The goal of permanent lifestyle change needs to be foremost in your mind for the next several months, perhaps even years, until healthy diet and exercise become second nature. Make the commitment that no matter what happens this is something that you aren’t going to give up on. You’ve likely heard many tales of people who lost a bunch of weight then quickly regained it, and that is because they didn’t have the goal of permanent lifestyle change foremost in their minds. It isn’t just about achieving fat loss and a muscular build, and it goes beyond sustaining it as well. It is about creating an entirely new person for you to live inside for the rest of your life.

Do’h! I’m starting to cheese it up a bit and I promised I wouldn’t do that. Let’s get down to business, shall we?

You’ve probably heard this one before. There is some disagreement as to what the acronym stands for, but I’ll just give you my preferred version of what SMART goals are for getting in shape:

• Specific
• Measurable
• Actionable
• Relevant
• Timely

Specific and Measurable – let’s throw these two together into some examples:

• Number of times you will workout in a week
• Length of training session (number of minutes)
• Number of miles you will run in a week
• Number of miles you will be able to run two months from now
• Number of pounds you will be able to bench press a few months from now
• Number of pounds of fat you will lose
• Number of pounds of muscle you will gain
• Number of abdominal muscles you will be able to see

Actionable – this is sort of a “well, duh” to the above. Other purveyors of the SMART method call this one “attainable” and the R is “realistic.” Excuse me if those two don’t sound pretty similar. Actionable means that there is something you can do to achieve it. If you have a goal to grow two inches taller you’re screwed because there is no action you can take to make that happen unless you’re still a kid. If, however, your goal is to grow two inches on your chest, there is action you can take to make that happen.

Relevant – I prefer this to “Realistic” because it is a broader term so that short and long-term goals all work together. If your short-term goal for today is to go bench 45 pounds 50 times, is that realistic? Well, yes. You can do it, but is it relevant to your goal of growing a bigger and stronger chest? Not really. Benching 155 pounds ten times (short-term goal) would be far more relevant to your longer-term goals.

Timely – others say “Time-bound,” but I am leery of doing that with long-term goals because I don’t want you to get frustrated. Chances are that achieving your goals is going to take longer than you think, and if it doesn’t happen on some arbitrary time schedule you’ve created then it might piss you off and cause you to quit. Let’s call them “timely” instead because you are looking at reaching your goals in a reasonable amount of time. You get to decide what “reasonable” is.

Short-term goals are easily made timely: “I will run fives miles, three times during the next seven days.” Now either you do it or you don’t, but with longer-term goals it gets harder and harder to predict what you will be able to achieve in a given amount of time. It also runs the risk of making you obsessive about achieving those goals which is a recipe for long-term failure via burnout (see Chapter [coming soon] on the difference between harmonious passion and obsessive passion). It is okay to put dates on longer-term goals to keep you moving forward, but don’t get all bent out of shape if you aren’t on schedule. Focus on the fact that you are making progress and then continue to do so. As long as you are moving in a forward direction, eventually you will reach your destination. Remember that two steps forward and one step back still results in a step forward.

As you might have guessed, there are two basic types of goals you need to set: short and long-term. Short-term are more task-oriented, and long-term are more health, performance and visual related.

As I already explained, forget about looking hot in the short term. Patience is the ultimate virtue when it comes to getting in shape. Still, you need daily, weekly and monthly goals to aim for, achieve and surpass.

Short-term goals are constantly changing. As you build strength, endurance, passion and willpower you will set higher standards for your short-term goals. Here are some examples of early stage ST goals:

• I will lift weights twice this week
• I will do 20 minutes of aerobic training this week
• I will cut liquid Calories in half this week
• I will not eat any Doritos this week
• I will go to sleep without a before-bed snack at least once this week

As you progress, your ST goals get more ambitious:

• I will lift weights three times this week
• I will run 12 miles this week
• I will have only eight alcoholic drinks this week
• I will only have three junk food snacks this week
• I will eat smaller portions at dinner four times this week

Then, when you've transformed into a diet-conscious workout warrior your ST goals become aggressive:

• I will lift weights four to five times this week, and I will royally kick ass doing it. I will be focused and intense
• I will run at least 20 miles this week, and probably more
• Junk food is an oxymoron. It is only allowed in my diet on rare occasions.
• Almost everything I eat this week will be healthy: a wide variety of fruits and vegetables, whole grains, and lean meats and low-fat dairy
• I will have four or fewer alcoholic drinks this week
• I will count Calories and focus on creating a significant caloric deficit six days this week

I had to smirk while writing that last scenario because I just scarfed a handful of potato chips and am drinking a beer right now. However, I also ran seven miles today and lifted weights for almost an hour. Even with that second beer waiting for me in the fridge I’m on target to create a caloric deficit of about 1,000 Calories today.

