Accountability Corner
Embark on an adventure with Darren, Morgan, and Chris, the dynamic trio steering the ship at "Accountability Corner." As passionate OCR enthusiasts, they're on a mission to share their expertise and enthusiasm for obstacle course racing with the world. From sharing insider tips on overcoming training plateaus to demystifying the complexities of race registration and gear selection, no stone is left unturned. Whether you're a seasoned competitor hungry for fresh perspectives or a newcomer eager to dip your toes into the muddy waters of OCR, these hosts are here to guide you every step of the way. Join them as they peel back the curtain on the electrifying world of OCR, revealing stories of triumph, camaraderie, and boundless adventure.
Don't miss out – tune in and discover why OCR is capturing hearts and minds around the globe!
Accountability Corner
#19: Small Steps to Personal Greatness and Life Balance
Ever wondered how some individuals manage to maintain an unwavering dedication to their goals, navigating life's ebb and flow with near-perfect consistency? This episode is your chance to unravel the secrets to that steadfast commitment, as we discuss how the simplest acts of consistency can forge the path to achieving personal greatness. We dive into the importance of sticking to a plan, how it shields us from injury and ensures a harmonious life balance.
Wrapping up, we chew the fat on the psychological aspects of habit formation and the art of bouncing back from setbacks. We shed light on the SMART approach to setting goals and how consistently chipping away at them, even when it feels impossible, is crucial to long-term success. So, if you're ready to get inspired and pick up strategies to stay the course—no matter the chaos around you—then this is one conversation you won't want to miss. Join us as we laugh, share, and support you on your journey to becoming the most consistent and accountable version of yourself.
Welcome to the accountability corner, where we talk about everything obstacle course racing, from staying disciplined in training, affording the sport, signing up for your first race and, more importantly, how the sport has grown around the world, with your hosts Morgan Maxwell, chris Shipley and Darren Martin.
Darren:So episode 19 of accountability corner. Let's get this under the way. How are you both?
Chris:Ripped.
Darren:What You're short been under, bob, why Well?
Chris:that's it, yeah, my bottom half, short, which is probably about as ripped as my top half now.
Darren:Okay, so you're feeling yourself in winter. You haven't got your winter coat on, like me and Moe have.
Chris:I'm outside all day, baby, so I don't feel cold.
Mo:How you know I'm good.
Darren:You just good.
Mo:I'm just good. I'm not great, I'm not, I'm not shit, I'm just like flat line Just getting stuff done.
Chris:I see you've been posting live pictures up on Instagram. Yeah, great captions underneath it just life, life, what is life? This is life.
Mo:I feel like people over complicate their captions.
Chris:I actually really enjoy little captions on Instagram because, one, it means I don't have to read it very long and, two, I think if you can explain everything in one word, then you've done a good job. I think I did that Because if I posted a picture of a cat and put cat, that is exactly what is. You know, it's exactly what said. I'm with you, I'm with.
Darren:This is exactly what I think, oh we're, we're gonna go so far with our social media reach, aren't we for accountants who don't know of you too? Accountability, that's all we're gonna say in our posts. Accountability To be fair.
Chris:it says everything it needs to say, doesn't it really it does a lot of people say it.
Darren:you know they're just spreading the good word of our podcast when they're saying it, aren't they?
Mo:The bad thing is now, every time someone says the word accountability call or accountability I always think of the podcast even if they definitely have no idea who I am or the podcast, and I always think, oh, maybe they know the podcast.
Darren:Everyone knows the podcast Mo. We do need we do need support from all our listeners to really spread the word. If you know someone in your life that needs a bit of accountability, this is the podcast to go to. And today's topic actually would be really, really interesting for people to listen to who aren't necessarily into OCR but just into general fitness or want to start a new sport or want to get into OCR. What are we talking about today? Shipps, your favorite topic.
Chris:I think it's one of the things that we say and talk about the most, and that is and it's also what I am the best at is consistency, consistency, consistency, consistency.
Darren:Consistency corner Enter, it just rolls off the tongue, doesn't it consistency?
Darren:It does and it means so much. I think a lot of people, when they look at consistency, they think it's just doing something over a long period of time in the same way, or or staying committed to a habit or or something that you've promised yourself. However, there's a lot to break down when it comes to consistency and how to actually build it, how to obtain it. How do I get consistent? How? What does consistent actually mean to me?
Darren:Like for this podcast, for instance, we have tried our best to say, stay consistent and releasing a podcast every two weeks and, yeah, we've had a little few dips here and there, but I feel like we we've actually been doing this for nine months now and we we have pretty much stayed consistent in what we promised. We haven't necessarily promised anything on Instagram, on social media, so we haven't really been consistent on that. So there is more to come on that, but I think we've done a good job of consistency, of bringing podcasts out. So, moe, I'm going to hand it over to you to give us a bit of insight. Don't necessarily need to go into too much detail, but just to kick us off. What does consistency mean to you in and outside of, probably, training and life?
Mo:So I've actually got it written down on my whiteboard in front of me. The only thing I need to say on this is consistency is king. So for me, consistency is above everything. It is the top of what we do, especially in from a sports kind of background. You have to be consistent, so consistency is king, consistency is top. That is the thing I get right first, and then everything else follows.
Darren:I like that. It's your foundation, it's the anchor that brings you, brings you to the motivation, the discipline, the extra percent in training, brings you to eating right. It's the main thing you always go back to If anything falls off the rails. Go back to consistency. Be consistent with something.
Mo:Start doing the little things right and then everything sort of follows. If they're consistent, then everything else starts to be a bit more consistent.
Darren:Ships. What does consistency mean to you?
