As you know, CFR’s 8 Week Transformation Challenge just came to an end. We had some phenomenal results! Congratulations to Melissa Arconati, our 1st place winner of the Smart Group Training contest and the $1,000 prize for a total of 17% weight loss! And to Sara Baumgartner, the winner of the Semi-Private contest and $1,500 prize for coming in at 16% weight loss!
Although there were only 2 prizes given out, we definitely have to give a hand to everyone who participated. Not only were our contestants focused and dedicated to a healthy lifestyle for the eight weeks of the challenge, we got to witness awesome weight loss transformations in ADDITION to increasing strength, endurance and functional movement. It’s been a pleasure!
But, what happens when challenges like these end? Are people able to maintain this level of commitment? Should they? What’s next?
To answer these questions we have to look at a few things:
- Drive. Everybody has their own unique and very personal reasons for why they begin (and end) anything. Almost everyone will tell you they did this because they needed the motivation. And while that may be true, it takes more than motivation to drive you forward.
Motivation is something that happens from the inside-out, such as winning the grand prize. From all of my years working with clients and leaders in the industry, I’ve learned it takes the type of desire that’s transpired from the inside-out. We call that inspiration.
Motivation feels like you HAVE to get out of bed each day to go workout or go to your job. Inspiration feels like WANTING to get out of bed each day to do that. As you can see there’s quite a difference between the two. One pushes you to do something; the other drives you.
So the question, what happens when a challenge or contest ends? This depends on the person’s drive and…
- Goals. The second thing we want to consider is the person’s goals. Not everyone will join a contest just to lose weight. In fact, we had a variety of people who joined for different reasons aside from losing weight: 1) Some wanted to gain muscle mass or 2) tone up in specific areas or 3) move better and feel better 4) lock in nutrition 5) increase energy
We had a lot of people who hit their target goals and others who were shy of it. What happens with each individual from here on out not only depends on their level of drive but whether or not they set another “end goal” from here.
“End” goals don’t necessarily mean “losing/gaining X amount of pounds or inches” by a specific date. For those who want to maintain, it could mean “maintaining my current weight for another 8 weeks” or “using the next 4 weeks to focus on strength” then re-evaluating and setting another goal.
I’d be lying if I said every single one of our contestants will continue to crush it from here on out. What I do know, is that those who have the most success hereafter recognize they must keep setting new goals. Reaching your goal is fantastic, but maintaining that goal is hard work too!
Aside from what drives someone to succeed and the goals they have in mind, the next step for continued success is utilizing the people, places and things they have available to him them stay on track.
- Resources. We recognize that everyone has different ways of staying accountable and tracking progress so we have a variety ways to help with that. For starters, the FMS is a simple and effective way to assess and re-assess a clients movements to figure out if what we’re doing is working. Our goal is to re-assess each client’s movements every few months.
We also put systems in place to ensure that every single one of our clients show up each week (if you’re already a current client who’s missed a week, I’m sure you’re familiar with and appreciate the friendly phone call).
We have Progress Trackers in place in 3 areas:
- A client-shared whiteboard to continue your very own 8 week challenge against yourself or other members.
- Progress Tracking sheets for “your eyes only” to keep in your client file.
- Progress Tracking sheet for “your eyes only” accessible from anywhere on Google Drive.
And last but not least, every one who’s a part of CFR has at least one common goal for being here–to experience greater health and wellness. We have clients that are here to get stronger, here to lose weight, here to move better, eat better and to live better overall– and it doesn’t stop there. One thing we really take pride in here is the inspiring, fun and supportive environment, so don’t be afraid to reach out to see what works for others.
Creating a healthy lifestyle is a process. A transformation challenge is only a small segment of a long term change. CFR’s Transformation Challenge lasted eight weeks. During this time, most people pushed themselves to work out more and have an almost perfect diet. But most people cannot make that period of high intensity last forever. So if you’ve ever done a contest or challenge or considering one in the near future, it’s important to ask yourself,
- What’s driving me?
- What are my specific goals? Short-term AND long-term
- What resources do I have available to keep me on track?
- What will I do THIS week to move me closer to my desired lifestyle?