No, I’m not talking about The Gap the store, I’m talking about my super unique title for a major reason you fail to reach your goals.
I wrote about it in my ebook Become Consistent with your Workout Routine. You can download a free copy here.
The Gap as I’ve defined it is the distance between where you are right now and the first step you need to take to achieve your goals.
Too often this space is set too big, which is why you struggle to see success.
Another analogy would be climbing a stairway to success. The gap is how big each step is on that staircase.
The way to achieve success is to make sure that gap and those steps are something you can achieve.
But too many people create too big of a gap when they are just starting out.
For example, you want to start exercising but currently do nothing. You decide to start by going to the gym.
A large gap would be going from 0 days of exercise per week to 5 days per week. Starting tomorrow. Oh, and you’ll spend an hour or more at the gym every day.
Maybe you’re laughing a little because you’ve actually done this.
But can you see how big of a gap that is?
Can you see how difficult that would be for anyone to achieve?
0 days to 5 days is unrealistic.
This is an easy way to get overwhelmed with your goals and when starting something new.
What you need to do is keep the gap smaller for something more attainable.
You want to go up small steps to your goal, not try and jump up floor by floor. This will lead to more consistency which means a greater chance of success.
The same goes for nutrition goals.
If your current nutrition includes eating out a lot, keeping junk foods around the house, and overall poor food choices, you need to consider these when creating your plan.
Jumping straight into changing everything, ie: throwing out the junk, never going to restaurants, making a whole new menu with all new ingredients, etc, would be creating a lot of change very quickly.
You’d create a huge gap that is very challenging to sustain.
This ends up creating a lot of struggle and failure in the early stages of your changes. Ultimately, it leads to getting frustrated, losing motivation and wanting to give up.
All because you created too big of a gap for your first step.
The key is to keep The Gap small and achievable.
For exercise, I recommend starting with something at home. If home is harder than the gym for you, start with 2 or 3 days a week, not 5. In either case, start with a 10-20 minute workout, not an hour or more each time. It may seem small, but it’s still better than nothing!
Same with diet. Trying to change your entire diet overnight is the quickest way to fail.
Shrinking The Gap in nutrition can mean just getting rid of the junk in your house. Or focus on 1 meal per day to make it healthier. Our habits, lifestyle, and emotions are so strongly linked to our food choices it’s even more important to start small with nutrition.
Hopefully you’re seeing some of the large, unrealistic steps you’ve set for yourself.
Review what you’re doing, simplify the step, shorten the gap, and experience success!