Well it has been a while since I have posted and after recently finishing Stephen R. Covey’s book on the 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, I thought it would be appropriate to write about some of my reflections after reading the book and coming off a very relaxing weekend with my wife as we celebrated our 10 year anniversary. That's us above. I will preface this by saying that the views and beliefs in here are solely that of me based on my learning’s from the book. No one paid me to say any of this.As a triathlete, we are often perceived (and note that I said perceived but not necessarily ARE) to be some of the most highly effective people around. But in my travels and discussions with other athletes, along with my own personal experiences, it is amazing to me how many of us are just the contrary. See most don’t have a structured program (let alone a high level plan) around their training and racing and in most cases don’t have a clue about what we are spending our time on. We have no clue as to what the most important things we need to focus on (or if we do we are ignoring them) to improve to have a successful season. The demographics are showing that 30-55 year olds are making up the largest population of triathletes. This means that one can only assume that most will likely own a home, have a spouse and most likely children. On top of that we have full-time jobs and all the time consuming commitments that go along with the above. Add on the fact that in order to be successful at triathlon we need to be able to swim, bike, run, strength train and most importunately REST on a consistent basis. As one may conclude, most if not all available time in a given day has now been consumed. Bottomline, we are BUSY!!!! If only there were 25 or 26 hours in a day I know my life would be a lot easier to manage. So the question becomes how to make use of what little time there is in the day and make it the most effective while staying balanced across all the roles we play in life?I am of the belief that we are all natural born procrastinators. Meaning, we will put off spending time on the things that often times push us outside of our comfort zone. In a society today where every minute counts we should only be spending time on the things that will help us improve. Unfortunately, the majority of those things cause us discomfort as they are outside of what we are normally used to or comfortable doing. I have found that these types of activities will always be put on the back burner if they are not written down and staring at us constantly reminding us of our bigger plan. Now I won’t say that this is everyone but for the vast majority of us from time to time (including yours truly), this is the case. Gentle reminders of what is important are always important to insure we stay on track and balanced around our life goals. With all that said, I thought I would take the first 3 of the 7 habits and give my point of view on how they can be utilized for time sensitive folks to effectively plan their triathlon training and season goals (not to mention overall life goals) so that they can be the most effective at what they do. But I should discuss one more issue before I get into that. It is around change and growth. In order to grow we need to change our behaviors. If there is something in our lives that we don’t like, we change it and from there we have grown. But the need for change has to be acknowledged for it all to work. No change = no growth. Pretty simple.Ok…on to the habits.
1. Be Proactive – This is the first habit and is based on the mindset that change starts from within. In order to be highly effective you must make the decision to improve through the things you can influence versus reacting to external forces outside of your control. I always hear athletes after a race coming up with a whole bunch of excuses why they did not hit their goal time. And while some external factors are valid reasons (ie: wind, weather, traffic, etc…), what it really boils down to is the athlete was not proactive in their training to improve the things limiting them in the first place. They did not reflect on the past and put a plan in place for the future. They just went on and did the same thing they were used to doing (in some cases more because that = better) and hoped for a different result which by the way is the classic definition of insanity. My recommendation is this, sit down right now and identify your limiters. You all have a pretty good idea of what they are. Write them down. You are 50% there. Put them some place where you can see them. Now, incorporate them into your training plan. Every thing you do should be geared towards improving them. When you do, you have upped the bar. That is being proactive. You have identified that change needs to happen and by writing it down you now have something to work on. This is the first step to set you up for success.
2. Begin with the End in Mind – The second habit is based on a principle based personal mission statement extended into long term goals based on your personal principles. We all deep down know the person we want to be. Take a moment and look ahead 5, 10, or even 20 years. Put yourself in that place and now reflect on what it actually looked like in the years prior. That is your legacy. That is how you will be remembered if by no one else but YOU. Put a plan in place now for the future so that when you look back on it you acted on it in a manner that you would want yourself to been seen as. This can bode the same for your training and racing goals. If your ultimate goal is to go to Hawaii, well by all means start with that in mind. Now you can start to BE PROACTIVE towards that end goal. I encourage you to write down your end goals and then back into it with a personal mission statement that is based on personal principles that will serve as your charter to get you there. Guess what? You now have a plan.
3. Put First Things First – This third habit is based on the mindset of spending time on the things that fit your personal mission statement while observing the time spent building production and capacity to ensure it is balanced. Basically, this is where you identify the key roles you play in life and start to make time for each of them. You should again write these down and prioritize them in the grand scheme of life. Now, undoubtedly the role of triathlete is on there. So take that and figure out how much time you have to spend on that role as it correlates to your longer term goals. Now write down your personal mission statement and long term goals and underneath them write your limiters that you have identified by being PROACTIVE. Those limiters are the things that you put first when you have your triathlete hat on. You will have a list of things that go along with each role you play in life. Always put the most important ones first. If you have to choose one over the other, choose the one that will get you to your goals. For example, let’s say that my limiter this year is running off the bike. I concluded that I needed to run more off the bike but also that I needed to ride more so that I was not so spent coming off the bike. Now let’s say that the day got away from me and now I only have 1 hour to play the role of triathlete but the plan today called for a 30 min swim and a 90 minute ride. Guess which one I am going to choose? That’s right, I choose the ride. One might think I would choose the swim because I only have an hour but not so…I shorten the ride to 60 minutes because it is aligned to my goals. I have a few simple guidelines when training and one of them is the ‘something is better then nothing’ rule. By making whatever minutes you have count and putting your efforts towards the most productive activities, you are putting first things first, being proactive and keeping with the end game in mind.
I am now off to my son’s swim practice. It looks like I am going to have to skip that run tonight that I had originally planned because life caught up with me today. But I did get that ride in this morning which was the more important of the 2 workouts (hence why I did it first). I am a firm believer that there must be balance across all the roles we play in life for there to be overall effectiveness. I guess I am on my way to becoming a more highly effective person and triathlete. There will be more to come on the other 4 habits in a future post.
Until then, happy training
