Startegies for Working Smart
Working diligently towards any goal and then achieving it, is empowering and motivating - and euphoric.
In university, I always showed up to practice and worked hard, but adjusting to the pace and atmosphere of varsity life was challenging. It was SO frustrating seing my performances crawl forward compared to their leaps and bounds in high school.
This is when I started looking at how what I did off the track, affected what I did on it.
In 2009, I committed to a few minimal lifestyle changes not only did I shatter my personal best, I broke the Canadian Javelin Record for the first time, and became obsessed with high-performance habits.
Working smart funnels and accelerates your effort into unprecedented growth and results.
It isn’t about doing more, but doing differently. The goal is to enhance training quality and recovery speed, without a an overwhelming lifestyle adjustment.
I noticed that when people decide to increase their commitment to a goal, they either:
Work even harder (intensity, hours, additional workouts), but then might get injured, or burnt out.
Take on a slew of complicated, time-consuming, and intense habits - but then get overwhelmed, and drop them.
Look into Want to try new high-performance habits, but don’t know where to begin.
Consider these concepts before taking on a new habit or routine:
Get out of the red, before you make the green greener
Start with the biggest limiting factors in your foundation.
If your diet is ok, but your sleep routine is atrocious - work on sleep first.
If you’re underslept, under hydrated, or living off of highly processed food, you’re likely reaping a fraction of the growth from the work you’re putting in. Start here.
Start with high-yield, short duration, accessible habits
Look for the biggest bang for your buck, in the shortest amount of time, with the greatest ease to accomplish. This way it builds your experience of “being someone who makes change happen” faster. Then you can expand on that habit, or add another one later.
For example: many people try to overhaul to their diet. My advice? Pick one action, and once it’s second nature, add another. Once you identify as someone with a decent set of eating habits, then you’ll feel equipped to take on more.
My favorite habit to start with: Eat protein and carbs within 45 minutes of working out: it keeps your muscles insulin sensitive hours longer, and allows them to absorb more carbs to refuel and repair. Read: less muscle soreness, recover more fully for the next workout, and build more muscle (also increasing metabolism).
Aim for better, not perfect
If you only did your post-practice stretching routine ⅗ times this week, you still improved your mobility. 60% of something is better than 100% of doing nothing.
Acknowledge and celebrate daily wins. Being consciously aware of your growth makes the journey exciting and inspiring.
Set the bar for success at the minimum effective dose (MED).
Show up consistently before show up intensely. Like getting in shape to handle harder workouts.
If you know the MED of a habit, then you know the specific pay off you’re getting from a small time investment.
For example: Meditation starts to be noticeably effective at 1 minute: blood pressure and heart rate drop, cortisol drops if it’s too high from stress, and blood flow in the brain moves away from the amygdala (fear/ego) and towards the prefrontal cortex (rational thinking - the most evolved part of your brain). Inducing this state allows you to make better decisions.
Eventually you may meditate longer, but you know there's a significant benefit after 1 minute.
Here’s a New Habit Checklist:
Is this the right place to invest my time and energy?
Is this a doable commitment, and am I satisfied with likely return on investment?
Am stuck on perfectionism, or celebrating growth?
Am I aware of the minimum effective dose?
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Want to individualize and fast track your growth? Message me to book an exploratory call for 1:1 coaching!