Chris:Consistency means to me pretty much exactly the same, but it also means to stay consistent, means to stay injury free, to keep life in check, to keep goals at the top of being a goal and to, in fact, to be honest with you. Consistency means happiness to me a little bit, because the more consistent I am, the more happy I am, because I'm doing everything right. That makes me happy.
Darren:Like that. What about you? Consistency means to me keeping my promises to myself, to making sure that I am keeping the promise that I've said to myself of a goal or a purpose that I want to bring to my life. For instance, I want to make sure that I do train, I do keep fit and that is the main thing I want to keep to, and I've made that promise to myself to always be the person that keeps fit and is in the top shape, that best shape I can be. Therefore, that's consistency to me. So, keeping my promises to myself and making sure that I allow promises to drive me to be consistent. They lead one another.
Darren:I feel that consistency is great, but then you also need to have purpose, you need to have goals, and if I build those goals and then I stay consistent to them, like use ships, it builds happiness and fulfillment in my life. It's great to have, but I think also there's most that's amazing as well, which is it's small things but it's not huge things we went through. I think my algorithm on social media in a minute is a nightmare. It's really. I'm just directing people like David Goggins. David Goggins, all these people that are constantly telling me to be a better man, and it's just such a weird scenario to be in at the minute when there's so many of these extra 1% things you can do like oh, getting a sauna, I'll take this Sterragon. Oh, you need to be taking salt water in the morning all these little things.
Darren:But actually it doesn't come down to those things. It comes down to being consistent.
Chris:There's no magic pill, there's no secret sauce, there's no one trick thing you can do. The thing that actually makes you better out of all of those things is doing those things consistently.
Mo:You can't just buy in an ice bath and then think, oh, I'm going to be the fittest man on the world now, but you go on it twice. If you buy an ice bath, and that's what you want to do, stay committed to it, get in it every day and make that almost commitment to yourself a little bit.
Darren:Yeah, I think, be the person that's scared of making those promises to yourself, because you know that you're a person that's going to stay consistent. So as soon as you make that promise to yourself, it's like crap. I'm a consistent person, so now I actually I'm going to be doing that. That is why I feel like at times, I don't take up the 1% extra things, or I don't commit to more things to up my training or make me better in certain parts of my life, because I know if I do that, I've made that promise and I'm going to be consistent to it and therefore there's going to be other things that I might sacrifice for it.
Darren:Even like I think starting this podcast, to be honest with you, was one thing. I don't know if you guys went for it as well. Well, if I start this, we're all three of us in a similar mindset. We're going to continue to do it, we're going to make. We're going to continue to make this the best thing, but actually we need to really assess should we start it because we're consistent people, so it's going to take up a bit of our life.
Mo:Yep, and it has. We love it.
Darren:It helps. It helps talk through things like this, because I'm sure there's lots of people that we can relate to and there's lots of people out there that are finding it hard to build consistency or build or even coming off of like Christmas, want to get into sports, want to get into, want to get a little bit fitter, like what is the one thing that they need to build? It isn't a fitness base, it isn't a diet, it's a goal with consistent habits. That's what they need to build.
Chris:That's funny in there. We could actually end it there.
Darren:Yeah, be our quickest episode yet, but I think there's actually more substance to it and hopefully we can get into it. But we don't want to make it about OCR, because what we said when we who the what, the why of starting this podcast, there's going to be times when we don't talk about OCR. We just talk about actually how we as athletes, humans, are trying to just do the best in life we can do. And then also that has a good relation to OCR, because we want to build that as well, but we don't build consistency. We're not going to, we're not going to relate to people, we're not going to keep people wanting more in terms of podcasts or we're not going to give them the content they want, like people right now who listen to this podcast will probably be waiting every Saturday morning because they know we're going to be consistent with our releases.
Chris:Well, you'd like to think they are anyway.
Darren:Well, they are. They're waiting there, if they're consistent, like us.
Mo:They've been waiting on Spotify all week. They're consistently waiting Refreshing.
Chris:Refreshing.
Darren:Mo, how have you built it over the years? Because, let's be totally clear with everyone we have failed. We have assessed our failures. We've not been consistent in certain aspects of our lives. What do you go back to? Or how did this actually started that way? How did you build it first?
Mo:I think the main thing for me is having a clear goal or something I want to execute. So obviously for us, for most of us, OCR is that's my clear goal. So before that it was other sports and it was maybe a bench press number I wanted to hit, or there was always something to keep me consistent. But set a clear goal first and then from that you can then start to okay, now, this is how I need to be consistent. To do this, I need to show up every day, do this one thing, even like running, for example, you want to run 10K, just get out the door and run one day, then run the next day. It doesn't matter how far, but as long as there's a goal first, you can find consistency follows.
Chris:Yeah, I totally agree with you on that one. You definitely. I think you really really need that goal to start off with, because once that goal is there, it outlines sort of the road mapping, if you like, of how to be consistent or the things that you need to be consistent.
Mo:Yeah, I think it's hard to be consistent without a goal although you can be consistent without a goal in a way but it's just a lot harder.
Darren:I think everyone's got a goal. I think we just need to understand and break down what goals actually are. I think for us it's easy because goals are quite tangible things that we can clearly see. But actually someone's goal might just be to be fitter person, or a goal to just move more as long as they see that consistently happening, hopefully they feel like they're achieving that goal.
