What's up guys? Shaun Kober here of the Live Train Perform podcast.
Over the next two weeks while I launch this podcast, I'm going to be dropping one episode per day, then I'm going to drop back to one episode per week. The first episode is an introductory episode explaining who I am, my background, my knowledge, my experience. The second episode is all about goal setting, that's going to be followed up by progress tracking, then building habits, doing the things that you enjoy doing, consistency, restricting temptation and meal preparation, accountability, CRAP foods, getting started and building momentum, along with hierarchy of value, motivation direction, and the effect of your environment.
Now, if you go back and listen to each one of those topics again, they are all relevant for optimizing your performance and your everyday life. It's not just to do with health and fitness. Yes, I am a strength and conditioning coach, that is my background, that is my specialization. However, I'm a coach first and foremost and I need to optimize the other 23 hours of the day so that I can get the most out of my clients for that one hour that I'm with them.

I'll also be answering some of my followers questions that have posted questions on my Q and A memes, and I'm going to incorporate those answers into the pertinent episodes. Yo what is up guys? Welcome to the next episode in this two week launch series. During this episode, we are going to be discussing all things consistency and what that entails. How can we build consistency into our lives and how can we put processes in place, positive processes that are going to allow us to move in the right direction. In the last episode I spoke about habits that can either take you in a positive direction, or habits that can take you in a negative direction. So today we're gonna be talking about how to implement positive processes into our daily schedule and then how to build consistency around them. Alrighty, let's get started.

Long term consistency always trumps short term intensity. I always get people asking me, hey man, you're in really good shape, how do I get a body like you? How can I be disciplined like you? How can I do these things that you're doing? And my answer always leaves them wanting. Because my answer is, well, I've been in the gym, I've been training consistently for 20 years. So that's where the secret is. You've got to do something consistently over time, day after day, week after week, month after month to reap the benefits from it. If you're not doing something consistently, then you're not going to be able to build the patterns. You're not going to be able to build the discipline and all of these other processes that contribute to long term success. Consistency is king.
An average nutrition and training plan followed consistently will yield much better results than the best program that money can buy, followed intermittently to achieve results. First we need the desire to achieve something to want to move in a positive direction, then we need the discipline to be able to implement action.

All right, then we need to do these things over and over and over again, even when you don't feel like doing them, this is how you build consistency into your lives and consistency over time creates habits. Once you can rely on your habits, then you don't have to rely on motivation, motivation is fleeting and should not be relied upon when it's there, of course implement it, use it to use it as a tool to give you a kick up the arse and get yourself moving. But once that motivation disappears, consistency and your habits that have been created from the consistency are what remains and that's what's going to get you through over the long term. All right, so I love to travel and I've done quite a bit over the last few years, particularly once I got out of the army in 2012 from 2013 until 2017 when I moved to Thailand, I pretty much ran my business, my PT business for eight or nine months of the year and then I went traveling for 3-4 months every year and it was awesome too. Kind of get away and um switch off and take an objective your life and um, you know, get away from the things that I was so close to, that didn't give me the overall bird's eye view of what I want to do.

But anyway, when I was traveling, people would always say, man, you always come back in really good shape, like how does this happen? and one I had the desire to continue training because training for me makes me fucking feel good, so I'm going to make sure that I prioritize that and I'm gonna add that into my day somewhere, right? Then the action comes along when I went and bought myself a set of rings. So whenever I travel, I've got a set of gymnastics rings, I take a band, I take a skipping rope and I'll take a lacrosse ball and I can literally do everything that I need to do with my little mini travel bag. Now, when I was traveling, I always set some rules for myself when I was on the road. Some of these were that I didn't allow myself to drink alcohol unless I'd train that day. Another rule was I couldn't have a treat every day, meaning, you know, drinks or desserts or shitty food that I knew was shitty, that wasn't great for me, and I wasn't allowed to have that stuff unless I exercise that day, so it was kind of like a little bit of a reward. Now, I didn't use that all the time, but it was a rule that I put in place for myself to ensure that I'd at least done some training before I had some dessert or treated myself.

