The following is a rerun of a popular blog I did many months ago. To those who are foundering with their challenge right now, this might be just what they needed to save all their hard work from failure!

DID YOU KNOW that I am psychic? Not really! I don’t really believe in a

lot of that stuff, but I do have some powers that help me a lot. For

example, I can tell you exactly how your day is going to go today if

you show me just one thing—your written exercise plan, goals, and meal

plan for the day.

“Ha!” you say. “I don’t have one, so now what are you going to tell

me?” Well, for starters, I’m going to tell you that your day is

probably going to be frustrating, unproductive, and unrewarding. Body

for Life in an overall perspective is a great adventure, but on a day

to day basis it is a carefully executed plan—a war plan if you will.

Good generals don’t win battles and wars just by their wits; they win

them by knowing the enemy; knowing the territory and terrain; knowing

their own strengths and weaknesses; knowing military strategy and

history; and putting them all together into a carefully crafted and

detailed plan. They then gather all field commanders and make sure that

everyone understands the plan, buys into it, understands his exact role

in the plan; and has the resources and abilities to execute his part of

it. No good leader gets up in the morning, gathers up his troops, and

says, “let’s start out and we’ll make this up as we go!” That’s not

leadership—that’s disaster.

You, as the commanding officer of your challenge, have exactly the same

responsibilities. You must know yourself, know the elements of the

challenge, the exercises and the diet, and you must have a carefully

crafted plan to execute it. You must know the enemy—which includes the

old you by the way; and you must know your strengths and weaknesses and

act accordingly. If you don’t have a plan for today, I think I know

where we can start with your list of strengths and weaknesses. Put down

on the weakness side of the ledger “Need to get organized.”

This all sounds too obvious, but truly you would be stunned to see how

many people come to the website in a big tizzy, never read the book,

ask a bunch of questions, join a gym, and then just “start” without a

clue as to how to really do this. Of course, the ultimate result is a

quick dropout, and I doubt that is you, if you are reading this blog.

Still, it applies to all of us—that trite but true old phrase—”Fail to

plan? Plan to fail.”