goal to reach. But so many goals are abandoned because we see it as a long race. Eventually, a long race can become demoralising, tedious and unobtainable. Simply put, you need to break it down into smaller tasks that can be achieved before moving onto the next task.

In effect, I have used the SMART method of achieving the end goal. I have spoken about the effectiveness of SMART before.

S… Be Specific with numbers and deadlines.

M…Be sure that the goal is Measurable and trackable.

A…make the goal attainable, challenging and possible.

R…be Realistic and honest with yourself.

T…remain Time-Bound and stick to deadlines.

Don’t get me wrong, I’ve questioned every letter of this acronym in the past 14 months. That’s natural. But I have never doubted the process. I am always able to reason with it eventually.

This has never been a long race. It has always been lots of short races that need to be tackled one at a time. Hopefully, that makes me smart.

Remember This Going Into Your New Year…

Wow. Some year huh?!

I hope that this year has been a prosperous one for you. I hope that, whatever you set out to do at the beginning of this year, you have succeeded or are on the right path in reaching it.

But it is important to know that whatever you want to achieve in this coming year, it is done for you. Nobody else.

Sure, you’ll get support from the ones who you can put your trust in. You know the ones. They proved before that they will pick you up when you’re down and go out of their way to help you out.

But then you will come across those who place expectations upon you and sneer at your downfalls or shortcomings. You will never please these people so you don’t even need to concern yourself in trying to. For these people, you just need to limit your time around them. Don’t hate them. Don’t become them.

I came across a quote the other day and it made a lot of sense to me but, forgive me, I’ve tried to find the owner of this quote but I don’t know who it is. Maybe you do? It says…

“No matter how good you are, people will judge you according to their mood and needs.”

Not all people. As I say, you know the ones. But you’ll get a little alarm bell that sounds in your head when you speak to someone who will.

It might be a snigger as you tell them about your fitness goal or a mocking shake of the head as you express yourself about a lost relationship or job opportunity.

You know the face they pull, right? The ‘how did you ever think you could date that person?’ look.

Maybe their needs and mood could be helped by your supportive attention, but it’s not your job. Just make sure that you protect you first of all. You can’t help anybody if you aren’t protecting yourself first of all.

So let’s start thinking about what you want to achieve in 2024. Think big. But remember that some people won’t want you to get there, no matter how good you become at striving for it.

Leaving The Comfort Zone

Since Jonas was five he has played football for Scarborough Athletic. He was only able to train with the under 7’s team as he was too young, but once the new season started, he was able to play official matches.

Now ten, he has a new challenge coming up. Soon he will begin training with his new team, Sertanense, a club based in Sertá, central Portugal, ready for the new season in September.

Both Jonas and his younger brother Finlay will be starting a new school in Portugal in the new year and this is the biggest challenge of all seeing as it will include learning a new language (it is a local school and not an international school). It also means that they’ll not be with us every hour of every day which has been the case for the past few months as we made the permanent move.

Things are happening quickly for them. Lou and I don’t know how they will react on the morning of the 3rd of January when we take them to their new school. So far, when we talk about it, the signs are good. But to them it’s still Christmas. January might seem a distance yet. In reality it is a week today as I write this.

Finlay seems to want to take up a martial art as his extra curricular activity. He plays football, but it seems a bit more forced because he just joins in what Jonas is doing. But he doesn’t seem to have that passion for it. He doesn’t like watching it, whereas Jonas will analyse a period of play and talk about positioning during a game on TV. I’ve had play fights with Finlay. I think Karate or Judo will be a good choice for him. He’ll be a black belt in no time.

I’m trying not to transfer my fears onto the boys. What I mean by that is maybe I’m more scared than they are. They might just walk into school without any issues. Jonas might run onto the training pitch with 20 other kids with no problems. Maybe it’s me who has the nerves.

I hated new beginnings. The start of a new school term and definitely a new school still makes me shudder. And I never really pursued any extra curricular stuff as a kid because it meant meeting new people. I just stayed in the safe zone as much as possible.

But there’s a little bit of our move which is exactly for this purpose. We wanted to take ourselves and our kids out of the safe zone. A couple of years ago I never expected to be speaking Portuguese to a postal worker in a sorting office with no knowledge of English about my missing post. But I did that today. It’s a little achievement, but a massive confidence boost that he actually understood me.

I’ve been driving along cliff edges on an unfamiliar side of the road in rural Portugal. We bought an old farm house that we intend to make into a well being centre and guest house. Individually, each one of us has a zone which becomes out of their comfort. Mine might not seem like much to some people, but I’m enjoying finding my zone and continuing to challenge it.