Darren:But a goal can be the smallest or smallest thing, like don't eat a chocolate bar a day. One chocolate bar. If you were eating five, eat four. You've been consistent in the goal that you've set out to do there. It's the smallest, smallest thing, but continuous consistency builds very healthy habits. If it's directed in the right way, the smallest of things can build to the biggest of things. Honestly, what you said, mo, it's the building blocks to success, or building, if it's moved and pushed in the right direction, a positive direction, because obviously you do need to realise being consistent at doing things that are quite negative towards you actually won't be a positive.
Mo:Consistently, you drink in a bottle of wine every night. Yeah, yeah.
Chris:They do that now in a couple of memes, don't they? There's a few people who do in the old. I've consistently taken the meat out of some of the thingies being like I'm consistently building things by drinking every day for the last six months. That is consistency, but it is a bit negative.
Darren:Yeah, like I said about my algorithm, I can't even go on social media now. Everything is telling me get up at five o'clock. You get sunlight straight away or wake up you sorry sack of.
Darren:Yeah, no, no, it's just all the science says going a sauna straight up, straight when you go up in the morning, take a pint of water and then put some salt in it. That can be consistent with all of these little things and you'll be a better man. These things on social media are great. Yes, there might be science behind these little tiny things, but people aren't even getting up and going for a walk to be consistent. And also myself, like I said to you, I would actually be scared if I started to say I was going to do that, because then I'd be consistent to do it. But I feel like that's just going to take up too much of my enjoyment in certain parts of my life.
Mo:I think that's where it has a negative effect sometimes as well, because you'll go on social media and you'll see 10 different ways to create consistency. Or, like you said, jump in the sauna every morning. Well, maybe that isn't plausible. Maybe what you need to do is find out your main goal, break that down into smaller goals and if that smaller goal is, try and make that small goal as attainable as possible. And if that means you've got to get in the sauna, yeah, get in the sauna, great. But if that's not part of your consistency, maybe steer clear of social media so you're not dragged into some of the things that maybe take you off your main goal.
Darren:Yeah, how have you Ships? You've built consistency in your life now of how you're progressing and you've improved so much in not only OCR. But you know you've said you've progressed loads and you feel quite positive about work as well. How have you built that consistency?
Chris:I think by making a lot of mistakes, yeah, so a lot of mistakes that have led to not reaching my goals or not fulfilling sort of things that I want to be doing, and then sort of going off track and having things sort of revert back to a unfulfilled sort of purpose or something like that. So having the mistakes has made me think, right, well, I've made these mistakes. What is the things that I've made these mistakes? And then it always comes back to not putting the sort of timing, like I say, doing the little things and doing them over and over again and staying on point with them.
Darren:So you've had setbacks and you've learned from them. To address the setbacks but also to bring them into like a new habit or a new way that you've built consistency.
Chris:Yeah, yeah. So it's like well, yeah, exactly that, exactly that it's difficult, isn't it? Because it's like I do find that like having a lot of consistency probably makes you quite boring sometimes when you're staying quite consistent, because you do have like a lot of sacrifices that you give up. So, like, if you're staying consistent, doing the goals that you're doing, it does mean that, like some things have to waver and some things you're not going to be able to do because you can't do everything. And sometimes, trying to do everything, you're not actually being consistent at all because you're just skipping on all sorts of different things. So it does mean, you know, maybe being a bit boring and sticking to like the things that you need to do to get to those goals. But I think that's kind of like what makes some people happy as well, because it makes me happy.
Darren:You've hit a mark there of why I've failed in the past. I've actually taken on too much and tried to put a lot of pressure on myself to be better. And I start taking on these little things in my head like, oh, I'm going to start having some more water every morning, I'm going to get up at six, I'm going to try and build a consistent level of being better. The better Darren and builds, and builds, and builds. And it comes so overwhelming that you actually end up dropping everything and not doing any of them.
Chris:That's it. You're all of a sudden you're doing way too much.
Darren:You need to find balance and you need to make it achievable for you Whatever's accessible to you, like what Moe said. If you don't have the means to get up and do an hour run in the morning but you have you know you spend 10 minutes looking at social media or sitting down and reading the paper or watching TV. Do 10 minutes of like a walk. That's more movement than you would have done. And if you do 10 minutes of a walk every morning, every morning, that's 70 minutes, 17 minutes. Yeah, that's it. You have more walking and more movement a week.
Chris:That's actually what the doctors prescribe, isn't it? An hour's worth of exercise a week, yeah.
Darren:And through 10 minutes, the smallest of smallest goals, you've built consistent habits that are going to be healthy for you.
Chris:Yeah.
Mo:I like that. You need to look at it as well. Obviously, we come from a training background, so it's easier to look at it sometimes for us because the principles are quite similar, I think. And I think it's almost that progressive overload. So, like you said, darren, to be consistent, just get up every 10 minutes, but eventually every 10 minutes every 10 minutes get up, oh, I'm awake, oh, I'm awake.
Chris:It's a lot of sleep.
Darren:The sacrifices would be sleep.
Mo:You just walk around with bags on your eyes and knack of no. Get up and do your 10-minute walk every day, but then and eventually that will then start naturally turning into oh, I'll try a 20-minute one this week, so you'll do your 10, 10, 10. Oh, and then I'll do the 20. If you can find some more time so you might wake up earlier for that or wherever, but you almost. I think there's two parts of this. The first part is getting consistent, so doing exactly like what Darren just said. And then the second part is then, if you want to do more, start to almost progressively overload it. So start adding little bits, but again, not too much, so that you just burn out because you're trying to be consistent in too many things.
Chris:Yeah, you have to try and stay flexible a little bit, don't you?