Another rule that I had when I was training was that I was not allowed to go more than two days in a row without getting some exercise in and walking around the city did not count unless I'd covered at least 15 kilometers. This meant that I had to plan ahead and have a look at what we're planning over the next couple of days. If I knew that we had a flight or we had a, you know, 10 to 12 hour bus trip or something like that, then I needed to fucking have a look ahead and make some plans um and not use that as an excuse that travel as an excuse to not do anything. All right. So an example of how I would do this is if I knew tonight where having some drinks and we're going to go and have a bit of a party and then tomorrow we've got a long bus ride or something like a flight or whatever, then I'm gonna make sure I'm going to get some good quality movement in today and I'm going to eat high quality, high nutrient dense foods that are going to be typically lowering calories so I can save my calories for my alcohol. Um and I'm getting some movement in. So I've kind of given myself that movement to allow myself to have that treat and let my hair down a little bit.

Now, if I've got a um a long bus ride tomorrow, for example, then I'm going to do some strength, stability, power based work, some skill development today, then I'm going to get on the piss tonight. Then tomorrow I'm up early, I'm traveling or whatever, I'm going to make sure that once I get on the other side I can either have that as a rest day because I've trained today, then I can have tomorrow is a rest day and then if we're walking around checking out the city the following day, then I know I need to get some training in the day after. But This is where I used different modalities. Um where if I've been sitting on a bus for say 10 hours, which was fairly common traveling throughout India and Nepal and stuff, then I'd make sure that once we got to the other end and we checked into our guest house or whatever, I'd make sure I'd get in some mobility training. So, you know, I've been sitting on my ass for 10 hours or whatever reading. So I'm gonna make sure I get some form of movement in and that's typically going to be some stretches, some mobility based work, some soft tissue work or I might be looking to loosen up my hip flexes and uh, you know, the my pecs and my delts those muscles that our flexes at the front of our body that basically pull us into a flexed, rounded position if we spend a lot of time again comes back to consistency.

If you spend a lot of time doing something, your body is going to adapt to that. So once I get on the other side, then we do some soft tissue work, loosen up my flexes have a stretch, then I might do some activation work for my extensive is so typically in my glutes and hamstrings and then my room boys, my lats, my lower traps and all of those muscles that are going to pull my shoulder um back into good alignment and create good posture. All right. So using different modalities at different times is an excellent way of breaking up your day, which I'm going to talk about on this episode very shortly. All right, so a very simple way that I used to break this up when I was traveling. And this is something that I've actually started implementing now that we're in quarantine and you know, we're having these monotonous days where we're locked inside and we can't really do too much just to break the day up. I've actually started implementing this During my quarantine time right now. Um but I did this, I first started doing this when I started traveling and that was break my training sessions up throughout the day. So an example of this might be when I get up first thing in the morning, I was dating a yoga teacher at the time, so we might do a little bit of yoga like 10, 15 minutes work or some foam rolling.

I had a lacrosse ball at the time. So I used that to do some soft tissue work, might have a stretch, might go for a little bit of a walk, get some fresh air, get some sunshine, just get some basic movement and whilst I listened to a podcast, alright then, later on in the day, if we were hanging around down on the beach, then, you know, I'd find a pole or a tree or um you know, just use my environment. I'd take my rings down, I'd set my rings up on a tree on the beach and I just do some skill development work where I might just do 10, 15, 20 minutes of strength and stability based work. Then later on the day I might go down back down to the beach again and do a sprint session on the beach or there might be a hill in the area where I might go and do some hill sprints or might just go for a long, slow jog in the afternoon. So it's kind of breaking my days up and getting my exercise in throughout the day. Now, this is exactly what I'm doing during my quarantine time right now. Okay, my motivation has been lacking a little bit, even as a strength and conditioning coach. Um I do still have a schedule and it's pretty consistent, pretty solid. But you know, my training has taken a back seat in favor of recording podcasts and doing study, reading and listening to podcasts and things like that.

