The Tribune

Health coach Ethan Quant, of Elite Wellness Solutions, has succeeded in his weight loss journey and now wants to share his methods with the Bahamas in an effort to foster a culture of wellness and conquer the obesity epidemic.

It is always a good feeling when someone recognises your hard work, especially when that someone is you.

Far too often we are so busy working towards our goals that we don't really see and appreciate how far we have come in our journey. It's mainly because we are so focused on how far we have to go to get to where we want to be.

This way of thinking can be very tricky because it has the potential of having negative effects on the path to achieving our goals. The detriment we potentially face when only looking towards our goals without periodically taking stock of our accomplishments is that we inadvertently make self-improvement an insurmountable task.

Imagine your first day at the gym being over 300 pounds. Surely, I was not the most physically fit guy there by a long shot. However, if I took for granted every milestone, every time I lost 10, 20 30 pounds, I hardly believe I would be where I am today.

What we do when we look at our fitness goals through a telescope is make ourselves feel like we will never get to where we want to be. We become unnecessarily hard on ourselves, thinking we won't get there fast enough. We become our own worst enemy, essentially minimising the progress we've made.

Ironically enough, I, too, was guilty of this and even now it's something that I have to consciously work through. Interestingly, when I was 306 pounds I wanted my body to change so badly that I would get frustrated at the slow rate of progress, totally ignoring small milestones. This led me to putting more hours into my training and implementing more restrictions on my diet. Like I said before, this was borderline unhealthy, but at the time I felt as though it was my only option. Looking back, I am thankful that I didn't do irreparable damage to my mental, physical and social well-being. It wasn't until I learned the difference between process goals and outcome goals that I was able to gain a greater appreciation for the journey.

Outcome goals are the end goal or the main objective you want to achieve at some predetermined point in the future. For example, if you want to lose 20 pounds that would be your outcome goal. The process goals are the things that you have to do in order to achieve them. In other words, these would be the acts laid out in your action plan that reaffirm your commitment to your outcome goal. However, it is important to note that process goals are only viable after you make your outcome goal SMART (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Time-bound). Case in point, your process goals would consist of various actions like walking three days per week for 20 minutes and cutting out your morning doughnut at least two days out of the week. As a process goal, you may also want to restrict fast food to weekends only.

Whatever you and your health coach decide are realistic behaviours you can change based on your current lifestyle would be considered process goals. Therefore, every time you would have completed one of those actions - no matter how small it was- you would have successfully completed a process goal. It's the consistent achievement of your process goals that add up to your outcome goal at the end of the day. This is where you win!

While you may have been at it for a month or two and have yet to hit your target weight loss, you're still winning if you've successfully shifted your behaviour. Be patient and don't be hard on yourself. Remember, the race to good health is a marathon, not a sprint. Rest assured, you're on the right track.

Moreover, if you need help navigating any aspect of your health, wellness and fitness journey feel free to reach out to me directly. Always remember, at the end of the day you have the power to be successful in health, in fitness and in life!