By: Jacob Wellock

You have been exercising for a while now and you have lost that little bit of stubborn body fat that got you in the gym in the first place, now what? All too often I believe that we get stuck on accomplishing small goals and then have to take a step back and reassess what we want to do next and that usually takes most people a long time, so what do we do next?

It is very important to accomplish your goals one step at a time, but we need to have a bigger vision. When you climb a flight of stairs, the vision and goal is to get to the top. That is why we started climbing the stairs in the first place, we didn’t start climbing thinking about getting to the next stair step and stop there, no we want to get to the top, because that is where our goals lie. You also cannot skip the staircase and jump to the top, which is what some people try and do and then they fail and never want to approach the stairs again. As the expression goes, “just one step at a time”.

What I am trying to say here is that we need to set long term goals for ourselves and be specific with those goals. You want to lose weight? Great! It should be, “I want to lose weight so I am comfortable in my own skin and then I really want to be able to get my first pull up that I never thought I would have been able to do.” Losing that weight is getting to the top of the staircase, but if you are parked on the top floor of a parking garage with no elevator, guess what? You are climbing multiple staircases to get to your destination. It is up to us on how many flights of stairs we want to climb, but none the less, if you have goals, you have to climb them on your own. Surround yourself with people that encourage you to climb the stairs, but no matter how encouraging they are, or if they are not around, you have to take those steps all on your own.

So I encourage you to take those steps and get to the top. Set those big and scary goals. The ones who make a difference are the ones who aren’t scared to take the stairs, the ones who don’t are always waiting for the elevator. There is never a line at the stairs, think about it.  No one is going to take the steps for you, no one is going to lose the weight for you, no one is going to get YOUR first pull up, you are going to accomplish those things. Get to climbing.