Consistency is the Prerequisite to All Results: A Coach’s Guide to Building Sustainable Habits

In my first year of coaching, I realised that consistency is the prerequisite to all results. I realised this when I watched the same pattern repeat itself over and over. I would provide clients with immaculate plans: perfectly calculated macros, expertly designed training splits, and meal prep systems that would make a Michelin chef jealous. Everything was optimised. Everything was perfect. And within weeks, sometimes days, it would all collapse.

I realise that the ones who succeeded weren’t the ones with the perfect plans. They were the ones who could actually stick with their plans long enough for them to work.

This is the consistency paradox that haunts our industry, and if you don’t understand it, you’ll struggle as a coach no matter how much you know about exercise science or nutrition. We design perfect programs that produce zero results because perfection and consistency are almost always at odds with each other. The uncomfortable truth for us coaches is that a client doesn’t need the optimal plan. They need a plan they can actually sustain, day after day, week after week, even when life gets messy.

Think about the clients you’ve worked with. How many had truly bad programs that failed them? And how many had perfectly good programs that they simply couldn’t maintain? The problem isn’t usually the program. It’s the adherence. Ultimately, your programming knowledge matters far less than your ability to keep someone showing up. The best program in the world is worthless if your client can’t sustain it. And the mediocre program they can stick with for six months will always, always outperform the optimal program they abandon in two weeks.

This isn’t just my observation. It’s backed by research, philosophy, and the lived experience of every successful long-term transformation I’ve witnessed.

William James, the father of American psychology and a key figure in pragmatist philosophy, put it simply: “Truth is what works.” In coaching terms, the “best” program isn’t the most optimal on paper, it’s the one your client will actually do. Truth is what works. And what works is what they can sustain.

The coaches who get this build thriving practices with clients who actually get results. The coaches who don’t get this spend their careers frustrated, wondering why their brilliant programming doesn’t produce results, blaming clients for “lacking discipline” or “not wanting it enough.”

But discipline isn’t the issue. Design is.

If you want to become a world-class coach, you need to become a master of consistency. Not motivation. Not inspiration. Consistency. Because consistency is the prerequisite to all results. Everything else is just noise.

In this article, I’m going to share what I’ve learned about building consistency with real clients in the real world, where motivation is fleeting, life is chaotic, and perfection is not only impossible but actively harmful. This isn’t theory from a textbook. This is what works when someone has a deadline at work, kids who won’t sleep, a partner who doesn’t share their goals, and a lifetime of all-or-nothing thinking patterns to overcome.

This is about the messy, non-linear, beautifully imperfect reality of human behaviour change. And it’s about your role, not as a program writer, but as a guide who helps someone navigate that reality successfully over months and years, not just weeks.

Let’s dig in.

TL;DR

Consistency is the prerequisite to all results, yet most coaches remain obsessed with optimisation while their clients fail because they can’t maintain adherence. The uncomfortable truth is that your programming knowledge matters far less than your ability to keep someone showing up. A mediocre plan sustained for six months will always outperform an optimal plan abandoned in two weeks. 

This isn’t about motivation or discipline; it’s about understanding that perfection and consistency are at odds, that our evolutionary wiring fights against modern health behaviours, and that all-or-nothing thinking sabotages more transformations than laziness ever could. 

World-class coaching means designing for sustainability first and optimisation second. It means building floor and ceiling goals that eliminate binary thinking, teaching clients the Stoic dichotomy of control so they focus on process over outcomes, and creating systems that make healthy choices effortless rather than relying on willpower. 

It means normalising slip-ups, fostering self-compassion over self-criticism, and helping clients find their golden mean and the 75-90% range where sustainable progress lives. Your role isn’t to write perfect programs; it’s to guide someone through the messy, non-linear reality of behaviour change over years, not weeks. 

Master the human side of coaching, become a consistency expert, and you’ll build a practice that actually transforms lives.

Understanding the Science of Consistency

Before we dive into practical strategies and tools, we need to establish the foundation. You need to understand why consistency is the prerequisite to all results. You need to understand why consistency works the way it does, not just that it matters, but the mechanisms underneath. 

When you understand the neuroscience, psychology, and evolutionary biology at play, you can explain to clients why they’re struggling in ways that create compassion rather than shame. You can design interventions that work with human nature instead of against it. And you can stop blaming clients for “lacking discipline” when the real issue is that we’re asking modern humans to override millions of years of evolutionary programming with nothing but willpower. So let’s start with the science that explains everything.

Why Consistency Beats Intensity (Every Single Time)

I need you to understand something fundamental: intensity is exciting, but consistency is actually transformative.

When new coaches come to me, they’re usually obsessed with optimisation. They want to know the perfect rep range, the ideal meal timing, and the most effective training split. And I get it, I was exactly the same way. We enter this field because we love the science, and the science is genuinely fascinating. But what nobody tells you in your certification course is that your clients don’t fail because you prescribed the wrong rep scheme. They fail because they stopped showing up.

