Tired of Vague Fitness Goals? Try the Storybook Method!

Are you struggling to stay consistent with your training because your goals feel unclear? In this episode, we introduce the "Storybook Method," a creative approach to gaining clarity and setting yourself up for success on your fitness journey.

Learn how to:

• Define your "true" end goal: Go beyond generic goals like "get stronger" and paint a vivid picture of your ideal self.
• Identify the actions that support your vision: Discover the daily habits and strategies that will bring your story to life.
• Embrace the hero's journey: Develop a growth mindset and understand that challenges and setbacks are a natural part of the process.

If you're ready to ditch the vague goals and create a fitness journey that truly empowers you, this episode is a must-listen!

Ready to start writing your story? Head over to https://www.getnovastrong.com/get-strong-with-us to learn more about our personal training programs and book a free consultation.

Do you ever find yourself setting pretty

vague goals, only making it really hard

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to stay consistent with your training?

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Maybe it's that you set the goal for one

thing, but you do it kind of like half

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hazardly, and then you find that you

want to add something else, and you start

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program jumping or trying new things.

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While that exploration is really healthy,

what I find is that the idea of just

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jumping around causes inconsistency.

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And really the thing that it comes down

to is that we weren't clear with what

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we wanted from our training, what we had

for goals, believe it or not, this is

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actually super common at Nova strong.

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What we find is that some people will

come to us with, you know, very clearly

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defined aspirations, others, not so much.

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And since we write everything super

personalized and we are extremely

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detail oriented to how we're going

to curate the process, it makes it

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so that we really need to create

clarity before we can move forward.

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So today, what we're going to do

is we're going to go through my

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storybook method of creating that

clarity in a very creative way.

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Now, really quick, before we go

super deep into it, I want to be

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clear on why this is important.

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Sometimes people will come to us with

just the goals of get stronger, get

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healthier, lean out more toned, et cetera.

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For us, these are really broad

and they can mean a lot of things.

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When we're trying to achieve them,

we want to know the application.

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If someone wants to get stronger,

what does that look like?

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Is it doing more pushups or is

it a one rep max when someone

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says they want to get healthier?

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How does that look and feel?

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Because there's a lot

of aspects to health.

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We really want to zero in on these

things that we're going to be working

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on because we want to make sure they're

going to be happy with the outcome.

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So one of the other things that I

also notice is that when people are

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kind of broad, it's not necessarily

that they want one specific thing.

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It's usually that there's

something that is plaguing

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them that they want alleviated.

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So someone might say, Hey, I want

to, Get healthier just because

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they're feeling less energy.

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They are feeling more pessimistic

about their longevity.

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They might have specific things

that are starting to pop up, right?

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And so those are the things

that we want to address.

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They might say, I want to get stronger

because they're feeling more vulnerable

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in certain situations, or that they are

feeling that their physical capacity

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to do things is starting to dwindle.

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And so we want to make sure that

they can do those specific things.

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So it's extremely important that

as we start with these vague things

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that we really identify what they

look like for each individual.

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And so let's talk about how to do

that with the storybook method.

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All right, if you've ever

seen Citizen Kane, that's kind

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of what we're going to do.

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We're going to start with the end of

our story and then work backwards.

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So I want you to picture yourself

roughly 12 weeks, six months,

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or a year into the future.

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I want you to picture what you

envision yourself to be like, so

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long as you've hit your goals, right?

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And so now we can actually start to

paint the picture of what we want to be.

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What we really want, and I want you to

start off with just the adjectives that

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you want to use to describe yourself, the

things that we want to grow into, because

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these adjectives are going to allow

us to see what attributes in actions.

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The character is going to need to

take right because it's one thing

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for an author to write, in their

story that like this character

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strong, this character is healthy.

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Well, we need to show it in the story.

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So, you know, if you wrote their

strong, how are they strong?

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What are they doing on a regular basis?

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How are they showing it?

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Are they confident in certain situations?

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What situation?

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You know, what are the

things that are different?

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And so, as we start to look at

these adjectives more clearly,

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I want you to clearly define the

attributes that go with them.

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Once we have those attributes, I

want you to clearly define what are

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the actions that they are taking

that are sustaining these things.

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So, to put this into a

more, A better example.

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If we say the person is

healthy, this might also mean

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that they are less stressed.

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This might mean that they are

eating regular meals, that they

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are taking time for self care,

that, that all that is going on.

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Right.

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If we say that this person is confident,

we show it and how that they are

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walking, what they are wearing, certain

situations like, that that reflects that.

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And so as we start to just paint

the picture of what this character

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looks like, we can start to see.

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The immediate changes in

things we want to work towards.

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And then now here's the

really important part.

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So just how I said in Citizen

Kane, you see that ending scene.

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Now I want you to paint your own

ending scene, but you're going to take

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it through your, average day, right?

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What is the average day for this

character with these attributes look like?

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And this is where we're going to be

able to set realistic expectations,

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because if you said that this character

is lean, you know, maybe 20 pounds

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lighter than currently is now, but in

the average day that they are starting,

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stopping off to get a frappuccino

or, crumble cookie, then that might

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not be the most realistic story.

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And we want to make sure that we

are staying within nonfiction here.

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So.

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Write out what the average day

for this character looks like, you

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know, are they having to work out?

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Are they meal planning?

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What activities are they doing to

sustain these attributes in this day?

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And now finally we come to kind of

the final part where we're actually

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writing the rest of the plot.

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And this is the beautiful part because

now that we've clearly identified not

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just like the end goal in terms of

outcomes, but we've identified the end

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goal in terms of lifestyle, the habits,

the strategies that we need to get there.

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And also because we're framing

this in the sense of story, I want

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you to think of a hero's journey.

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You know, most heroes journeys Entail

some struggle, some loss, some learning

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moments and some skill building.

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And that's what these goals

are usually going to, entail.

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And so this is where you and

your coach can now start to work

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backwards and be like, Oh, cool.

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Look, you know, we want to

start working out regularly.

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We need to work on your self advocacy.

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We need to work on your scheduling.

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We need to help you with this,

it also allows us to start to

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pack in the idea that some of

these things are gonna be hard.

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We're not going to be

able to flip a switch.

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It's not like we're just going on a

diet and all of a sudden it happens.

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There's no story that is realistic

in character development where

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all of a sudden the character

just decides I'm going to be

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strong and then that's it, right?

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Instead, we see that there

is a progressive challenge,

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something to overcome.

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And that is going to be your plan

moving forward, and it's going to

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help us to create those realistic

expectations of challenge and create a

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growth mindset so that we can approach

it in a really healthy mindset.

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So, here's how I want you to apply this.

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If you haven't already, go get your paper

and start writing your storybook ending.

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Start with your character, get the

adjectives, the, attributes and the

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actions that they're doing, draw out what

a normal day looks like, and then let's

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start to look at how that's different.

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If you need help with this, our

coaches are always here, and actually

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we start off people with a free

consult to work through this exactly.

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So if you already have your exact goals

in mind, great, let's hop on a call.

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If you think you need a little bit of

help, try this storybook method, and

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then let's hop on a call to really

identify what that plot needs to be.