So um I've started implementing this again this week. I've still been doing it fairly consistently, but nowhere near as hasn't been as important as it was when the gym was open. All right, so what I'm, what I'm looking at today is again this morning I went and did some laps in my pool, luckily I live in a complex and my pools open. I've got a sauna as well which is open. So I got some light movement in 20 minutes of light swimming, sat in the sauna had a stretch uh and you know, did some meditation, so that starts my day on the right foot and that's more recovery based. Um you know, mobility uh and I'm prioritizing that recovery and that meditation, that mindfulness and that mindset and that light movement to get my blood flowing and all that type of stuff. So I typically neglect my mobility work when I'm at the gym, I'll do a little bit before my training session. But I've really prioritized that now that I'm sitting at home and I've got the time to stretch and implement soft tissue work and um you know, some yoga drills and some mobility flow exercise and things like that, so that's my priority and I've blocked that into a 20 minute block 1st.

1st thing in the day. Alright then later on in the day I'm gonna do some strength based work. My strength based work might be on the rings, which I'll hang up from a tree, then I or I might do some kettlebell based work or I might do some gymnastics based work where I'm doing some tumbles, some handstands, some cart wheels or whatever. Okay, so this is all about moving, slow moving, controlled, practicing the skill of movement, then later on in the afternoon and then I'm gonna do some conditioning base work. The conditioning is all about keep it super simple and might just be some skipping, it might be some hill sprints, might be a long slow jog or some crossfit stole sessions, some body weight based hit sessions, et cetera. Now I've got 3 20 minute blocks there and I'm prioritizing them. Block one is my first priority, which is my mobility based work. Block two is all about my strength skill, stability work, then block three is all about my conditioning, right? So even if I only do one block throughout the day because I'm not feeling it, Then at least I'm getting the most important thing done throughout the day.

And if I only do that 20 minutes for the entire week and I don't do any of my strength and skill based work and I don't do any of my conditioning based work, then I'm happy with that. Something is always better than nothing and that's the point, consistency is about working with your energy levels and finding what you can do at any given time regardless of your energy levels. So finding something that you enjoy doing is absolutely critical, particularly during this time here. All right. If you're looking at a one hour training session and you just really could not be fucked, then you're not going to do it Alright. Much better off just going right. I'm going to block out 3 20 minute sessions throughout the day. I'm going to focus on different training modalities through those blocks. I'm going to prioritize what's most important to me and if I just do one of them, then at least that 20 minutes is better than nothing. All right, So you're much better off doing something that's important to that. You actually enjoy doing that, you're going to be able to do day after day consistently over time. Why is consistency so important? One consistency allows for measurement and accountability until you've tried something new for a period of time and in a consistent manner?

You can't decide if it works or not? How do you measure effectiveness? If what you're measuring isn't performed consistently in line with this is the accountability aspect, You can't eat solid for a day and then wonder why you haven't lost weight. Okay, you need to be accountable to yourself and others. If you are to truly reap the benefits of engaging in a new goal or routine regime, okay, This is where consistency gives you these tangible results that you can measure over time to see if you're moving in the right direction and okay, a lot of people bounce around from training program to training program, nutrition plan, to nutrition plan. They wonder why nothing works well. You didn't give it any fucking time to elicit the results. If you don't follow the program, the program doesn't work. Number two, consistency creates habits. If you do something long enough and consistently enough, you will be able to do these things almost on autopilot. This can be a great thing if you're creating habits that aligned with your goals. But this can also be a double edged sword and sabotage your efforts. If you consistently put things off, make excuses or simply don't put positive processes in place that can help you achieve whatever it is that you would like to okay, consistency also establishes your reputation.

We all know that someone says they're going to lose weight, start eating better, go to the gym or even just show up to a birthday party, but never does after a certain amount of time we realized that what this person says and what they actually do are two different things. If people know you for backing out on your work trust is diminished on the flip side. If you consistently do what you're going, what you say you're going to do, you build report and the people know that they can count on you, they can trust you. They know that you're fucking word is your promise. And when you say you're going to do something, you're going to follow up on that. All right. Set some rules and guidelines. You'll be more inclined to stick to your own rules and guidelines than someone else's. So, to recap that, okay, long term consistency beat short term intensity, prioritize what needs to be done in line with your goals and your values do something that you enjoy so that you can do that consistently and consistency creates habit. All right, you need to rely on the habits, you need to rely on the consistency and the discipline to do that to push yourself in the right direction.

