862 days until I compete in my first NPC Bikini show and I’ve got a LOOOOONG way to go. I’ve made the decision to train myself for Year 1 and then hire a fitness prep coach for Year 2… and here’s the deal- what got me to this point of being out of shape won’t get me to winning on the NPC stage… So… Having been a personal trainer and now facing my most challenging personal training client EVER (myself), there are 5 realities I’m going to have to accept to hit my first milestone on March 14, 2021 AND eventually compete on stage in 862 days:

1- EVERY SINGLE workout is prescheduled.

If I told you how many minutes I have spent (during each workout) perusing my Peloton spin class offerings, looking at the music, and trying to find a class that has EXACTLY the music I want in it, you’d quickly see that I lose about 5-10 minutes EVERY single workout trying to select ONE spin class. No bueno. My workout schedule is now CLEARLY defined (down to the minutes it takes to move from one workout to the next and all of my spin class selections are pre-selected).

Why is this powerful? 1- It eliminates the need to make a decision (which conserves energy) and 2- Over time, it gives me more time to workout (which eliminates distraction).

2- The biggest workout happens in the am.

As of January 21, 2021, I’ll be back to 2-a-day workouts and here’s the thing I keep drilling into my head:

I AM NOT A NIGHT WORKOUT PERSON. Period. As much as I’ve wanted to change my mind about that, here’s the reality: After 8 pm, the ONLY thing I’m good for is watching the latest episode of the Real Housewives of Salt Lake City. So… now that I’ve met myself, here’s the deal: I do the bulk of my workout from 4:30 – 8:00 am and then I do a 45 min spin class every evening (before 8 pm). That’s it. I’m not giving myself any room to negotiate that because, at the end of the day, any lies that I could tell myself about working out at night would be just that- LIES…

3- I’m going to be peeing ALL OF THE TIME (at least for the next 8 weeks):

Getting in a gallon of water every day is my absolute nemesis. I will work out 4-5 hours a day and LOVE it. I will eat chicken and broccoli for breakfast every day and tolerate it. But the drinking so much water that I’m in the bathroom every time I turn around… GETS ME… EVERY… SINGLE… TIME…

So… here’s the deal: I’m just going to have to accept that peeing is what I’ll be doing all the time for at least the next 2 months… until my body gets used to it. There’s no sugar coating this- it’ll suck and, at some point, it won’t.

4- Coffee’s got to go.

This one… pains me. Coffee is my cup of joy (mainly because by the time I put Coffeemate and sugar in the raw in, it’s turned into a piece of coffeecake) and here’s the problem- every coffee I drink is literally a piece of cake I’m NOT eating AND too much caffeine in my system turns my sleep to crap. So… since sleeping soundly and getting 7 hours of sleep a night is KEY to building muscle, the coffee (gulp) has got to go. I’ll still have caffeine supplements in my life so there’ll be pep in my step but my venti Americano with room for lots of cream and sugar- yeah, that’s gone as of this Thursday, January 21st. I’m having LOTs of coffee between now and then. #justsayin

5- Between business and working out, I have NO TIME to socialize.

I’m not much of a social person in general but I always feel bad when people invite me to meet up and I have to say “No, I’m too busy this quarter and next quarter and, oh, by the way, I work out 3-4 hours a day 6 days a week and can’t hang out… ever.” Here’s the reality: I have built no time in my life to socialize and, with COVID still being around, that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

But here’s the other deal- I’m not going to have time to socialize for the next 862 days either. A- Once I start eating fitness competition prep style on January 21st, there will be no such thing as going out to dinner (Goodbye sushi! I’ll miss you dearly!), B- I live in the country and it takes me 20 minutes each way to go into town (I’m not wasting 40 minutes sitting on my booty when I could be working out for that amount of time) and C- I simply don’t have time for anything that isn’t growing my bank account, my booty, or my self-confidence. Period. And it’s not the nice response and I’d love to socialize a little bit more (just a little) but, right now, my focus is on achieving the goal of getting to IFBB Bikini Pro by 50 and I’m now 43 with a lot of body fat to lose so I can’t afford to waste time on things not centered on that goal.

So what’s the lesson? There’s a lot of sacrifice involved with getting to any major goal. Period. So many people are going to say “Let it be easy. Just flow with it.” Things are easy AND they flow when you have a system, when you follow the system, and when you don’t deviate… and there’s a ton of sacrifice in doing all three. So… that’s where I’m at on Day 862… and I have today and tomorrow to eat good food and then on Thursday, January 21, 2021… well… goodbye yummy foods, hello goals. #timetohandleit