Every year on January 1st, gyms around the world see a massive influx of visitors as people flow in to try to finally stick to their New Year’s Resolution of getting fit. It’s the most popular New Year’s Resolution by far. But as January continues, and as the year develops into February and March, the visitors start to decrease little by little as the initial motivation from the New Year starts to wear off.
Whether you’re trying to gain muscle or lose weight, crafting a new body takes a fair amount of time and dedication, and for those who’ve never experienced fitness before, it can be discouraging to put in hours of hard work at the gym and not see results as fast as you want to. However, if you have a little patience and stick to the plan, your hard work will pay off in the long run and before you know it you’ll be looking in the mirror at a brand new body.
In this article, we’re going to give you some tips on how to stick to your New Year’s Resolution of getting fit so that you can finally say you stuck to your goals and built the body you’ve always wanted.
Tips to Stick To Your New Year’s Resolution of Getting Fit
1. Create A Workout Routine
Have you ever heard of the quote, “Failing to plan is planning to fail.”? One of the biggest issues with fitness goals for the New Year is that there is no true planning involved. People workout at random times throughout the day and just hit the same old exercises over and over again, hoping that one day they’ll wake up to a huge set of biceps or a toned stomach. Would you set off on a trip to drive 6 hours away to a location you’ve never been without mapping your way beforehand? Probably not!
Creating a routine will help map your route to a healthier body. First, pick which days of the week you want to workout, and also pick a time of day. Planning dates and times are the most crucial aspect of your routine, because then you’ll know in your head, “Okay, every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, I’ve got my workout at 6:00.” Instead of trying to fit your workouts around your daily activities, you’ll start to fit your daily activities around your workouts.
Next is to plan your actual workouts. Whether you’re going to the gym or working out at home, this is the fun part because you have complete control over the type of workouts you do. You can split workouts up by body parts (for example: upper body and lower body), you can split workouts up by muscle group (for example: chest, back, arms, legs), or you can create some other type of unique program too. The important part is that you know what you’re going to do when it comes to workout time. The last thing you want is to get to your scheduled workout on Monday at 6:00 and not know what you’re going to do.
2. Improve Your Diet
Eating healthy will have an immense impact on how fast you see your physical results from working out. You can put in as many hours at the gym as you want, but if you’re still stuffing down bad calories then your body is going to be extremely reluctant to reveal that six packs you want. According to Shawn M. Talbott, PhD, a general rule of thumb is that physical fitness is typically 75% diet and 25% exercise, meaning diet plays a much bigger role than workouts do in your body’s overall transformation from flab to fit.
Take the time to learn about foods that will help you reach your goals. If your goal is to build muscle, you’ll want to start eating more protein-packed foods and focus on lowering your intake of fat and carbs. If your goal is weight loss, the same foods are vital, but you would also want to learn about calorie deficits to ensure you’re not taking in more calories than you’re burning (thus preventing your body from losing weight).
Remember how we just mentioned above that creating a workout routine is crucial to your success? To take that a step further, you can also learn about meal prepping and macros. Meal prepping is where you plan your meals for each day, with each meal containing a certain calculated number of nutrients (macros). This is typically a practice for the more advanced fitness enthusiasts, but if you take the time to learn about this method, you can develop a routine that covers all aspects of fitness (workouts AND meals) and maps a surefire way for you to succeed in your New Year’s Resolution.
3. Be Patient and Stay Committed
Creating a routine and improving your diet are your two biggest keys to reaching your goals physically, but this last tip is to help you stick to your goals mentally. Building a new body is not something that happens overnight. It’s not something that happens in a week, or even in a month. Although this tip comes the last, this is where most people often fail.
Know now that it will take time until you look in the mirror and notice any visible changes in your body. Remember, you are invested in this for the long-term, not the short-term. While you might not see the changes right away, you have to be patient and trust that your workouts and diet are doing their job and slowly transforming your body from within. As long as you stay committed to tough workouts and clean meals, you will begin to see your hard work pay off before you know it.
Wrapping It Up
Committing to healthier lifestyle is an amazing goal to have, especially at the New Year when everyone is starting completely fresh. The pure thought alone of the new body you’re about to have should be lighting a fire inside you to attack your goals with everything you’ve got. With that said, it’s important to remember that this is a goal that will take time and careful preparation in order to succeed. Nail down a proper routine, make sure your meals are done right, and stay committed for the long term. In the blink of an eye, you’ll be piecing two pictures together in amazement at how much different you look then and now.
