mo·men·tum
/mōˈmentəm/
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Noun
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Momentum is a powerful force! Don’t believe me? Do you watch football in the fall? Do you watch basketball playoffs or March Madness? Sports show us how powerful momentum is to determining outcomes. How can a team who dominates the first half of a game have the tide turn in an instant, on one key play, and from that point on making mistake after mistake? It’s maddening as a player, fan, or coach, to see the momentum shift from your side to the other side. And so much of coaching is designed to seize momentum and keep momentum, knowing that it will determine your success.
I am a former football player, so I understand momentum very well. When momentum is on your side, EVERYTHING seems to go your way. When the momentum shifts against you, you can’t do anything right!
Did you know that momentum also affects YOU in the same way? It affects your relationships, your careers, your school, your nutrition, your workouts, your attitude … EVERYTHING!!
Some of us are more sensitive to momentum than others. My wife can skip a workout and life goes on. She keeps eating healthy that day and picks back up with the workout the next day. Me on the other hand. If I skip my morning workout, I’m a ticking time bomb. I can find it INCREDIBLY difficult to eat healthy that day, and I give in to foods that aren’t in my plan. Why? Because mentally I’ve already messed up the day, so the momentum is against me. I figure today is a lost cause and I’ll just have to wait and try again tomorrow.
I’m a very momentum-oriented person! I’m either moving fast in the right direction or I’m going backwards. I don’t tread water well at all! How about you?
That’s why I hate unplanned cheat meals. It’s like saying to yourself in the third quarter of a football game, “We’re ahead, I think I’ll just throw an interception and enjoy taking a break on the sideline.” Giving up that precious momentum may lead to a loss!
That’s why I think never skipping a scheduled workout is so important. It’s like saying to yourself in the backstretch of a 400 meter sprint, “I’m starting to feel winded. I’ll coast for a while, then make it up at the finish”. No you won’t! You’ll finish last!
I’ve learned that now that I’m at my goal, I can allow for calculated cheat meals, which I know about ahead of time and have factored into my overall plan. It doesn’t feel so much like a blown play to my mind as it does a planned kneel down (to use a football analogy). So it doesn’t crush my momentum. But I still have to be careful that I don’t cave in and go beyond the planned cheat meal to a cheat day, or a cheat weekend, or I could quickly slide down a very slippery slope!
What is the key to momentum? When momentum in a football game radically shifts after a big play, do the players actually get better/worse? Faster/slower? NO! Momentum is IN YOUR HEAD! It’s real, it’s powerful, but it’s in your head! When a basketball player is “in the zone” they often say that the basket seems bigger. It’s not. But when they pull up to shoot that next shot, they KNOW it’s going in! When a basketball player can’t hit a basket to save his life, and he pulls up for that next shot, what is going through his head? Probably “I hope I make this one.” His expectations are different. His confidence is different. He’s not anticipating the success that the guy “in the zone” expects.
Are you riding the wave of momentum with your fitness? I set the tone early with my transformation and gained a ton of momentum with losing body fat, gaining strength, gaining energy and a developing a new outlook on what I was capable of. And I wasn’t going to let ANYTHING seize that momentum from me. No cheat meal! No naysayer would knock me down. No scheduling conflict was going to ruin my momentum or cause me to miss a workout. I rode the wave all the way to an amazing transformation. And I’m still riding it!
And while momentum, both for you and against you, is in your head, you can develop strategies to help you gain the momentum and keep it. Is the nutrition the area you struggle with? Then do the things you need to do in order to get momentum on your side with your nutrition! Have you committed to tracking everything you eat and researching what’s in the stuff you eat? YOU NEED TO! Click here to learn how to ACE your nutrition! It’s like a football player who can’t understand why the team isn’t executing the plays, yet he doesn’t feel like studying his playbook. You’ve got to do the things that give you the best chance to get “Mo” on your side!
Is sticking to the workouts without skipping them your area of struggle? Then do what you need to do in order to seize momentum with your workout schedule! Have you sat down and developed a daily schedule that will prioritize your workout EVERY DAY? YOU NEED TO! If you don’t have open time in the afternoon or evening, have you made the commitment to waking up an hour earlier so that you know you’ll get it done? That’s what I do, every single day. And it’s why I can count on 1 hand the number of workouts I’ve missed in the entire 3 years I’ve been doing this! It’s also why I look the way I do LOL! If you just hope to work it in during the day, don’t expect “Mo” to stick around long!
If you’ve lost the momentum, it’s not too late. If you’ve fallen out of the workout routine, out of the diet, and are paddling against the current, DON’T GIVE UP! Do something extreme! Make that big play to get the momentum back! Write down your commitment to yourself of how you will do it, tell as many people as you can to hold you to it, and go all-in! Plug in with our Facebook groups for accountability and motivation to keep you on track. The momentum is unstoppable with our TR17 Battle Together Challenge. Get in and get “Mo” on your side! And if you are on a roll, don’t get complacent! Do everything you can to keep the momentum going!!
Need a coach?
My email: coachwayne@teamripped.com
IG: @wayne_wyatt