And that’s the ultimate goal for my kids. That they can feel the discomfort in walking into a new class room, karate group or football pitch, thrive and grow from it and enjoy their achievements. Overcoming new and different experiences can make us more rounded, happier people.

I always told my new clients this whenever they felt like entering the gym became too much for them. Gyms can be an intimidating place. That’s why just stepping into the gym as a new member is the first goal. Not a deadlift or 20 minute treadmill run, but just entering the gym. From then on, with consistency, each visit gets easier to do.

Perhaps you have a new challenge that you want to focus on in the new year? My advice is to take that first step. It might mean leaving your comfort zone, but it’ll feel all the more sweeter when you overcome it.

I’ll keep you informed on mine and my family’s achievements in the coming weeks. Be sure to tell me yours.

The Sea Needs To be Sailed

As I was finishing my workout yesterday I reflected back on what I had achieved during  the session. Using unconventional methods, breeze blocks, trees and bottles filled with sand  I recognized that, despite not having the equipment I was used to, I had a damn good workout. Was it perfect? No. Was it effective? Yes.

Bob Marley, when asked about perfection, said it best. “The moon is not perfect. It is full of craters. The Sea is incredibly beautiful but salty and dark in depth. The sky is always infinite but often cloudy. Not everything that is beautiful has to be perfect.”

The Sea needs to be sailed, swam and viewed to be appreciated and admired. It doesn’t have to be perfect.

Far too often as I watch fitness influencers I see a common theme. They aim to teach us the perfect form and the perfect diet. I also see many of them mock those who have poor gym form and much of their content becomes just a dig at their competitors or some poor random bloke performing lat raises.

Sure, poor form can lead to injuries, so practicing each day is very useful. But condemning those who don’t fall into the ‘gym bunny’ category with the perfect form with the perfect kit is not helpful.

I’m not a fitness influencer, but as a trainer who represents the industry I see my job as encouraging people to give it a go and discover activities that will help their health and fitness goals.

You don’t have to be the perfect runner, have the greatest knowledge or form in the gym, be the best swimmer or be able to walk for miles. You do, though, have to be open to trying out these things that make you move to find out what it is that you actually like to do.

There is no one method to get you healthier, fitter, stronger, faster etc (whatever your goal might be) apart from the method that you enjoy. The perfect routine doesn’t exist. The perfect gym form doesn’t even exist. There’s only a simple set of rules that can keep us safe from injury.

Stop looking for perfection and just find what you enjoy and work with it. It might not be right for the next person as long as it is right for you.

And now, in my moment, I think I’ve found what is right for me.

Here is my ‘gym’ that is working for my mental and physical health at the moment…

A wooden bench, a bar and two breeze blocks
A bar lodged between two branches for pull ups
A rickety old work stool to sit on for seated shoulder press
The weight rack AKA the detergent bottles filled with sand

The Next Right Thing

Navigating our way through life is a complicated one. We do our best. Blimey, we try. But sometimes the anxiety of our past and what is in store for our future can be a constant buzzing around our head.

With it all swirling about, we miss our nearest targets. And they’re the most important ones. In resistance training terms, I use the ‘cycle’ of training programming to reach certain goals. I’ll explain…

We might have an ultimate fitness goal of losing 60 pounds in a year. This is called a macrocycle. Macrocycles are long term goals. Athletes, especially Olympians, can even have a macrocycle target set for 4 years time which is where they are expecting to be at their peak fitness for their main event.

But having this target of losing 60 pounds within a year is not enough. That is why, in the fitness industry, we implement mesocycles. This represents the different phases of training throughout a program and could depend on seasonal adjustments for example. Again, athletes will train for strength or endurance leading up to certain events depending on what is required of them to achieve winning a meet.

But we need to break it down even further. So we use microcycles. If we go back to the 60 pound weight loss in a year goal, a microcycle can be a weekly gym plan with a calorie or nutrition target. It can even be shorter than that. It can be a daily target. Shorter still? Every meal could be calorie controlled and every gym set can be weight and rep monitored.

Very often when I speak to weight loss clients, they have a very clear idea of their macro target (“I want to lose 60 pounds by this time next year”). Their mesocycle targets are usually a little less clear but can be managed (“I want to fit into this *insert item of clothing* by the summer”).

But their microcycle almost becomes none existent. And in 90% of my client base over the past ten years, I have found that it is the microcycle that is the most important bit for them and where the role of the PT has become essential. It has been their next gym visit or daily meal plan.

