Over the years, I've had several fitness objectives. As I'll talk about below in a lot more detail, I've wanted to lose fat, acquire muscle, enhance my bench press, do a lot more pull ups and pushups, run quicker, jump higher, and run farther. The dilemma is that several of these objectives conflict with one another and with my long-term goals.
The key to fitness objective setting would be to develop objectives that are both achievable and reasonable. I prefer to create objectives which could be met in the short-term but that supply some long-term benefit too. Fitness goals need to be difficult enough to motivate you to work hard, but not overly challenging where you'll give up too easily.
For me, objective setting is often complicated because of my competitive nature. This is the reason I've had a lot of distinctive short-term objectives in the past. Sadly, only some of these relate to my long-term objectives of being healthier and looking better. I'm not that worried about being healthy because I think any exercise program has well being rewards. For appearance, my objectives contain six pack abs and defined muscles. Particularly, I'm attempting to maintain a low level of body fat while marginally increasing the size of my chest, shoulders, and biceps. All this without obsessing about diet and exercise.
Lose Fat: it goes with out saying that this will need to be a priority in both the long and short term. On the other hand, in the past, I lost fat at the expense of muscle mass by trying to lose too much fat in too short a time period. Intermittent fasting has helped solve this difficulty.
Gain Muscle: like losing fat, increasing muscle mass meets both of my long-term goals. Like losing fat, I failed at this also because I usually overate in the course of "mass building" phases. Both losing fat and gaining muscle must truly be long term objectives. Make an effort to do either too quickly in the short term and you might wind up stuck in the middle like I did. I think I've lastly located a muscle creating approach that works though.
Enhance Bench Press: "how much do you bench" is most likely one of the most common topics at the gym. For a while, this was all I cared about. I achieved my objective of benching 1.6 times my bodyweight but I didn't look any superior. Flat bench press leads to overdeveloped pecs which I'm still attempting to compensate for by doing upper chest exercises. You will discover some great programs to improve bench press for those who have a legitimate reason, but focusing on your upper chest will result in a far more physically attractive body.
Do More Pull Ups and Pushups: my competitive nature genuinely hurts me here also. I read stories about individuals performing a specific number of pull ups or pushups and wonder why I can't do the very same. The challenge is that from an appearance perspective, there's only so much benefit you receive from really high reps. In addition, the most effective approach to do more pull ups and pushups is to grease the groove and I've struggled with incorporating that program with an every day weightlifting program. Pushups also result in overdeveloped pecs like flat bench press. I should have focused on decline pushups instead.
Run Faster, Jump Higher: upper body has often been my biggest strength but there have been times when I desire to run faster and jump higher. This kind of training actually doesn't conflict with long term objectives as you'll be able to burn a great deal of fat with explosive sprints and jumping. On the other hand, overtraining has been a large concern with some programs I've employed in the past.
Run Farther: every single year I watch the Boston Marathon. Every single year, I feel obligated to train for it. Thankfully I've only gone through the training once, getting up to running 7 miles. While long distance running can burn a lot of calories, I do not like the appearance of most marathoners as muscles tend to shrink with that sort of exertion. It truly is an chance for an once in a lifetime achievement though.
Overall, fitness objective setting has been a challenge because I tend to get sidetracked by my competitive nature. I feel I've finally accepted that I just need to focus on my ultimate goal of developing a much more appealing body.
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