Long-term goals are anything longer than a month in the future, although I’ll admit that it’s an arbitrary length of time I just pulled out of my ass. The reason I choose a month is it’s roughly the minimum amount of time it takes to notice any kind of significant difference in the way you look, feel or perform.

You don’t need to keep your eyes solely on your ultimate goals. For example, right now you might only be able to run a mile, but in a month that could be three miles. In another three months after that you might regularly run five miles. You may have a beach vacation coming in six months and have some realistic ideas of how you’re going to look and feel better by then and yet another longer-term goal for the following year where you’re going to have a body like a fitness model.

These ones may or may not change. The first bit of advice is to aim high. Look at a picture from a magazine of a guy you want to look like and keep this vision in the back of your mind that eventually you will achieve it, even though you may decide later that genetically you can't, or it just requires too many sacrifices and you're willing to settle for achieving 80% or 90% of your long-term visual goal. Pick an image where, if you only make it 80% of the way, you’re still happy with what you’ve achieved.

Really, there isn't anything wrong with settling short of your ultimate vision. It's true that the effort required to obtain the physique of 300's King Leonidas is tremendous. You can be healthy and look great without having washboard abs.

Here are some examples of health related long-term goals:

• I will have a total cholesterol level below 180 (4.66)
• I will have greatly increased energy
• I will sleep like a rock every night and bounce out of bed alert and ready to eat nails
• I will be an insatiable sex machine
• I will feel good about myself and have a positive, happy attitude about life
• I will be a super dad who can wrestle for hours with my kids
• I will enjoy diet and exercise, but not allow myself to become obsessed with it
• I will be more mentally alert
• I will be significantly better at the sports I participate in
• People will ask me to open stubborn jars and lift heavy things for them because they know I can

Short-term goals are the ones that need to be the most realistic. You want to do your best to achieve them each and every week. The long-term goals are more flexible. Set ambitious goals and try your best to reach them, but don't beat yourself up if you can't or decide that you're not willing to do what it takes to go quite that far. Find a visual look and level of health and performance that you are happy with and can sustain over the long term.

Now that you know all about goal setting, I want to report on the “Yale Study of Goals.” This states that:

• “The 1953 graduating class at Yale was interviewed.
• 3% had written specific written goals for their futures. 
• 20 years later, that 3% was found to be worth more financially than the other 97% combined. “¹ 

This seems like a pretty convincing argument for writing down your goals, except for the fact that it is complete and utter bullshit. No such study ever existed.² Nevertheless, several self-styled motivational gurus have perpetuated this urban myth, including Tony Robbins, Zig Ziglar, and even Body-for-LIFE creator Bill Phillips, except Phillips didn’t even get the name of the nonexistent study correct. He used the exact same details, except in his telling it was Harvard, not Yale.³  

Write it Down… or Don’t
Just because the study never happened doesn’t mean the idea is without merit, however. My advice is to do what you want. If you think writing down your goals is going to help you achieve them, then knock yourself out. I’ve never written down a single thing. Even though I asserted in Chapter 2 that keeping a written record of progress assists with exercise adherence (writing down progress is not the same thing as writing out your goals), and I do encourage you to keep an exercise journal, I will admit that it is something that I have never done. 

There is one simple reason why I’ve never kept track of my progress in a journal: I have an excellent memory and I store it in my head. Also, I hate hauling anything other than a water bottle around the gym because it is one more thing to keep track of. Taking breaks to write stuff down would interfere with super-setting as well (more on that later). Okay, I guess I have three reasons why I don’t do it.  So, write down your goals or don’t. Just make sure you set them, and make them SMART.


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1. Stephen Kraus, “Self-Help Snake Oil and Self-Improvement Urban Legends.” Online article: http://www.psychotherapy.net/article/Self_Help_Snake_Oil
2. Lawrence Tabak, “If Your Goal is Success, Don’t Consult These Gurus,” Fast Company Magazine, December, 1996. Online article: http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/06/cdu.html
3. Stephen Kraus, “Self-Help Snake Oil;” Bill Phillips and Michael D’Orso, Body-for-LIFE (New York: Harper Collins Publishers, 1999), p. 26.