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Stop Procrastinating: Do Pilates

Discover why we are likely to procrastinate when it comes to exercise and 10 practical steps to stop procrastinating and do your Pilates.

The Law of Forced Efficiency says ‘There is never enough time to do everything, but there is always enough time to do the most important thing’.

Everyone procrastinates.

The fact is that you can’t get everything done that you have to do. You have to procrastinate on something.

It is all to easy to procrastinate on the big important tasks and focus on the smaller less important tasks.

We can be busy all day completing low value tasks, but accomplish very little.
Those tasks that are important are those that give you the most value to your business, family, health and life in the long term.

The time required to complete an important job is often the same as the time required to do an unimportant job.’ (Brian Tracy)

Our exercise is one of these important tasks, would you agree?

Short term Pilates helps us to remain mobile, improves muscle strength and posture and helps clear our minds and long-term Pilates is good for our physical and mental health; we can remain active, independent and enjoy doing all those things we want to do, even as we grow older.

So why do so many of us procrastinate when doing it and put it off for another day? When you stop to think of the consequences of NOT doing Pilates regularly it is easy to see why it is of such high value.

Exercising is also something that no-one else can do for you. You are the only one that can do your roll ups, your push ups and your stretches. You can’t delegate this!

If we are prone to procrastinating, we often are better getting things done when we have a deadline.

But our health doesn’t always give us a deadline.

We don’t know if our back will ‘go’ tomorrow, if we’ll pull a muscle tomorrow, or if we’ll injure ourselves tomorrow.

Often our movement gradually seeps away without us noticing. For most of us it is a gradual process as we get older and we come to the slow realisation that ‘I’m sure I used to be able to do that.’ For example, in my head, I can still free cartwheel, but because I haven’t practiced it in over 20 years, my body can no longer do it. However, I can still get my palms flat on the floor with my legs straight, because this is something I’ve continued to do for the last 20 years. Not being able to free cartwheel is not significantly detrimental to my life now, but I know that I want to still be able to reach my toes and cut my own toenails when I’m 80, 90, 100.

Without a definite and known deadline, or ‘Panic Monster’ as explained by Tim Urban, (Ted Talk – see link at end) we put off doing our exercise, until tomorrow, because today we feel fine!

The time is going to pass anyway. The only question is how you use it and where you are going to end up at the end of the weeks, months, years that pass.’ (Brian Tracy)

So in order to avoid procrastinating on our Pilates practice here are some practical things you can do:

  1. Decide what is of value to you. Decide if Pilates and what it gives you is of high value. Ask yourself if it has a great positive consequence on your life? If yes, then it is of high value.
  2. You get to choose what you spend your time on. Choose to do your important tasks first; if you answered yes above, one of these will be Pilates. Do it first and then it won’t get forgotten.
  3. Procrastinate on purpose. Choose to procrastinate on or delegate the lower value tasks, that don’t make much of a contribution to your life and use your time to do your Pilates which is something only you can do.
  4. Set yourself a deadline. Schedule in when you will do your Pilates each day. For example, ‘I will have done my Pilates practice before I collect the children from school.’
  5. Change your mindset. Start thinking of yourself as productive, with plenty of time to enjoy Pilates.
  6. Eliminate that which you no longer need. Decide on what you are NOT going to do. Say no to anything that is not a high value use of your time.
  7. Promise yourself a reward if you do your Pilates by your deadline.
  8. Take small steps. Break the important task into smaller chunks so you avoid overwhelm. Instead of trying to find over an hour to get to a class once a week, do Bitesize Pilates (20 minutes 3 x a week = 1 hour) much easier to fit in consistently. Here’s one you can try right now - A Bitesize Pilates Workout for Beginners.
  9. Just get on and do it. Don’t stop to have a discussion with yourself about whether you should do it now or later. By the time you’ve done this you could have done 20 minutes. Have your clothes ready first thing in the morning, put them straight on and do Pilates before your brain registers what you are doing!
  10. Keep going. Continually review what you do and don’t do, and of what value they are to your life. This is an ongoing process.

If you are done procrastinating and are taking action with your Pilates, let me help you. I love people who take action.  Subscribe to my YouTube channel ‘Bitesize Pilates for Busy Women’ .

Grab my Bitesize Pilates 6 week programme and because you are taking action I’m going to offer you a massive 85% off. Just use this code ‘FITMIND85

Join my free Facebook group ‘Bitesize Pilates for Busy Women’.

References: 

  • Eat that Frog by Brian Tracy

  • Don’t Quit by Hal Fisher

  • Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway by Susan Jeffers

  • Ted Talk 

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