Peter Drucker a well known thought leader on management issues said "what gets measured, gets managed". This came to mind as I was working out tonight. I was thinking about the progress I have made in fat loss and muscle development. As I have progressed on this journey to fitness, I realized that my focus has shifted away from the scale, and onto the caliper (fat measurement tool), and my clothing as a measure of my performance. You may know that muscle weighs more than fat, which is why the scale is not always the best measure of your "weight" loss. So what is your goal? Weight loss or Fat loss? For me, the specific focus on fat loss was more objective. Weight loss had an emotional component, whereas fat loss involved applying a systematic approach to body chemistry.
As soon as I got over the hyper sensitivity to the numbers on the scale, I could really establish a SMART Goal! Here's what I recommend business leaders do when they are setting business goals, and oddly enough, it works for fitness and weight loss as well!
Here's an example of SMART Goals should be:
Specific – Reduce my body fat percentage from 24% to 19%, so that I can compete in a body building contest.
Measureable – I will use a caliper to measure and document the body fat % weekly
Attainable – Yes this is attainable
Realistically high – It is tough enough, but not too difficult to be overwhelmng
Time Bound – I planned to achieve this by Oct 19, 2009 – the date of the body building contest!
I bet you want to know if I achieved my goal… Well, I did get close, on the day of the contest my body fat was at about 20% (not perfect for the show, but I gave it a try anyway) Here's a link to the results of my first show! http://www.musculardevelopment.com/lindsay/index.php?mode=contest&eventcode=1365
You may also want to incorporate WHY into your goals as well:
Written – Yes, write it down!
Harmonious – You need to be okay with this goal you have set.
Yours – If it's not your goal… you will not be harmonious
Writing it down, is a very important part of the process! In addition to the regular measurements with the caliper, and yes the scale, I also created a log book to write down my exercise and eating habits daily. A funny thing happened when I started doing this; I paid more attention to both my diet and my exercise! And I continued to see measureable results… in both directions, I must admit. The results were measureable after Thanksgiving alright!
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