Darren:Yeah, building good habits builds better habits, so it just builds on top of one another. If you feel healthier, you probably want to get even more healthier. Like it's we are programmed to Sometimes. Well, my head works is to almost like never be happy or never. Never actually sit in the moment and think, wow, this is what I've done. But my mind sometimes will work Like right, done 10 minutes, now 12 minutes. Right 12 minutes. Not happy with 12 minutes, I'm happy with 15 minutes.
Darren:It's just a way that my mind works when it comes to building consistency towards a goal or being that better version. And that's why I was saying to Moe it's like, oh, I don't really get suckered into these things on social media about being a better man or better things, and oh, I don't feel like I need a six pack and everything. And I said to Moe I struggle every day, probably getting sucked into the noise, because I absolutely do. I'm looking at sawness, I'm looking at soul war, I'm looking at all these random things that I can do, but I think it's. What I'm quite good at, though, is that once I've set myself of what I'm committed to, I'll stay committed to it.
Darren:I won't deviate from the plan because, as everyone knows, love a plan, so I stick to the plan, and if the plan doesn't say, now and again, chuck in a random thing that's going to make you better, I won't do that. So what I'm trying to say is make sure you've got a plan in place as well. What is your plan? Similar to a goal, but a goal is the endpoint, the plan is the execution. So make sure that you've got them two things.
Mo:Plan is what you stay consistent on as well. You need a plan really to be somewhat consistent. It's hard to follow something If there's nothing in place to follow. You'll just be going in blind and doing random stuff every day. I think getting a program together or something to be consistent with is the main thing. After you've set your goals, you set your goal and then it's like OK, now let's create a plan or create some form of routine that we can use and follow.
Chris:We're basically pirates, aren't we?
Mo:Why?
Chris:Because it's like having a treasure map to a pot of gold or something.
Darren:You just mix pirates with leprechauns.
Chris:In my head that's all that works Irish Irish better.
Darren:Irish pirates.
Mo:Irish pirates, irish pirates, no, no, I'll say what you say. You're looking for that x.
Chris:Yeah, you're looking for that. X. We're sailing the seven C's of consistency.
Mo:Oh I like it. Yeah, the problem is our X is always moving.
Darren:Well, it's the ship called Accountability, accountability Corner.
Chris:Yeah, Accountability.
Darren:Does this?
Mo:sound very piratey.
Darren:No, it doesn't.
Mo:This will be like the jolly corner, it depends how you say it. Accountability Corner.
Chris:Accountability Corner yeah, I like it.
Mo:Yeah Right, so we've touched on kind of what we think consistency is and how we view consistency, but I think it would probably be good to go into kind of how we stay consistent and little things we put in place and things we do to make consistency easier. Rather, it's easy to say, oh, just follow a plan, but actually we've all had it where we don't actually want to do what's on the plan and we want to waver, so kind of wash your guys's ways to stay consistent shipmate.
Chris:It's going to sound really horrible, but I try and ignore loads of stuff. I'd never work late so I could stay consistent. I have sort of I suppose I have rules. I don't stay late at work so I can stay consistent. I don't go to bed late. I get up at the same time every day. I suppose that is consistent, isn't it? Getting up at the same time and going to bed at the same time. I just keep everything the same. I don't change anything. You build a routine, don't you? Yeah, that's it. There we go. I build a routine. Yeah, actually, that's exactly it. I hate change, so routine is it, I suppose? Yeah, Keep to the routine, Stick to the routine.
Darren:This is so strange, isn't it? There's so many different personalities. We'll need a different foundation to build a consistent way of thinking Like yours is built on routine, and just if you build that routine, everything else falls into place, does it?
Chris:Yeah, yeah, because if my routine's out of whack and Raphael can test to this, is that the right word.
Darren:Yeah.
Chris:You should agree with me. Basically I was just trying to use a big word. But yeah, like, if my routine goes out the flop, that is it, I'm all over the place. And then, in fact, if my routine goes out the way, that's actually where my consistency really does slip, because I don't really know what's going on. So, yeah, it'd be interesting to hear what your guys are as well. I wonder if it's similar.
Darren:Well, I'll go, because it's not. It doesn't, it doesn't. I do build a routine. I think there's so many factors we've said that builds it and layers upon one another. I'm just so influenced, I can be so influenced by external factors and, like I said, I have to ignore the noise of motivation from Instagram and have a place is telling me how to be better. But I think it's always built upon having the right circle around me of people and that allows me to be consistent, because they all think in the same sort of mindset and having that around me really supports my mindset to know that what I'm doing is a good thing and it is going to be better for me but also better for my relationships, because the relationships are built upon living and breathing the behaviors that I see as a positive thing for me. I think that builds consistency.
Darren:I think people might think, looking at me, like you're so your routine you're stuck to, you're not flexible because you'll want to go for a run at a certain time, or you've got so goal orientated. But all of those things are just what surrounds me. But I think the core thing is looking up to people and seeing how they do what they need to do and how they do it, and helping other people to see the same way I see. So, like this podcast, for instance, not to get too soppy, but this keeps me accountable for what I want to achieve at this moment in my life, which is want OCR to grow, and I also want to be the best I can be at OCR. And that's a bit selfish, because just talking about OCR, but obviously there's other things in life. I want to also feel like I'm almost entrepreneurial, creating different aspects of my life that give me purpose. So OCR does podcast does work, does life does. So there's a good mix of things there.
Chris:Like it.
Darren:No, you've got to follow that.
