How To Set Your Muscle Building Goals And Achieve Them – Part 2

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Ok, yesterday, I covered the foundational things you need to achieve your muscle building goals.

You can check out yesterday’s post here.

Basically, I said you need to get your mind right.

Today, I’m going to cover some of the essential practical steps to achieving your muscle building goals in the new year.

Some you may’ve heard of and some you haven’t.

1. Break Your Goals Down

I take my yearly goals which are pretty big and break them down to quarterly goals.  I break those down into monthly and weekly goals.  I like to set weekly task lists for myself to make sure I get certain things done on time and correctly.  This is a great way to stay on track.

It’s easier to eat an elephant one piece at a time than to try and consume the whole elephant in one bite.  Break your goals down and focus on smaller chunks that will eventually lead to your desired result.  So if you want eventually bench 300 but you can only bench 185 currently, that can seem a bit daunting.  Focus on getting to 195, then 215, then 245, and so on.

The psychological effect here is to get small successes which will get you in positive, winning mindset.  This will greatly increase your chances of reaching your desired result.

No surprise here.

2. Set Conditions

This is probably the most powerful goal achieving technique I’ve heard of.  It involves setting a condition in which you must achieve the desired result.

A friend of mine told me about this and it absolutely changed the way I looked at goals.  A great condition for you may be to get a personal trainer or get a dedicate friend that won’t let you quit.  Or maybe tie your goal to a specific reward like a vacation or competition.

The idea here is to not leave yourself with a way out.  If you limit your options to success or bust, you will be a lot more likely to succeed.

3. Focus on Performance Rather Than Outcome

Vince offers a great strategy in his No-Nonsense Muscle Building book which is to set performance goals.  What he means is that you can’t always guarantee the outcome (e.g. weighing 180 in 6 months), but you can control your performance in the tasks that you need to go to get to that result.

Your outcome goal is a result of a lot of factors.  Some you can control such as nutrition, training, recovery, and education.  But there are other factors you can’t control like Life.  You never know what may happen to detur you.

So instead of focusing on your outcome goal (e.g. a certain weight, certain look, milestone on certain lifts), you should focus on your performance.  Your performance includes getting the right amount of calories, pushing yourself on each rep, getting the right amount of recovery time, etc.  These are things and you can control which will positively move you toward your goal.

The rest, as they say, is out of your hands.  Accept it and move on.

4. The Little Things Count

These last few things are the small hinges that swing big doors.  They are often overlooked but shouldn’t be underestimated.

• Write your goals down – daily
• Visualize your results 5 mins a day
• Tell people about your goals – this creates a success only condition
• Track your progress and make periodical adjustments

And there you have it.  Some of the most efficient and effective ways to achieve your muscle building goals.  In my next post, I will share my muscle building goals with you and how I plan to achieve them.

Get Big. Get Ripped. Get Fit With Mitch.

Mitch

Related posts:

1. How To Set Muscle Building Goals and Achieve Them – Part 1
2. Mitch’s Fitness Goals for 2010
3. Do you know where you’re going? Workout Goals
4. How I’m Going To Own 2012 – Goals
5. How To Overcome Your Weakest Link – Diet