The BEST Day of Your Life Results: empowering activity to help you with your fat burning goals

It’s been a couple days since my day-long quest of achieving all my daily goals, which you can read about here. I want to share with you what I learned so that you too can achieve your fat burning goals one day at a time.

To begin, I have tried many, many times before to make drastic changes in my daily habits – things like reading more, spending more time with family, and playing less video games (if it’s not TV, it’s something else!). It has always been within me to commit to bettering myself – it’s inborn. I can’t tell you how many times I have actively tried to make changes and failed drastically. Over and over again I toiled to try and do something right, yet I was met with resistance and almost always folded under pressure – seldom achieving my goals.

There is a universal principle that I have noticed about changing habits and reaching goals. We must expect the resistance that will come with every new decision – everything we do anew will require us to press through this resistance, this membrane, that must be broken and left behind. This is the only way to progress and it works every time.

Here is my hourly journal for my “perfect day” activity. These are just cliff notes to keep it short and simple:

March 18, 2008 –

6:00 am – daily quiet time reading my Bible and time spent in prayer.

7:00 am – first half of full body joint mobility routine from the neck down to fingers, and then proceeding on to the top “half” of the spine. I did not do my entire spine or my legs until later in the day.

7:30 am – new recipe breakfast; protein powder oatmeal with blueberries and cinnamon, 2 cups of green tea.

8:00 am – begin working for the day.

9:00 am – performed a brief clubbell circuit routine to keep myself active during my work day, which is mostly sedentary (for more info. About this awesome training tool, check out the Big Book of Clubbell Training or The Encyclopedia of Clubbell Training:

11:00 am – meal two: leftover zucchini/beef dish from dinner last night

1:00 pm – main projects for the work day are complete. So, I spent some time learning about joint mobility exercises for kettlebell lifters, read an e-book and watched a 10 minute video on some business practices. I was supposed to spend 5-10 minutes brainstorming ways to improve my business – but it ended up being more like 30 minutes, I just got on a roll.

2:00 pm – meal 3: chicken sandwich on organic whole wheat bread, and one medium banana. Spent time helping members at the Burn The Fat: Inner Circle by answering questions about nutrition and training.

2:45 pm – began writing an article/journal for my Wednesday night church group.

3:00 pm – snacked on pistachios while reading Milton’s Paradise Lost.

3:30 pm – spent 30 minutes of kettlebell training for technique and conditioning.

4:00 pm – Took time to “play” with some BodyFlow movements. I like to move in an awkward challenging way each day just to expose my body to a new stimulus. Today was BodyFlow!

4:30 pm – spent another 30 minutes finishing up my work for the day.

5:00 pm – began making dinner, Pecan Crusted Salmon, and a side of spinach and peas. I finished my joint mobility routine while dinner was cooking – spine and legs.

6:00 pm – I admit that my computer was not off until after 6:00 since we played music during cook time and dinner. By 6:30 we were off taking a 2-mile walk in our new neighborhood (my wife and I just moved). We did some running ‘drills’ during our walk to move in various patterns and prevent overuse injuries and finished with an interval of light jog, run, and then walked the last 100 meters.

7:30 pm – visited my brother for his 18th birthday and we watched We Were Soldiers starring Mel Gibson.

10:30 pm – in bed.

Notes: it should also be noted that I did brush my teeth twice as planned, but only flossed once – I know…I was lazy.

I also did not contact an old friend, but did get to talk with a good friend that just moved from beautiful NH down to Florida this week. He made sure to tell me all about the wonderful weather they’re having down there while we’re on our millionth storm this season here in the Granite State, grrr!

Overall, I’m very happy with the results of this day and have seen the effects of practicing perfect time management in the following two days. I learned that is it very hard to fit everything into one day – but the barriers we setup are always defeated with persistence. The truth is that we are responsible for those barriers that say “I don’t have enough time to exercise, or to cook all of my own meals, etc.” Once we realize that we are in control, that our life is not enslaved to our circumstances – that we can choose whatever we want whenever we want it – then there is freedom and nothing in life seems too BIG. Focusing on what we can’t do is a common inclination that leads to failure – but focusing on what we are capable of is always enlightening and empowering.

Kyle said to me the other day during a training session that I could move to a tropical island anywhere and live there as long as I want. Most people shrug off a blatant remark like that, saying “sure, that would be nice, but it would never happen.” I was happy that Kyle and I were both in agreement – that either of us at anytime could drop what we’re doing and move somewhere adventurous. Of course, it would be hard because most of us don’t like change – but all of us are capable of great things. We slowly learn about what were capable of through the daily personal practice of managing our lives, by taking care of our health and choosing the hard, right choices instead of the easy, wrong choices.

To your health and success,

John Sifferman NSCA-CPT

P.S. If you took me up on the challenge to take one day to work on YOU – then we would love to hear about your experience, even if you think it was a complete failure. Let’s work together to seek the best ways to improve our lives!