Mo:Well, I think, how do I follow that? I think the main things in terms of like plans I have in place to keep consistent I'll talk more on that because I think you guys have touched on a lot of good points there but one similar to what you just said, Darren, is people. So training, especially if we're talking being consistent with exercise training, is hard. So having a good group of people around you to train with on the days that you might not want to just go out on your own is really important. We had it on the weekend, Darren, where we both had a long run to do, and I wouldn't have done that long run probably if I didn't go out and do it with you, because it was just one of those days where you don't really want to train, you procrastinate in a little bit. Having people around me or you in that instant really helped just get me out of the door and get me training.
Mo:I think that's a big one for me. And then also, I always just think, kind of every time you do especially training, do something. Even if it's not exactly what you're supposed to do, it's still better than nothing. So if I'm going to miss a run or a training session, I'll think well, let me just start with a walk, and if I really don't feel it okay, then maybe it's not the right time. Or let me just start with a mile. Normally, that mile then turns into four miles or whatever it needs to be. But just by almost saying to myself, rather than doing nothing, I'm doing something that normally helps me stay more consistent as well.
Darren:Yeah, you know, with that run on Sunday, I wanted to jump in, but I wanted to wait till you finish, because there's definitely a part to that I want to really emphasize on people is that if you've got the right people around you and you've created a great friendship, great relationships around you, that you solely trust them people, that they've got your best intentions for you, let them push you, let them in, let them actually make you consistent. Allow them to push you and drag you out for that run. Allow them to take you out for a walk because you know it's going to be good for your mind. Allow them to cook you a meal or you cook with them because it's going to be healthier for you. Allow that relationship to build because you've chosen it, you know it's good for it. If you know it's good for you, then allow it to continue.
Darren:That's the most important thing, I think, is if people don't see because I feel like there is a lot of noise of bad relationships and bad people being people being a bad influence on other people Like we talk about the bad influence, we always joke around sometimes that you're a bad influence on me, but I don't actually hear a lot of people talk or joke around, say you're a good influence on me, like you should actually say that to someone like you two are great influence on me. Like Shipley, every time you talk about your diet, even though it is something I'm probably never going to commit to, it makes me think about my own and makes me think you're really committed to that and it's great to hear that. And I actually try to make small changes. Like I've started eating carrots and veg, like just instead of snacking on, say, crisps or something, and that's a small, tiny change of what you're currently doing. But you've influenced me, so allow people to influence you.
Chris:Yeah, that goes on the same thing because obviously Rafi's influence, because I used to eat burgers all the time and then that same thing on an outsider doing something that I've kind of thought the same about. And yeah, it's done the same. It's funny how that yeah, definitely the people sometimes.
Mo:What's that famous quote of show me your by friends and I'll show you your future, and I think that I like that. That is so accurate, Like if you took the five people I would consider closest or the around me. I'm hoping that would show that quite a good future really for me if I'm honest.
Chris:But I live by that you probably won't show a lot of hair.
Darren:No, you won't Give me a couple months.
Mo:Yeah down, I'll have it back soon and then I'll be full of confidence again. It's not necessarily you can be consistent about the right people around you, but getting the right people around you makes it so much easier.
Chris:It's definitely back to easier.
Mo:And you want to make it easy. You don't want it, doesn't consistently, doesn't have to be a slog.
Chris:Yeah, it doesn't have to be hard, does it? Because if you're just doing the small little things that are easy over time, then that's not hard, is it? That's just easy. But you're just doing it for a long period of time. It's crazy. It simplifies everything, doesn't it really? But then I suppose, when you really do put it into practice, there is things that knock you off the wagon and things make it harder. But in theory it's simple.
Darren:Yeah, I think because we could. We're breaking it down and we're talking about the small things that make up the bigger picture. People, I'm guilty of this at times. I just see the bigger picture Like this is so random and different to sport or anything. But at the minute I'm trying to understand actually, like saving, investments, those sort of things, but all I'm thinking about is like the bigger picture, like well, how can I make, how can I save, and how my money can be secure in the whole future? But then I'm, but then I'm not even doing any savings at the minute or investing. So it's actually like I need to be doing, need to invest in now. The best time to invest was 50 years ago. The second time is right now. So it's investing yourself now rather than think about investing yourself in the future. That's the best way to build, build consistency. Don't think about the bigger picture. Think about the small picture. What's the small picture today? A 10 minute walk, easy, done. Let's build upon that tomorrow.
Chris:Banking and bank deposits Exactly. Yeah, it's right.
Mo:You could easily think I want a million pounds, but you're going to get it by winning the lottery.
Chris:If you saved saved enough you might make that million pound.
Mo:It's easy to think about, but it's actually putting some pennies away each month, for each week or wherever. It's the same with training. It literally is just pennies in a jar or running every day.
Darren:It's it's exactly the same thing when do you want to go from from now? Do you think we've touched upon everything we want to chat about? Consistency, or is there any other aspects of it that we would like to go through? I feel if I was listening to this and I wasn't doing anything consistent at the minute and swapping and changing and trying different training methods, trying different gyms like I don't know how to get inside some of that person's head Like why are they doing that? Are they doing it because they don't feel they haven't found something that's right for them?
Chris:I think, right, I think you just sparked something in my head then. It's like because now is a time when I think a lot of people, especially in the fitness world, have probably like chosen like a new coach and stuff. So they might feel like they've got this new coach and in like six months time no, not six months, it's probably. It's probably too long in like three months time they're going to do a race or something and they think they're going to like pop and be amazing, but they're not. And I think when you, when that happens, it's hard to think or it's easy to think oh, that's that person or that's that program or that's that thing that's not worked, but you just haven't given it enough time to let it work. Sometimes it takes a little bit longer to see the results of the consistency. It's not always like a short road. Sometimes it's actually quite, a very long road.
