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- 🏋️‍♂️ Zero to 244 days straight of exercise
🏋️‍♂️ Zero to 244 days straight of exercise
Adam Ratigan's oober-simple fitness challenge that changed everything

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⚡️ Estimated read time: 1 minute 27 seconds.
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My friend Adam Ratigan recently posted on Facebook that he’d just finished 30 minutes on the stair stepper machine at the gym. (at level 13 difficulty)
Several months ago, he barely lasted 13.5 minutes at level 7.
What changed?
I called him up yesterday to ask him exactly that!
Here’s the highlights from our conversation:
(heads up, it gets juicer with every question!)
Q1: How many days in a row have you exercised now?
A: I am just finishing 8 months (244 days)
Q2: What was your initial goal?
A: My initial goal was never numeric, it was more of an idea. I just wanted to be in better shape, and I was tired of chasing the kids around the house and being exhausted after 3 minutes or walking up a flight of stairs and being out of breath.
Q3: What did the process look like to go from not working out daily, to not missing a day?
A: I was expressing the need to work out every day, so Monique challenged me to a competition and we got a point for every day we worked out. So I started working out every day to win the competition - she activated the competitive side which is very strong in me! So that was the start of it. I set a goal to work out 6 days a week, I still take a sabbath.
Q4: Can you tell me more about the competition? Was there a prize or timeframe around it?
A: We had to be pretty strict with the rules cause I tend to try and find the workaround. So it was one point per day, you had to exercise for 30 minutes. There were no boundaries around what exercise meant, it was just about getting in physical activity. The first person to 20 or 30 points would win a prize - I honestly don’t even remember what the prize was cause for me it was way more about winning and less about the prize.
Q5: Any other strategies you used for accountability?
A: I put a calendar up on my wall at home and I put an X through every day that I work out. I’ve missed 3 days in 8 months. The lack of an X on those days is motivating - well, I guess it’s haunting and motivating at the same time!
Q6: So why and how did you keep going after the competition?
A: I think part of it was that the competition was designed to kickstart all of it anyway, so I always intended on continuing it after. And I also started the calendar thing during the competition, so that helped me continue with it after.
Q7: What, if any, challenges have you faced with staying consistent this many days in a row? How have you overcome those?
A: The first is thinking I was ever going to love it. I haven’t got there, and I don’t expect to. I was listening to an interview with Andrew Huberman and David Goggins, and he talks about how there’s a portion of the brain they’ve been recently studying that has to do with your ability to do things you don’t want to do. That portion of your brain physically grows in proportion to the number of things you do that you don’t want to do.
So even though you may never come to love those things, doing things you don’t want to do becomes easier because you’re repeatedly doing them.
So that was one of my challenges was expecting to learn to love it, and being able to overcome that was just realizing that that’s not necessarily how we’re wired. Sometimes we don’t like doing something, we may never like doing it, but we get into a rhythm and a habit of “I don’t like this, but I know that it’s best for me, so I’m going to keep doing it”.
So it was about not waiting for motivation to come, but just doing the thing that was hard to do.
The other challenge was that I tend to be pretty hard on myself in wanting to be perfect, so I’ve had to give myself a lot of grace. There’ve been days when I wake up late, and I don’t go to the gym I just do a workout at home or I go for a 30 minute walk later. And that’s okay! For me it’s about the consistency, regardless of the intensity.
Realizing that it’s okay not to be perfect, but that I still do something was the second breakthrough.
Q8: Any other tips that made a big difference for you to overcome obstacles that come up?
I do it first thing in the morning. I can’t fathom doing it at any other time of day. I wake up at 5 oclock, and that allows me to do it. If I didn’t wake up early, I wouldn’t get it done cause there’s just so many other things that happen during the day, that’s the time I work on things for my physical, emotional, and spiritual wellbeing.
With travel, it’s just been not giving myself an excuse not to, just because my schedule changed.
Having a system already in place for when things don’t go according to plan is important to stay consistent so that I still do something, even if it’s not what the ideal would look like.
Q9: What advice would you give someone who’s tried workout plans before but has struggled to stay consistent?
Make it simple. I think we overcomplicate things and we feel like our goals have to be grandiose, like I have to want to run a marathon but I haven’t even run in 10 years. So start small! Just decide “I’m going to run everyday”, even if it’s 100 yards, I’m gonna run everyday. Another thing with keeping it simple, I pack my gym bag the night before. Morning of, I don’t necessarily want to. It’s easier to do the night before. Remove all the obstacles you can!
Know what rewards fulfill you. For some people, it’s something fun. I don’t care if something is fun! I don’t care if the work around the house is fun or if my workout is fun. That does not motivate me at all. For my wife, that’s it! It’s important for her to have fun. For me, it’s about accomplishment and completion. Just seeing that X on the calendar is highly rewarding for me. Doing more pull-ups than last week? Highly rewarding to me. Seeing the progress on the stairmaster? Highly rewarding to me.
Motivation is false. We cannot create or destroy motivation. There’s nothing I can do to “feel motivated”. All I can do is choose to act. So my workout plan is actionable. It does not require motivation, it just requires me to do. Some days, all I can do is choose to do - and other days, it’s easy to choose. But I’m not waiting on motivation, because the model is in place, and I have concluded that I’m going to act on that model every day. Period! Not when I feel motivated, not when I want to. I’m not seeking motivation - I’m seeking action to do.
What do I love about this most?
Adam found what works for him.
The competition, the calendar, the repeatable workout plan that couldn’t care less about fun. This could be exactly the right thing for you, or it could be the worst.
But unless you’ve tried Adam’s strategies before, you’ll never know.
So pick just one or two things he shared, and try it out!
What ideas popped in your head while reading? Hit reply and let me know!
(And if you or someone you know has experienced an impressive physical, financial, emotional, or spiritual transformation, share with me your story to be considered for a future Habit Example!)
BRAIN SNACKS
🎶 What I’m living for (song)
👉 How to Build Willpower w/ Andrew Huberman & David Goggins (YouTube)
🙏 Don’t say please. Say this instead! (Habit Example from 1 year ago)
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My 5-year old: What’s faster than a motorcycle?
Me: A Lamborghini!
Her: What’s a clambergreeny?
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What did you think of today’s habit example? |
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- Kody
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P.S. These take 5 hours to research, write, and design. It only takes you 5 seconds to share.