You see, some people might be able to book their place for next year’s Tough Mudder and break their training time down into cycles. For the rest of us, we need to just do the next right thing.

Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung once received a letter simply asking him ‘how to live’. Jung admitted in his reply that this was an almost impossible question to answer, but he did attempt an explanation. He said…

“If you always do the next thing that needs to be done, you will go most safely and sure footedly along the path prescribed by your subconscious. Then it is naturally no point at all to speculate about how you ought to live. And you know, too, that you cannot know it, but quietly do the next and most necessary thing.”

My interpretation of this is about doing ‘the next right thing’. This could be going for a walk, booking an exercise class, preparing a nutritious meal, calling on a relative you haven’t spoken to for a while or meeting up for a coffee with a friend. The next right thing is YOUR thing, nobody else’s.

I heard the quote ‘doing the next right thing’ on the soap opera Coranation Street the other day. Having studied Jung many years ago I recalled his reply after hearing the quote on TV.

In the soap opera, the character asked her friend how she coped with the tragic death of her young son. Her friend said that she didn’t cope and never will, but each day is just about doing the next right thing.

We all live with some sort of grief, regret, anxiety or doubt. But if you can manage the next right thing in your life then it is a step closer to some sort of comfort. It can, in many cases, lead to not just a strategy of coping, but to enlightenment and happiness.

Think now about your next right step. What are you going to do?

In That Moment

I wonder if any of my readers might know the author of this quote…

“It is better to have done something imperfectly than done nothing flawlessly.”

I like it. And in my attempts to find the author I came across another quote not dissimilar by John Steinbeck…

“And now you don’t have to be perfect, you can be good.”

What is wrong with imperfections? What is wrong with good? Or sometimes even  adequate?

Blimey! If I could leave the gym feeling that I had done an adequate workout for most of my visits then I would have been making excellent progress!

But perfection? Even if I attempted to aim for that then I know that I would be disappointed. Disappointment leaves us demoralised. Being demoralised means that we give up. When we give up, we achieve nothing.

I have begun to embrace my imperfections. Maybe it’s an age thing, I dunno. I aim to do a ‘good’ job at everything I do. I have sometimes got anxious about not getting it spot on and it leaves me feeling rubbish. Inadequate. But when I aim for ‘good’, there’s a weight of responsibility lifted from my shoulders. It’s almost as if I can just begin to enjoy the task in hand rather than pretend to be super human.

I do my best at that moment in time.

And this helps me to understand other people’s efforts too. I used to get frustrated when my son could play a ‘player of the match’ performance one week and the next he didn’t turn up. This, as I now realise, can be for a whole number of reasons. Just like a client in a training session. We will not always achieve a personal best, a player of the match performance, score a worldy or be at our optimum 24/7. We are not robots.

But what I appreciate about my kids, employees, clients and of myself is that we just turn up and give it a go. To do our best in that moment.

Sometimes we feel like crap, right? We’re not always on tip top form. But it would be better to have done something imperfectly than to do nothing flawlessly.

Have a think about that the next time you’ve got a job or a task that you face. Just do it and do your best

In

That

Moment

Xinjiang Highway

The Xinjiang highway fascinates me. Stretching for 6214 miles and winding up and down mountainous cliff sides, it is said to be China’s longest highway. It is quite treacherous too. The weather conditions, high altitude, wild animals, a lack of water, food and fuel for miles and miles can make this road a difficult journey.

But when I see images of this road, it reminds me of something else. It reminds me of your journey towards your goals. And mine of course.

So this is just a quick message to remind you that your path to success will not be linear.

During my training I can get a run of some great days in the gym. I feel strong. I stay an extra half hour to get out a few more sets. I feel good. But some days it feels like I’m travelling up hill and turning back on myself on a dog leg bend.

I’m currently devoting a lot of my time to learning Portuguese. And again, there are times when I’m cruising to being fluent and bilingual. But then come the moments when I can’t even remember how I would greet anyone in Portuguese. I feel like giving up some days, but I have to remind myself of the reasons for doing it. I HAVE to, so I will do it.

It’s important to know that you will suffer the same in whatever goals you want to achieve. And just because the path seems to wind into a different direction, don’t panic. If you have faith in the journey then follow it.

Prepare yourself in the best way possible. Know the distance, fill the tank with fuel, take plenty of water and food, rest often and bring along a mate going the same way if you want and you’ll reach your destination.

The Problem With Motivation

My gym journey, building a new business, being a good husband and father and moving to another country all need a consistent and considered approach.