Mo:Yeah, I think it's easy to be consistent when everything's going your way. But the people that we see on top or dominating their field, the ones that soon as it goes bad yeah, as soon as it goes bad they're still back on it. They're still being consistent. They don't just give up and try something else. So I think if you've got especially if you've got a goal and that's what's setting the goals really easy you've got a good goal that you really want to achieve. Be consistent until that happens, especially if it is a realistic goal. It's going to happen. You just need to stay and keep doing it.
Darren:Yeah, with any project plan that I do at work, you have your overarching end goal and then you're working towards that. But in that is going to be key milestones that you need to hit. If you're hitting those key milestones at the dates that you wanted, then you're staying very consistent towards the end goal and that's what you need to pick. Everyone needs to understand. Set your small milestones. If your small milestone is 70 minutes of exercise a week, that is 10 minutes a day and that's an easily achievable goal. When you're doing people's goals at work, you do them to the smart acronym, which is specific, measurable, attainable, realistic and timely. So making sure that they hit every single one of those, because that's what's going to make them actually goals that you can achieve. Make them achievable.
Darren:So is it specific to what you want? Can you actually measure it? So 70 minutes is measurable. So is it attainable? Yes, 70 minutes. I can give up 10 minutes a day. Is it realistic? Well, 10 minutes in the morning or even at lunch is absolutely fine. Realistic, yeah, timely. When am I going to get it done? Seven days, you've got seven days to get it done, it's all there.
Chris:Smart, that is.
Darren:That is smart. Have you ever heard of that?
Chris:smart. We don't do training days at work.
Darren:Don't you? You don't have your goals.
Chris:We don't sit in an office and talk about things. I'll do them for you. Often I did a first aid course and that had quite a lot of acronyms.
Darren:We love them in marketing. We love making up words in marketing Like spectator ability.
Mo:Is that where that came from? No, I've just made that up.
Darren:We need to make up one for consistent ability.
Mo:Consistibility.
Chris:We should actually do one for consistency Car, carry it on, carry Obstacle. Now, science, industry, stock time, efficiency, numeracy, counting yourself, nice system Right, you know what?
Mo:I think you hit the nail on that head there. Yeah, there you go.
Darren:That's confusing people.
Mo:Obusability corner Back out again.
Chris:If anyone could come up with an acronym, we'll do a prize.
Darren:On consistency. Yeah, okay, yeah, everyone listening right now. Here's your time to stop. We're not being too serious, we're not giving you motivational speeches. Just stop and have a think about how the acronym could work.
Chris:It's a word puzzle. We've gone into word puzzles now.
Darren:Yeah, like Sudoku. Yeah, is that word I like that. That's not word, is it?
Mo:Numbers, numbers, yeah, post-nap Right.
Darren:Where else do you want to go through?
Mo:I think we've gone through most things. I think we can start to maybe outline on what we've gone through today so people have a clearer understanding of all the little things we might have touched on, but definitely what we've earned. Set goals first, make clear goals. They can be well. Start, make one big goal and then work back from that to something smaller and something more obtainable, to stay consistent, to Create a routine or something around that, and then you're on the right track to being consistent. I think.
Darren:Yeah, and then you need to prioritize. You need to identify what's important to you. What's the most important thing to you right now? Is it the goal? It should be the goal, because you've already set the goal, but is there other things that are a priority and you need to make sure you're going to be flexible towards them? You need to make sure that you're using reminders, reminding yourself Like Shipley's got his Post-it notes up on near the treadmill reminding him of why he's doing it. Why are you here, why are you doing what you're doing? Like, make sure you're reminding yourself that, because sometimes, within the noise of busy life busy everything that goes on like why are you even doing it? Remind yourself of that, because then that really sets you back.
Darren:I always do, like a project reset, reset and understand why you've started this goal in the first place, so that you can then move on and build momentum, track your progress. Make sure everything. I think make sure you're tracking everything. So anyone that wants to lose weight or eat differently, do a food diary. Just track what you're eating, something that gives you a baseline that you can then look back at in a month's time and say am I eating the same?
Darren:If the answer is yes, then you haven't moved from what your goals might have been. So track it and see how you're doing. Track them 70 minutes of walking, have the 70 turn into 80. Then that's a good trajectory you're going on. Stay committed to it is one of the other things as well. Making sure that you are committed to it and it's a goal that you can do. And even in the face of challenges of life, of picking the kids up, going on holiday, can you stay committed to 70 minutes of walking? We're going to keep going back to walking because I think that's a good example. And in ships, do you want to take the next one?
Chris:What To be accountable. Yeah, that's it. To like share your goals with a friend or family member or a colleague who can provide support and hold you accountable. That's what you need. You need someone to like share your progress with and who can enhance the motivation.
Darren:Yeah, that goes back to what I said about that. You have the right people around you. They will also help you to be accountable towards it and allow them in to make you accountable. If you've shared your goals with them and you've shared what you want to do, they will only have your best interest at heart. So don't get annoyed when they're trying to tell you that, hey, have you done your 10 minutes today? And he's like, oh no, I haven't done it yet, get out, get out of the house, just get out. That's it. Allow them to do that and I think we've the last one's ships. I think you said about one of the main ones that you learned from yeah, setbacks.
Chris:Yeah, yeah, yeah, because if you face the setbacks or you encounter obstacles, you have to view the opportunities to learn from them, and you just have to know how to get on with it once you've made them mistakes and move forward.
