Why in fitness as in life: good is great

The world of fitness and exercise is constantly inundated with messages of ‘get better, work harder’ and ‘no pain, no gain,’ and it can be hard to balance the pressures of perfection with our personal reality. As much as ambition and frequent goal-setting can be beneficial for seeing progress inside, and outside, of the gym, it is important for our mental health to ensure that we aren’t setting our baseline too high. 

In business, there is a rule known as the Pareto Principle, which states that 80% of total results come from only 20% of causes. When we take this theory, and apply it to fitness, it means that 80% of our significant results in the gym are going to come from 20% of our total efforts. Instead of always aiming for 100%, why not focus on the exercises, workouts, and routines, that are most positive for our mind and body; 20% is all it takes. 

Many people might hear the words, ‘good enough’ and immediately think of inadequacy, or imperfection, but it pays to take a deeper look. Being ‘good enough’ entails being the precise amount of good needed to achieve the goal at hand –it’s a perfect level of good. And being good, in the long run, is great.

In addition, when we position our goals around the notion of ‘good is great’, when we know “just good” is more than enough, we give ourselves the flexibility to work in accordance with our bodies, our schedules, and our lifestyles. There will be some days when a 15-minute workout is all we have the motivation for, other days when we can conquer the vertical climber, the rowing machine, and weight training, and other days when we never even make it out of the door. 

If we hold ourselves to a standard of unwavering greatness, we run the risk of feeling like a failure, when our unreasonable requirements are, inevitably, neither met nor sustained. Not only that, but when we strive for perfection we rob ourselves of the chance to appreciate how far we have already come. 

You do not have to attain perfection for permission to accept and give credit to your body. Feeling good is, and will always remain, more important than looking perfect. 

Don’t let great be the enemy of good. You are, indeed, good enough. You are great.