Last week we talked about doing a mid-year reflection and giving yourself a halftime pep-talk. This week is all about how taking action on what you found in your mid-year reflection will inevitably set up your second half of the year wins.
Regardless if you’re crushing it and you’re just looking to advance to the next level or your reflection told you you needed to reset and restart, I want to frame how we’re going about implementation and dive into the importance of taking action.
Trying Out Maverick’s Advice
I’m typically a very pragmatic overthinker. This can often lead to procrastination or inaction which results in not making any progress, missed opportunities, wasted time, etc. The past few months, however, I've found myself in a mode where I’m consistently just taking action. Big and small. Very Top Gun: Maverick “don’t think, just do”. It’s not my usual forte, but I must admit it’s brought some incredible results.
I knew that some of the actions were only temporary to bring me to certain results because they weren’t sustainable. Other actions, especially when it comes to my wellness, I scaled down so I could stay as consistent as possible with them. I sprinted with a focus, but also with a contingency for after the goal was achieved. While this was a really great experience for me, I don’t think this is should be my M.O.
When it comes to wellness, I think there is a way to meld Maverick’s advice and a repeatable process for sustainable and maintainable lasting results.
Start Taking Action With What You Have & Where You Are Now
I listened to an Ed Mylett podcast with Layne Norton late last year and at the end of the podcast they were talking about implementing sustainable and maintainable habits. For this piece, I re-listened to their discussion and I realized that I have been implementing this throughout the year. In doing so I’ve laid a foundation, been able to pivot or refine as needed, and it’s brought me some results I’m really proud of.
The 3 and a half takeaway ideas I want to share are as follows:
TAKE ACTION. The initial steps you need to take to begin are: start where you are, with what you got, right now. Stop over-analyzing, stop overthinking, start doing. Sure, take the time to set yourself up for success, but not at the expense of starting. Meaning, start doing something – even if it’s not perfect – with your current resources and circumstances instead of creating excuses or unnecessary obstacles that will keep pushing you back from doing anything that will move you closer to achieving your goals. The sooner you can start where you are with what you already have is going to be way better than doing nothing and staying still.
ASSESS. Although last week was about assessing your first half of 2023, this is a good reminder that evaluating is essential and continual. However, this order highlights that after you take action is when you can really begin effectively evaluating what is and isn’t working. The analogy they gave is if your house is on fire, the first thing you need to do is get out of the house. Then you can assess how the fire started later. Take note (of the fire and potential problems that may have caused it), but take action (get out of the blazing house) as soon as possible.
CONSISTENCY. What do you think you can be consistent with right now? The actions you begin taking in #1 should be simple and feasible enough that you can be consistent with them starting with your life as it is today OR they need to be made sustainable and maintainable so you can be as consistent as possible. A majority of the time, the reason diets don’t work is because you weren’t consistent. Or maybe you were consistent, but the weight came back because you didn’t have a sustainable contingency plan to maintain the result. In order for an action to be consistent to the level you need it to be to maintain a result, it has to be sustainable. So when you’re setting out on mapping the second half of 2023, go big or start small, just try to have an idea of a maintenance mode or next step in mind that will keep you aligned with the result you want.
THE HALF: Consistency is how you build confidence. The “key” to become confident in something is to just go out and do the dang thing. Over and over, rep after rep. You can improve, but first you just have to start and focus on consistency. You will stumble. You will fall. You will fail. When that happens, you simply get back up and keep going. Maybe you pivot, but you still forge forward. It’s often said that success is inevitable if you don’t give up. Even better, I love in the podcast when they say: “resilience is a super power and you will achieve what you want if you keep going.”
The Key to Lasting Change in Wellness: Consistent Action 🗝️
Most of my wellness regimen is on autopilot with my consistent action. I’m all for resting, reflecting, and restoring, but that doesn’t mean that I’m not taking small steps consistently that align with my wellness goals. Even when I’m resting and restoring I’m taking small sustainable and maintainable actions consistently towards my goals. For example, I’m still intentionally moving my body or exercising daily. I’m still taking my supplements and vitamins. I’m journaling my morning pages every morning. I have discovered and automated foundational consistent actions I can take to help me maintain and sustain the results I want to keep or get me closer to my goals. Sometimes I have scaled back versions and other times I have all-in all-star versions of what these actions look like. Do I take a couple days off here and there? Yes. If I do take time off, I just pick back up when my life allows me to.
The bottom line is, however you choose to move forward with the second half of 2023, what you do consistently is what creates your result. Start as small as you need to. Build mastery there. Then level up. But for now: keep it simple, start where you are, with what you have, and begin now.