Mo:And also consistency over time. I think we've talked a lot about every day here. But going on to setbacks, if you do miss a day of training, let's say we're going from an exercise point of view, that isn't the end and because you've missed that day, I think that's where a lot of consistency breaks down, because you'll be consistent for a week and then let's say your normal Monday to Sunday week. You've been consistent, see Monday to Friday, but then Saturday about a slip up. That doesn't mean that then Sunday has to also be a slip up. Get back on it as soon as you can and just kind of bury it under the rug and be like okay, cool, we're going again.
Mo:It's still consistency. Consistency is over time. It's not you miss one day and you've killed your consistency. We're talking about almost it could be years being consistent. But training four to five times a week consistently is going to be a lot better for you than doing three days a week and then having a five day break and then getting on two days and then jumping back on. Just be consistent as much as you physically can.
Darren:Yeah, do you know? There's two words that we actually haven't used in any of this conversation, which is discipline and motivation, and I know there's a lot of back and forth about discipline builds motivation, and then motivation can then build consistency, or vice versa. It might work the other way, but we haven't really talked about discipline and motivation, because I feel that discipline and motivation are outtakes of everything we talked about today. If you get all these things right, you're going to be disciplined towards the goal, and discipline then builds motivation. I think motivation is a state of mind that comes and goes. You won't ever be in a total flow of motivation. I'm sorry, you will never be motivated to do it.
Darren:If you say to yourself you're going to do 10 minutes of walking a day and you don't feel motivated to do it today, that's normal. You're going to want. Some days you're going to say, no, I don't want to do it. You're going to put your shoes on at the same time. No, I don't want to go out, don't want to go out, tine your shoes up. No, don't want to go out, don't want to go out, go out the door. I think we will work that way. It's the same with eating right as well. You're like I don't want to eat this food. I want to go for McDonald's. I want to go for McDonald's. Drive past McDonald's and you eat something healthy at the end of eating.
Chris:That it's like actually I feel bad. I've had that so many times. I've gone to get a coffee from McDonald's. I've pulled up at the drive-through and I'm like I'm only getting a black coffee. It's only good, it's good, I'll just get a black coffee. Then they go welcome to McDonald's. Can I take your order? I'm like that Big tasty, please. I'm like I'm going to eat it and then I think, oh man, what did I eat there for? Because in three hours time I feel like rubbish yeah.
Mo:That's why I always go to Starbucks or costas for my coffee, because there's nothing on the menu that really interests me. That's so expensive. Yeah, you take that here, yeah.
Darren:Well, I said to you ages ago, didn't I? I come over what you're talking about? I went out to buy a chocolate bar at lunchtime and I ended up walking around for a whole hour thinking about buying a chocolate bar and then just went back to work. There are times where your mind is just going to play tricks on you and just be trying to. Really, I feel like the mind is the biggest challenge. It's always going to push you, trying to push you off the balance. Babe, you're on it, you feel stable and your mind is just going to come in with a random thought and it's going to try and push you off.
Darren:There's so many voices that go on your head. If you have that internal voice, just try to remember what you promised yourself at the beginning. Go back to the beginning, reminder what did I promise myself? What did I promise myself? Those things are the most important thing and they will build you back up. I feel this is a building block rather than a process to follow. Go back to the beginning, build up. You fall off. Go back to the beginning, build up. Don't think you can come back in and be like right, need to celebrate milestone. Hang on. No, I fell off the milestone. Okay, I won't worry about it. Go back to the beginning. Talk about the goal then come back to it again.
Darren:Yeah.
Mo:Don't just give up straight away because you fell off once or you've had that chocolate bar or Well, you're going to fall off Always. All of us three, we talk about consistency and we probably are quite consistent people, but every single one of us have fallen off at some point At least, and sometimes it can literally be a week, two weeks like you've proper or longer. We've all had it where we've fallen off. It's just about going back to them reminders, going back to what we talked about at the hip. So it's going back to seeing what that goal is and then getting yourself back into it. And that's where motivation and inspiration can be quite good, because that can get you out of the door. But then discipline is always going to be your best friend because it's going to keep you going.
Darren:And it's like with anything in the world the more experience you have at it, the more experiences you've had of failing in it. So the more experiences you've got and the more you've got in your toolbox to cope with those failures and then move on. It's not that I'm more experienced so I've just done this consistently and perfected it for all my life. No, that's not what experience means. Experience means that you've done all the failings, you've done most of the things that will come up, and yet you've still stuck to it. So the more you do it, the more you stay consistent, the more you learn, the more you have the ability to take on anything that actually crops up and still stay to your goal. So all I'm saying is that this is not a quick fix. It will take time. It's not something that's going to happen tomorrow, but if I promise you you stay at it, you will become better at getting through the noise of people or things happening that just distract you from it.
Mo:I think, going back to noise and social media, like you said, dan, the other thing is all them people on social media are showing you their consistency. They're every single video, everything, every reel, every picture they post. It's all their consistencies. They're not posting when they fall off. So then when you fall off and you look, go on Instagram and you look at the reels, you're like, oh fuck, I've really fucked it here. But they're not showing you the days where they've had a chocolate bar, so they are guarantee, unless they're freaks of nature. There's days where they have slipped up and they haven't just stuck to the script and stuck to what makes them consistent. So you just need to think okay, they're showing me what consistency is, but they're not showing me the full truth. We all fuck up. Just get back on it as soon as you can.
Darren:Do you think we've done a mistake with this podcast in a way that we should actually be? I know that we always try to plug accountability corner and say the word accountable, but the reason we started this was to help each other to stay accountable towards our goals of OCR and training. Do you think we should actually be more upfront about failures and not showing people on our social of our consistency? We posted up the other day we went for a run together but we haven't met up that much because we've not been really consistent meeting up. So maybe we should be saying that I haven't been able to meet up this week because you know and then there's times where Mo you have, you've had things on last minute that we haven't done the podcast. Do you think we should be more open about things like that, then, and say when?
