Is The Continual Pursuit Of A Great Workout And Calorie Perfection The Reason You’re Not Making Progress?

Each time you hit the gym, you want to have a great workout.

A logical thought process. After all, what’s the point of going if your mindset is to mindlessly go through the motions?

But is a constant pursuit of greatness, setting the bar to an unrealistic level?

You might feel that aiming for anything less than great workouts and calorie perfection is a sign of failure. But chasing day-to-day greatness could be holding you back from achieving your goals.

Is A Great Workout An Unrealistic Expectation?

“Consistent Greatness Sounds Good On Social Media, But Is It Realistic?”

In his book, ‘Good To Great’, Jim Collins said “good is the enemy of great.”

You might have seen the quote flash up on your social media feed or in a motivational YouTube video.

You’re told to strive for greatness. And that aiming for good, drifts into “good enough”. Ultimately, resulting in you selling yourself short.

Instead, you need shoot for the stars and put the chips all the way in. Anything less is waving the white flag of mediocrity.

In the context of your fitness goals, this means every workout NEEDS to be a great workout. A balls to the wall smash-fest of epic proportions. Go big or go home!

Time for a reality check.

Go big or go home? Most of the time you feel like going home, right? After a full day in the office, the prospect of going balls (or ovaries) deep in the Iron Paradise doesn’t quite fill you with the excitement and fervour the quote intended.

Sure, the idea of striving for greatness is a sound one. After all, you’re unlikely to achieve great things without pushing yourself. But ALL the time? Every day?

Pull your head out of the motivational clouds and back down to reality for a second. Can you realistically commit every ounce of your being to EVERYTHING you do, day-in-day-out?

I don’t know about you, but most days just rolling out of bed is an achievement.

So, setting the expectation you’ll have a great workout every time you step on the gym floor is likely to result in you thinking, “FUCK IT”, more often than you realise. And if you have the seed planted in your head that anything short of a great workout is pointless, then the call of the sofa and a bottle of wine will win out all too frequently.

Replacing Great Workouts With “Good Enough” Workouts

“Consistently Showing Up For Yourself, Creates The Opportunity To Be Great.”

“Be consistently good enough with fleeting interjections of greatness.”

It probably won’t make it as a viral social media post, but it feels more realistic. At the very least it’s reflective of daily reality. And it’s certainly better for your sanity.

Imagine calibrating your life’s expectations around your most perfect days.

Most of the time you’d be living in a constant state of disappointment. Essentially setting yourself up for failure, each and every day. In reality, not every day can feel like the Super Bowl, or the NBA final. In fact, most days are pretty mundane. And that’s why consistency trumps greatness every time.

Achieving your goals, whether it’s to build muscle, lose fat, or live a healthier life, is not about having great workouts all the time. And it’s certainly not about maintaining the perfect diet (whatever that means).

It’s about showing up consistently and persistently striving to do your best each day. Some days you WILL have a great workout and feel like a dog with two dicks. Other days your workouts might feel pointless. But that consistency and adherence to your programme is what will bring you greatness, over time.

If A Great Workout Isn’t The Goal, What Is?

Showing up for yourself and being consistent is more likely to help you achieve greatness than aiming for greatness itself.

Stop calibrating your minimum standard to the unrealistic expectation of perfection.

As Voltaire said, “Perfection is the enemy of good.”

Perfection is a self-limiting pursuit. It’s a paralysing endeavour, resulting in no solution to your current problem. At its very core, striving for perfection is likely to leave you wallowing in mediocrity.

So, instead of holding the panacea of perfection and greatness on a pedestal, focus on consistency. Because if you’re consistent, I guarantee you’ll end up being great.

Here’s What To Do Next If You Want To Get Your Training And Nutrition On Track, For Free

Having a great workout every time you set foot in the gym might be an unrealistic expectation. And feeling as though you need to be perfect with your diet every day will only set yourself up for failure. So how do you make sure you have more good days than bad? It can be confusing, frustrating, and overwhelming to know what to do. So let me help you keep things as simple as possible.

Here’s what you need to do if you want to get on the fast track to a leaner, healthier, stronger body.

Click here to get access to my free online calorie and macro calculator. It’s designed to take the headache out of knowing how many calories you need to lose weight and build muscle.

Then, over the next few days I’ll send you some more free guides and information to help kickstart your fitness journey, including:

• A 4 week training programme for beginners, complete with exercise videos and a workout tracker increasing the probability of a great workout).
• A guide on how to conquer your uncontrollable cravings.
• An exclusive recipe book with over 30 delicious, diet-friendly recipes.

So if you want all that, click here.

But for now, all I’ll say is… Keep living the Lean Life and I’ll see you soon.