Remember this image of the road, it’ll make sense later.

This blog is about the one key feature that you must have in order to achieve life long health and well-being. And it’s nothing to do with flashy sounding language or any fakery like that. If your looking for unicorns and rainbows to get you that body your looking for then it’s time to wake up and smell the sweat.

It doesn’t matter how many supplements or dietary alternatives you try, if you don’t have this one key attribute then you’ll forever be a sucker to short term fixes and constantly chasing your tail in the pursuit of the next easy route to a healthier body. Maybe you can relate to this – have you lost a lot of weight fast with the latest diet or supplement craze, only to pile it back on 6 months later lighter in pocket but less confident in mind? Read on because this blog is for you, the good news is that if your prepared to put in the hard work you can change who you are and what’s more, it doesn’t cost a penny to put right.

When your talking about being fit and maintaining that fitness for years, your mostly talking about having endurance. Endurance in body and mind sees you through and keeps you in the game, whether that be bodybuilding, athletics or any sport or activity in-between. It is this stubborn fortitude that fosters all the feel good emotions that you then associate with your chosen activity and keeps you doing it long term. So the secret ingredient to life long fitness is endurance.

Be honest with yourself

Back when you first started going to the gym for example, I’m betting the few few times would of felt like the hardest. You probably felt a bit uneasy or nervous as you got used to the new environment and new faces, then probably had to really motivate yourself to go back next week. Slowly but surely I’m guessing things started to get easier as you gained confidence and away you went, being stubborn gets you places. Revealingly, it’s that first hard part that millions of people give up on and it reveals something of your nature how you deal with it. Sorry to hurt your feelings, but if you give up at the first hurdle the minute things don’t go your way it means you’ve got things to work on!

I’ve thought long and hard about this blog. And I’ve purposefully kept it honest about people’s lack of endurance. Like I said, if what I say hurts feelings then I apologise but it doesn’t make the truth less…true! It can be hard to hear someone else comment on your faults (I’m the same). We could beat about the bush, be fluffy and nice and politically correct by saying things like; ‘eliminate the stresses of your life’ or ‘find the golden space inside yourself’. Those sort of things are ok to eliminate at the beginning, but eventually just like my old grandad used to say, it’s time to; ‘just sort yourself out and get a grip!’ The reality is you just need to work on your dogged determination.

I’m a big believer that we’ve become too niche nicey about such things, too afraid to hurt peoples feelings. We’d rather tip toe around the real issues of weight loss and the health problem, afraid to use real words and potentially lose income. At the end of the day how would you rather people treated you, would you rather things were sugarcoated especially for you and in a way that keeps you in your bubble? Or do you want honesty, to be spoken to with truth and for people to be straight up with you? I rest my case.

How to work on your endurance

Not surprisingly, the way to work on your endurance is to, endure! Believe me I’ve tried every trick in the book to get less motivated clients the results they’re after, I’ve been the fluffy nicey – nicey rainbow man. Generally it hasn’t worked, it’s this precise nicey approach that the person with poor endurance doesn’t need and simply serves to keep them sheltered. The way to improve is to improve, treat yourself and those around you with respect and honesty and it will repay you. Challenge yourself, it’s my ethos as a Personal Trainer! Ultimately however, I can wax on about sucking it up and trying just that bit harder but gaining endurance has to come from you. Your the only one that can pull yourself down to the gym, it’s you that will get you out running day after day and it’s only you that has got your back until the day you die.

So hopefully this blog has made sense, it should of explained that once you strip away your excuses all that’s left is a simple choice. Exercise – You either do it, or you don’t. You either take that road or keep hitching a lift. Enduring is something we all have to work on at different points in our lives so take heart in knowing that you are never alone in feeling like the road is just too long. When you think about it, exercise and long term health and fitness is precisely that, one long road that has to be endured. So drive, aim for the hills and don’t ever stop.