January marks another new year with new goals. No matter what your fitness goals are, they will always involve weight management and mental state. Exercise has no choice but to affect caloric expenditure even if pounds lost isn’t a major goal of yours. It is also a proven method for improving your mental state. If your goals include one or both of these, does one affect the other? You already know the answer is ‘yes’. The relationship is undeniably bidirectional. For some a positive attitude preludes the actions taken to lose weight. For others, it takes a noticeable change in weight before their positive thoughts kick in and they believe it works. The more each happens, the more each is affected. This seems simple but the struggle is still there to get started for so many. Be SMART about it by using this method to help you get going on your goals.

‘S’pecific

Whether your goal is to have a more positive attitude or weight loss, be very specific about what you want to achieve. When it involves fitness, tell yourself you will enjoy each bout of exercise regardless of the mode of exercise. Telling yourself that you are going to be more positive overall toward everything is not specific to the goal and can be overwhelming to take on. Focus on each exercise bout, set your positive attitude and complete that day’s exercise task. Each bout will affect both your attitude and weight loss ability. As we already know, a positive mind set will help you achieve weight loss and as weight loss is achieved, it will give you a positive attitude toward the process.

‘M’easurable

There should be some way to measure your progression. Weight loss is straightforward. It’s as easy as stepping on a scale. Mental state can be a little trickier. With fitness, an easy way is to refer to the previous step. Each time you work out, you set a positive attitude beforehand. Tracking your work outs in any way that is convenient gives you a number of times you made the attitude adjustment. You can simply mark it on a log or calendar or use a fitness app.  

‘A’chievable

Success is the greatest motivation. When you set any goal, it should be challenging so that you get the results you want. It should also not be so far out that you don’t succeed. Fitness goals are no different. The beauty of fitness is that new goals can always be set. Making it a priority and a habit is the end result, but even those that reach that point can set more goals. 

‘R’ealistic

Achievable and realistic are closely related if not the same. The acronym, however, doesn’t work without both an “A” and a “R”. With that said, an example for fitness would be the number of workouts per week. If your motivation is through the roof and you work out once in the morning and once in the evening to fit no less than 10 workouts in a week, that would be a little unrealistic. It is particularly unrealistic for those just getting started or restarted. Yes, it would improve the chances of achieving your goal or achieving it more quickly, but it could cause burnout and be a detrimental to the original, achievable goal.

‘T’ime-bound

Goals should come with a deadline. An entire year is not too long for fitness goals. If you’d rather break it into small increments, there is benefit in that. Giving yourself a shorter time to achieve each smaller, incremental goal will continue to improve your belief in yourself and your ability. The key is to be consistent with your work outs to achieve the year’s end goal.

There are multiple ways to reach a goal. The SMART method isn’t the only way but might help you get started. It takes both a positive attitude and tangible results to reach fitness goals. The question isn’t which comes first. It is which one will you start with?