February Fitness Article
The Flywheel
Picture in your mind a giant medieval flywheel, like an old turn wheel on a mill. This wheel is huge, iron, rusty, about 30 feet tall, heavier than all the weights in your gym, and has an axis in the middle. There are also 4 giant buckets in 4 equal distant areas of this giant iron circle. Now imagine you have to turn this flywheel yourself, could be quite a chore, the only way to turn it is to fill up these buckets with weight.
I recently read a book called, Good to Great by Jim Collins, in this book he talks about a Flywheel Concept. The Flywheel Concept is used to describe how Good to Great companies move slowly from stage to stage, starting to become better companies, but when they breakthrough, they are able to maintain the performance by the same or slightly less effort and process. There is no one single step to turning the Flywheel, no one instance that a company can remember that made it turn, no ‘miracle’, no fast fix, and no ‘aha’ moment. The book talks about how there was no single strategy or single person that was responsible for the transition. Instead, the author points out using the analogy of the flywheel, a single push to a giant medieval flywheel barely moves it, but if you exert that same effort, constantly, pushing it a little at a time, it will gain momentum, moving faster and faster, until it reaches breakthrough and is able to sustain its movement with fewer pushes than before - BUT it still requires that push otherwise it slows down. The pushes must never wane, they must never end, and they must continue to drive with the task at hand, disciplined and focused. They continued to fill the buckets to move the flywheel toward reaching their goal.
Now being an exercise nerd, of course, I thought about how this concept applied to my workout goal. I have written about a quick fix before and how I used to think there was one, this concept describes I changed my thinking about my goals, and this was when I had my breakthrough.
Each time I go to the gym to workout, each time I lift, each time I eat the right foods, and each time I learn more about health, fitness, and nutrition, I am filling buckets. With every minute or hour that I spend during my day to attaining my goal, I am gaining momentum. Set backs can take things out of buckets we have filled, yet once you have a level of momentum it is easier to get the flywheel moving faster again. Set backs are a part of life and we all will have them, what matters is how soon or how well we are filling our buckets after these set backs.
Some things fill the buckets more than others, like proper nutrition. In my experience, proper nutrition has been the best thing I can do to gain speed on the wheel. My diet is the best way for me, when it is on point, to shed those extra pounds, feel better, and continue toward my goal.
A great way to monitor how you are doing filling buckets is with a journal. There are some sites online that you start a journal on that you can go to at home or at work. For me I use my Google® calendar, because it is easily accessible from anywhere and easy enough for me to use. If you really want to get after it, you could set up a spreadsheet with different categories for nutrition, cardio, and lifting with a numbered rating. You could rank yourself daily, then accumulate or average it out over a set period of time. But, an easier approach for me was just setting up my month long calendar and adding what I did that day for a workout or if I missed a workout. I can look back and see how I am doing filling my buckets for the month and see if I need to start filling more often or faster.
It is very important to be honest with yourself, if you do badly, then admit it, if you do well, reward yourself with a cheat night. I think it is important to have a reward here and there because it is a pretty long and grueling process. Turning the flywheel can take a long, long time. This is a lifestyle change or lifestyle improvement process that you have decided to pursue.
One word that stuck out in the book was ‘zeal’. Zeal by definition means, an enthusiastic devotion to a cause, ideal, or goal and tireless diligence in its furtherance – which is also the same as the Flywheel concept. Never forget that this is a journey that matters, yes; cliché, but very much true. I encourage you to find your zeal, lay out your goals, and remember to fill your buckets daily. Enjoy the journey folks, it is good to have an end to journey toward, but it is the journey that matters, in the end.
Good luck yall!
Cory J