Whatever the pitfalls each one delivers (and they do) if I live by the rule of consistency then I will eventually find a conclusion that works for me. It might not always be the best or most perfect outcome. I’m a realist. But it will, at least, enable me to move forward and continue my plans to reach that elusive ‘perfection’.

What helps me keep consistent is two main factors. The first is the question ‘Why?’

Why do I do what I do? Why bother with the gym every day? Why put the effort into my relationship with my wife and children? Why start up a new business? Why move to a different country?

The truth is that I would be immensely unhappy if I didn’t.

Some days I really don’t fancy going to the gym, but I enjoy the endorphins and the way it makes me look.

Some days my kids are driving me mad! But if I shout and lose my temper then I am teaching them that being kind and patient does not work.

And some days I really don’t want to deal with solicitors, VISA applications or business plans. But if I don’t do it then the move to Portugal can’t happen and therefore the new business can’t happen. I’ll be back in a commercial gym faster than you can say ‘500 quid a month rent’.

I don’t want the alternative, so I have to be consistent in how I get things done. Having a few days off is not on the table. And this leads me on to factor number 2.

These actions are non-negotiable. I cannot let the consistency slip. Now, I’m not talking about missing the gym for an emergency, bickering with my wife or watching Coranation Street instead of working on my business plan. I’m talking about serious procrastination that begins to turn itself into a lifestyle.

In a year’s time I don’t want to be overweight and miserable. I don’t want to be snappy with my kids and push my wife away. I don’t want to  still be in the UK paying double on my mortgage and losing my freedom of movement just to rub salt in the wounds.

Consistently doing these activities gets me to where I want to be, so they are non-negotiable. I have to do them.

So I must address the one major problem I hear from people when they talk about changing their habits or lifestyle and working towards a goal. They tell me that they’re not motivated enough.

The problem with motivation is that it is a fleeting emotion. When it arrives it is fantastic. You’ll book the gym classes, write out a shopping list consisting of lots of fruit and veg, you’ll start to look at other job opportunities. Ones that will make you happy. You’ll call your friend or family member who you’ve been meaning to make contact with again. That’s what motivation can give you.

But what about when it isn’t there? If you haven’t answered your ‘why?’ and created a set of non-negotiables then you won’t get any closer to your happiness. You have to keep waiting for that glimmer of motivation that comes around now and again.

It is those cold, dark mornings when you get to the gym when you really don’t feel like it that edges you closer to a goal. It’s working through an online open university course on an evening when your friends have gone out for a few drinks that gets you out of your mundane work life rut. Motivation, on its own, won’t do that.

Take a moment to write down five things that you would like to achieve in the next 12 months. Next to each one, write the question ‘why?’ Honestly answer it. Dig deep and give your most honest answer, however hard it is to read it.

Then implement one thing that you will do to work towards each goal. It doesn’t have to be life changing, but whatever it is must become your consistent non-negotiable. You must do it when you say that you will.

From now until your 12 month goal you will sometimes find yourself without motivation, even demoralised. But keep your consistent approach.

Motivation is like a wind up toy. It’ll give you one big burst of energy or inspiration but eventually it stops. Consistency, albeit not a term that is as sexy or flashy, is the key to unlocking your future goals.

Shay is a Personal Trainer, CBT therapist, meditation guide and lifestyle blogger.

Quote Of The Week

Hello my friends.

Today I have just a short message of inspiration for you to think about and it comes from author Napolian Hill. He wrote…

“Whatever the mind can conceive and believe, it can achieve.”

Now, it is important to remember that this is about what the mind can conceive and believe, therefore it refers to realistic outcomes. Within the fitness industry the acronym SMART is used. Which stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time. But actually, this can be used in any life goal.

I want to play for Liverpool FC but no matter how much I think about it I doubt Herr Klopp will be calling me up. So creating realistic, time bound goals is extremely important.

The other day I wrote an article about doubt and how this behaviour can cripple our future goals. We put far too many blockers in the way of our own journey instead of actually believing in ourselves.

There is a universal principle that states you will attract into your life whatever you focus on. It is something that I touch on regularly in my meditation guides. The impact over the course of a few sessions is very encouraging, enabling those who attend to realign their thoughts into a much more structured, positive outlook.

So conceive it, believe it, plan it and act on it.

Let’s see what you can achieve!

Spirit Guide

Episode 5 on my podcast channel is now available to listen to called Spirit Guide.

Whether you are spiritual or not, the power of energy can always help you in finding solutions to your future plans.

Check out my podcast, NGU Guided Meditation , on Spotify for Podcasters: https://anchor.fm/shay-durant-duckworth