Are You Ready?

Readiness is a critical success factor in most endeavors.  However, it is absolutely critical when it comes to fitness improvement efforts 

Your sense of readiness is the powerful feeling that you are ready to take this task on. Determining readiness should be the first step in any fitness improvement effort.  Yet, so many delve into such efforts before they are ready.  Low readiness is a common cause of many failed attempts at fitness improvement. 

In order to increase your chances of success, you must feel a strong sense of readiness.  Otherwise, you may end up wasting your time and money and getting disappointed.

The Fitness Protocols approach helps you evaluate, and if necessary build your sense of readiness for fitness improvement before moving on to the next step of building your conviction to improve.

Readiness for fitness improvement depends on four key aspects:

• Power and control aspects
• Economic aspects
• Health aspects
• Support aspects

Power and control aspects involve a number of areas related to your capability to make and sustain key decisions for the effort. Economic aspects involve a number of areas related to your capability to afford and pay your best attention to the overall effort. Health aspect involves areas related to your capability to perform physical activities and make adjustments to what and how you eat. Finally, support aspects refer to areas related to your capability to get and retain the support of key individuals and to set up and maintain supportive environments.  The figure below shows how these four aspects align to drive a strong sense of readiness in you. Click on the image to enlarge it.

The Dynamics of Commitment

Building your commitment to improve and maintain your fitness involves managing the dynamic tension between two key forces:

·         Drivers

·         Pushbacks

Drivers are the forces that compel you towards commitment and pushbacks are those that deter you from it.  This type of dynamic tension is often active in most decision-making processes.  The bigger the decision is, the more complex its structure and the stronger the tension that builds between these forces.  The diagram below illustrates how this dynamic works in this context.   Click on image to enlarge.

Driving forces on the left-hand side of the diagram include those factors that drive your sense of readiness and conviction and any other factors not included in the first two.

Pushback forces on the right-hand side of the diagram include those factors that drive a weak sense of readiness and or conviction, and any other factors not included in the first two.

To build highly sustainable commitment, you will first need to eliminate or mitigate as many pushbacks as you possibly can.  Once you feel ready, you will identify the most meaningful set of highly energizing drivers possible.


Fitness Protocols can  help you manage this seemingly complex dynamic!