Consistency is everything!

Mike Potter, of Leeds Krav Maga blogs about his thoughts on the real magic bullet for getting results in life

My training career has seen me work with hundreds of people, the ones who always stand out are the ones who get to where they want to be with fitness and training.
Gary – A man who lost 20lb in 2 months and is well on the way to healthier happier life
Jon – A young guy who made a fantastic weight loss of 21lb in 4-5 weeks look easy and also managed to alleviate a long standing shoulder injury problem at the same time
Tom – A slim student who managed to gain 5kg of muscle in 3 months and improved his strength to no end
Simon – A great friend of mine who, under my guidance, lost 3 stone in 3 months and now regularly competes in runs and obstacle course races
Ruth – A young lady who I helped to lose 7lb and drop 2 dress sizes whilst teaching her boxing and self defence skills
I could go on, I’ve been lucky enough to help a lot of people but this article isn’t here for me to toot my own horn [beep beep], it’s here so that I could talk to you about what sets my successful trainees apart from the rest.

A few weeks ago I was asked by a friend, what’s the most important thing to do for getting results with training, (Krav Maga or otherwise). The answer is actually very straight forward, firstly you need to Progress, as in you need to keep doing more and forcing your body to change. Running for 20 minutes at the same pace 3 times a week for years on end won’t help you as your body will adapt very quickly you must do more! Secondly, you must adhere to your training, you must remain consistent and keep it up. If you follow these two rules you will improve.

Since I was asked that question I’ve been sat thinking about being consistent and progressing and how it affects not only everything you do fitness wise, but everything you do in life too.
Wherever you are now in life it is likely you got there through constantly doing certain things and as a result of progressing the habits you have formed, you got where you are!
Nobody ever woke up one day to find themselves in fantastic shape, obese, an expert martial artist, a wine critic, top level footballer etc etc. I hope you see where I am going with this.

Somebody who is obese has formed a consistent habit of eating too food and not being active enough and progressed by eating more and exercising less
Someone in great shape has formed the consistent behaviour habits of eating well and training regularly and progressed their behaviour by pushing themselves to eat even better and train even harder
An expert martial artist was once a beginner who formed the consistent habits of regular practice and progressed by learning and implementing new skills regularly.

I hope what I am saying makes sense. All you need in life to hit your goals is to have a plan, develop consistent habits to move you towards that goal and progress your behaviours/training in order to hit that goal. The real magic bullet is to realise that there is no magic bullet and be willing to consistently set the time and effort to one side to achieve what it is you want to achieve. Results don’t come in a bottle, work to form the right habits break the bad ones and you will see progress! Nothing worth having ever comes easy!

Mike

Mike Potter isthe Instructor at Leeds Krav Maga. Mike is an accredited, professional Krav Maga Instructor under British Krav Maga and certified personal trainer.