Chris:we fail. I think we are quite open about things. I mean, now it's off season, but even remember, like last year, when we didn't do so well at the races or we did I think we was quite open about how you know. We may have thought that some of the problems with that was a lack of consistency in our training.
Mo:Yeah, I was waiting to open last year with my chocolate bar addiction. That was me falling off consistency.
Darren:Yeah, I do agree with you both. I think we do say it, but only probably 20% of it. I think there's a lot else that goes on the background that I want everyone, to all the listeners, to know that we fail, but we pick ourselves up and we go. We just go back to the goal and we keep going again.
Chris:Maybe next time should we talk about failure.
Darren:Yeah.
Mo:Do a whole episode of failure? Definitely the amount of time we've collectively failed at something we're trying to achieve.
Darren:Yeah maybe just a hell of a lot. I think it's a good way to end this episode today, because we've talked about how to be consistent, and then next one, we should talk about how we fail, learn to fail, or what we've learned from failure, or what we do when we fail in and outside of the sport. Oh, that's going to be deep, I think. Yeah, maybe not outside of the sport.
Mo:I'll get the boxed tissues for that one, yeah.
Chris:I'm not going to say anything.
Mo:I think that you've kind of. What we're trying to say here is consistency is being consistent, obviously, but almost consistency is what you react, your reaction to when you do fail. Sometimes it's not. Consistency isn't just about doing the same thing all the time. Sometimes consistency is doing the same thing again after you've failed or after you've taken a day off. That's what builds consistency. Not necessarily doing the same thing every day is consistency, but it's your reaction to when you don't do. That is what we're trying to get at and what we're trying to say right now.
Chris:I think what we're trying to say is consistency is what transforms average into excellence.
Mo:Boost bumps.
Darren:We ended it on that average into excellence.
Chris:On a high.
Darren:No well, thanks to everyone listening to us, go through, and you can probably do a drinking game on the amount of times that we've said consistency. I think that'd be a good one.
Chris:Yeah, if you want your stomach pumped, if anyone's got a night out on Saturday, listen to this podcast and have a drink.
Darren:every time we say consistency, That'd be a good one to do.
Mo:Maybe we aren't the five friends that people should have around.
Darren:I just it's such a weird, weird thing. I think, like we, I wouldn't have gone for my run if I hadn't been accountable to turning up to it. To run with you on Sunday, moe. But why does that make a difference? Why can't I just be accountable towards myself and my own goals? It's just such a strange thing. Like I said, I go for a run to be accountable to myself. Turn up for myself before you turn up for anyone else.
Mo:Yeah, and it sounds simple, but it isn't easy and that's why people are so important. And having little rules and little ways of dealing with things is good because, like you said earlier, down our minds of being mental half the time and we're all over the shop. And what is should be so easy? For some reason, as humans, we make it so complex.
Chris:I'm so different from you two. You just don't think. No, I try not to, but that's the thing Do. That's it yeah just because if I don't have my my what do you call it again? Routine, then everything's worse off, so I can go for a run without any of you. Lot, in fact, I actually really enjoy just going for a run on my own or working out on my own or training on my own, because it's part of my routine, it's part of my, my purpose of happiness.
Darren:Yeah, but you stick to your routine. I think me and Mo sometimes don't don't stick to routine. So therefore, when you don't stick to the routine, you're trying to get something else out your toolbox to keep you consistent. So routine isn't even keeping me consistent right now. So, actually, what else have I got in there? Have I got friends? Yeah, I got a milestone in here that I need to stick to that. No, can't find that. Am I committed right now? No, no, not committed to it. Can't find that. So hang on, hang on. I've found prioritization of turning up for Mo. I've found that. So that's what I'm going to use today to stay consistent. It's not yeah.
Chris:Using those bits in the bag to get that consistency. Yeah, yeah, finding out. I suppose we've done it there. We've found you need to find the tools to make you consistent and if you can do that you can get anywhere, I suppose.
Darren:Yeah, you can be pushed off, the balance boom and you can always get back on If you know that you've got the tools. But a lot of people and I include myself in this, when I first started, didn't have a lot of tools to stay consistent.
Mo:You build them as you keep going, keep going and keep building them From the mistakes.
Darren:Yeah, let's talk about failures in the next one, because then that will talk a bit more about how you build them, how we diversify to actually understand ourselves, to be better at this and being able to actually explain this sort of thing.
Chris:Love it, love it.
Darren:End it there. Consistency. Let's All listeners out there. Let us know how you stay consistent. What is your what's in your toolbox? What do you use? Is it a big post-it note on the wall? Is it? What is it that keeps you consistent? I'd love to have. Yeah, I'd love to hear this.
Chris:I'd love to know what other people do, because sometimes I think we're all very similar, but then, when we obviously do these sort of things, I realise how different we all are getting ourselves to do stuff, and it's really, really interesting.
Mo:Yeah.
Darren:Let's get people involved in this, because I think obviously we're just coming at it from our perspective and the three of us of the things that we've learnt, and we do try to relate it to obstacle course racing, but lots of other listeners out there that don't necessarily do obstacle course racing so we can learn from them. There's so many other things that they do that we don't. Let's learn from you all. Right, we're going to end it there. I think that's a good point, isn't it, mo? Do you want to end it there?
Mo:Yeah, why not?
Darren:Sounds good to me. Well, all right. Thank you very much, guys.
Mo:That was Play the music Interesting the wrong one, you can tell what podcast I listen to.
Chris:Good bye guys, Thanks guys.
