As a trainer, you sometimes feel like a parent being asked by your kids over and over again, “Are we there yet!?!”

Sorry trainees, but it’s true.

Most people come to the gym to accomplish a specific goal – be it a new lifting number or weight loss.

And most people get frustrated when they don’t start seeing results on paper almost instantly.

They start asking,”What am I doing wrong?” “Why am I not there yet!?!”

The answer is…Maybe you aren’t doing anything wrong.

Most likely, you just haven’t given yourself enough TIME to see the results adding up.

You can’t necessarily FEEL yourself getting stronger every time you workout.

Heck, there may even be some workouts where you feel like absolute crap and even feel like you’ve gotten weaker. (Which honestly probably isn’t the case.)

Sometimes you might not see the weight on the scale changing. Or even your measurements.

But that doesn’t mean good things aren’t happening!

I, myself, am not a patient person. I don’t like waiting in any sense of the word. If I have a project to do, I want to do it now, even if that means working through the night.

So I do understand when people want results instantly.

That simply isn’t the way it happens though…at least not in the sense most people want it to be true.

Every day you WORK toward your goal, you are getting results. Doing the hard work, itself, is a huge result!

Think about how many people out there are still only thinking about doing what you are trying to do!

And I don’t mean to put those people down…I’m just saying you have to give yourself credit for taking that first step.

Every time you workout. That is a result. It is a step in the right direction.

Every time you make a healthy eating decision, even if it is a conscious decision to cheat, that is a result!

It may not seem like it, but it is!

Because results are about us making better decisions. Results are every time we make a decision to do something that leads to our long-term goal.

Results come in many different forms and BIG RESULTS are the culmination of hard work day in and day out.

Think about it…People don’t expect to be the CEO of the company the work for in one day…one week…or even a year.

Yet they expect to be as strong/fit/in-shape as they desire in a matter of weeks. And the crazy part is, most of them spend way more hours each day focused on their job than they do on their health.

So how do we stop focusing on the numbers and stop getting discouraged when we aren’t there yet?

We start focusing on small victories and enjoying those successes. We enjoy the journey.

Yea, yea, yea…Enjoy the journey!

HA!

Are we there yet!?!

Ok, not every day is going to be fun, but reaching your goals doesn’t have to be about sacrifice and torture. Find an exercise or a diet that you ENJOY doing. Trust me…it is possible. There are so many physical activities out there that can help you stay healthy…and a lot of them don’t even involve a gym!

On top of finding something you enjoy, celebrate your mini victories. Give yourself CREDIT for all of your hard work.

Because when you focus on the destination and not on enjoying the journey, you get stuck in a cycle of “Are we there yet?” When you constantly ask that question, trust me….it makes the trip feel a whole heck of a lot longer!

If you are doing the right things day in and day out, things will add up.

It just takes time.

And a slight side note…but just to demonstrate that even if you aren’t SEEING huge number jumps you probably ARE getting results.

One of my clients whose goal is to lose a bit of weight and feel healthy just managed to do an exercise she wasn’t able to do before.

It wasn’t a concrete goal of hers to be able to be strong enough to do that specific move, but the fact that she could do it, showed that she was making progress.

And it made her pretty freaking excited even if it wasn’t part of her long-term plan.

How often do you question yourself and think “Why am I not there yet?” instead of focusing on all the things you can now actually do?