A mental challenge accompanies every fitness journey.
Strengthening your body and pushing your physical limitations requires that you train your mind because your body can't go where your mind hasn't allowed it to go. Remember, our brain dictates every movement.
Every inhale, exhale, push and pull results from your brain sending signals to muscles in your body.
So if we want to gain or lose weight and strengthen or tone our body, it will require that we train our minds. When we fall short and will, it's often due to our willpower. The ability to see yourself as this healthy individual, whatever that may mean to you, should start in your mind so that it can manifest physically.
Grit, a book by Angela Duckworth, a professor of Psychology at the University of Pennsylvania and Founder and CEO of CharacterLab, has advised leaders in politics to teams and athletes in the NBA and NFL.
The coach of the Seattle Seahawks, Pete Carroll, called Angela Duckworth after hearing her TED TALK on grit, and after conversing, she visited the Seahawks training facility. She spent time with the team to understand their culture and philosophy of winning. The players were gritty and had a mindset of success, not letting their setbacks hold them back from their ultimate goal.
A fitness journey is similar. Many moments throughout the day allow us to move forward, stay stagnant, and even move backward in our health and fitness goals.
When we find ourselves complacent or moving backward, we can't stay there; we have to pick up the pieces and focus on the lifestyle we want to lead.
Training our mind can consist of many things, but ultimately we must be aware of how we feel and know the next step to get ourselves to the goal we want to accomplish. We don't need to envision every step, but taking the next step will suffice. That's where grit and a strong mind comes in. And sometimes training the mind is moving the body.
Stretching can get our brain focused and allow us to be present. Listening to positive music, meditating, or sitting in complete silence may help.
Whatever activity you need to keep your brain focused and dedicated to the mission is fine, but find something. It will give you strength for the journey.
You can find a full list of activities for the brain here.