Now, when it comes to health and fitness and particularly movement, it's I can't stress enough how important it is to choose something that you actually enjoy doing okay, because I'll discuss this in one of the final episodes in the two week launch series, but there's something called motivation direction, this is where we're either moving towards something or we're moving away from something again, I'll discuss this in a lot more detail. But essentially, if you're moving away from something like you're simply, you know, I just want to I'm fucking overweight right now and I want to get away from here. Once you're far enough away from there, then you stop, okay, that can be a good place to provide motivation to get started and start pushing in the right direction, but a better way of looking at motivation and direction is looking at moving towards something. Now, consider this. If you're one of those people that fucking hates exercise, guess what you're not going to do after a hard day at work, you're not going to fucking exercise. All right? But if you actually enjoy exercise and you like going to the gym and you like lifting weights, then go and lift weights.

If you like running, then go and run. If you like swimming, go and swim, okay? It doesn't matter what it is, choose a fucking modality of movement and that's the thing. It's movement. Just move. It doesn't have to be strength, it doesn't have to be cardio. It doesn't have to be hammering yourself at the gym every single day, okay, do something that you actually look forward to that you enjoy that leaves you feeling good. All right now, some people are adrenaline addicts, They fucking their adrenaline junkies. They just love getting into the gym and absolutely hammering themselves into the ground and yes, that's going to give them, you know, this endorphin rush, they're going to uh this physiological change. All right. But if that leaves you fuck for the rest of the day, then that's not really serving you, is it? All right? So looking at things that you actually enjoy doing is absolutely essential for building that consistency. If you looking forward to something then everything else in your day feels lighter and it gives you something to um drive towards, it gives you something to even when shit's going downhill and things aren't going to plan throughout the day, at least you get to look forward to something later on in the day or if you prefer do that thing that you enjoy first thing in the morning.

I know for me I prefer to exercise first thing in the morning because it gives me energy, it makes me feel good, it makes me feel sharp, you know, I'm not smashing myself into the ground because that leaves me fucked. And this is what I used to do when I was in the army actually when I was in the army, you know, we would do PT first thing in the morning, we would parade and then from 7 30 until 9 30 we'd have two hours to basically go and do physical training in our sections, in our platoons, in our teams, et cetera. Uh And then we'd have breakfast and go back down to the hangers, draw, draw weapons and go through skills and drills for the rest of the day. But during the P. T. Sessions like where all fucking soldiers, we would absolutely hammer ourselves into the ground. Everything was a competition. It was like let's see who can put themselves the deepest in the fucking pain cave every day when I lived on base, there were days when I would literally be walking back to my room and I would pull the key out of my pocket in my fucking arms are shaking and I couldn't even unlock the door because I've done so much work now, I enjoyed that. I got a lot out of it, built a mental toughness and resilience, but it also fucked me for the rest of the day.

So it's dose dependent. Yeah, you've got to do things that you enjoy that you like doing, but you've got to make sure that it's not impacting anything else in your day. Okay, exercise or movement should be complimenting your day, it should be adding to your day, not taking away from it. So finding that balance of knowing when to push and knowing when to pull back is absolutely critical. I have discussed the autonomic nervous system in one of the progress tracking episodes, but I will dive a lot lot deeper into that in a future episode, but basically we need to balance our autonomic nervous system, were knowing when to push hard, knowing when to pull back is important, okay, and this is where the different modalities come into play. If my body is under stress and I've had a really tough day, you know, most people go to the gym, they want to hammer themselves, you're probably better off doing some mobility base work, some recovery base work, maybe getting a massage, going to the sauna doing an ice bath and things like that and then you know, the next day if you're having a good day at work and everything's going to plan and you're super productive, then get to the gym and get after it.

All right. So we need to balance our stress levels out and we need to focus on what is going to be most important to us at the time and this is where the different tools come into play. Okay, the more tools I have in my toolbox, the more options I've got to apply at the appropriate time in the next episode, we're going to stick with the theme of consistency. However, I'm going to be answering some of my followers questions who have posted comments on my Q and a memes, which you'll find on most social media platforms. Social media is at codes K O B E S underscore pft is instagram, facebook is performance functional training and my Youtube channel is also at performance functional training. Let's get it. If you enjoy the content that I'm bringing to you guys, please help me spread the message and life save, share and subscribe and pass this off to your friends, your family, anyone that's relevant in your life that it Could potentially help and please make sure you leave a five star rating and review much love guys, please