Think about compound interest. If you invest a thousand dollars at a 10% return, you’re not going to notice much difference in month one, or even month three. But give it ten years, and the growth becomes exponential. Human behaviour works exactly the same way. A client who does pretty good workouts four times a week for six months will get dramatically better results than the client who does perfect workouts six times a week for three weeks and then disappears.

This is the compound interest of effort in action. Small deposits daily, like a solid workout, a protein-rich meal, or seven hours of sleep, create exponential returns over time. Any single deposit is not extraordinary, but because the compounding never stops.

This plays out in practice consistently. Consistency of behaviour tends to be a stronger predictor of long-term weight loss than the specific intervention used. People who maintain even small, consistent habits are more likely to be exercising regularly years later than those who start with intense, ambitious programs.

Consistency doesn’t just produce results, it actually becomes easier over time. The neural pathways strengthen. The behaviour becomes automatic. But only if you can maintain it long enough for that automation to occur. Most estimates put habit formation at anywhere from 18 to 254 days, with an average of around 66 days. That’s two to three months of consistency before something starts to feel natural.

However, your most motivated clients often struggle the most with this, and it’s counterintuitive until you understand why. High motivation leads to high ambition. High ambition leads to aggressive goals. Aggressive goals require massive behaviour change. And massive behaviour change is nearly impossible to sustain when motivation inevitably drops, which it always does.

I call this the motivation trap, and I’ve seen it destroy countless transformations. The client starts at a ten out of ten motivation. They overhaul their entire life overnight. For two weeks, they’re crushing it. Then motivation drops to a seven. The plan that required a ten becomes unsustainable. They start missing workouts, skipping meal prep. Then motivation drops to a five because they feel like they’re failing. The plan that was designed for a ten is now impossible, so they quit entirely. They go from a hundred to zero because there was no middle ground built into the system.

The issue is that motivation follows action more often than it precedes it. We’ve got it backwards. We wait around to feel motivated before we act, but the neuroscience shows us that action itself generates the neurochemical cascade that produces the feeling we call motivation. This is the motivation paradox: you don’t need motivation to start, but you need to start to get motivation.

The coaches who build long-term success with their clients understand this deeply. They design for sustainability first, optimisation second. They know that a client who maintains a moderate calorie deficit and trains three times a week for a year will absolutely demolish the results of someone who does everything perfectly for six weeks and then burns out.

The Evolutionary Mismatch: Why Modern Life Makes Consistency So Hard

Before we go further, you need to understand something about your client’s brain. It wasn’t designed for the world they’re living in, and that’s not their fault.

Our brains evolved over hundreds of thousands of years in an environment of scarcity, immediate threats, and constant movement. Your client’s ancestors didn’t need to “motivate themselves” to move; they moved to survive. They didn’t need willpower to avoid sugar; sugar was rare and valuable. They didn’t face the choice between the gym and Netflix because neither existed.

This is mismatch theory in action, and it explains so much about why consistency is hard. Your client’s brain is still wired for immediate survival, not long-term health optimisation. The cravings for sugar, fat, and salt made perfect sense when calories were scarce. Now they’re liabilities. The desire to conserve energy was adaptive when you might not eat tomorrow. Now it keeps your client on the couch.

The gym is an evolutionarily novel environment. For 99% of human history, no one needed to create artificial scenarios to move heavy things. Now we pay money to go to a building specifically to do hard physical work that produces no immediate survival benefit. The brain looks at this and goes, “Why? This makes no sense.”

Understanding this creates profound compassion for the struggle. When your client says “I don’t know why this is so hard, I just can’t stick with it,” you can help them understand: it’s hard because you’re asking a 200,000-year-old operating system to run modern software. The struggle isn’t a personal failing. It’s a design challenge.

This is why environment design matters so much. We don’t want to try to override evolution with willpower; that’s a losing battle. We want to design environments where the ancient wiring works for us instead of against us. More on this later.

The Psychology Behind Why Clients Fall Off Track

Let’s talk about what’s really happening in your client’s head when they start to slip. Because if you don’t understand the psychology, you’re just guessing.

All-or-nothing thinking is the silent killer in our industry. It shows up in a thousand different ways, and once you learn to recognise it, you’ll see it everywhere. A client misses breakfast, so they decide the whole day is ruined, and they might as well get takeout for dinner too. They skip a workout on Monday, so they tell themselves they’ll just start fresh next week. They have two drinks instead of one at a party, so they say screw it and have six.

This cognitive pattern is also called black-and-white thinking or dichotomous thinking in psychology, and it’s incredibly common. Our brains like simple categories: good or bad, success or failure, on the wagon or off the wagon. But human behaviour doesn’t work in binary. Life exists in the grey area, and clients who can’t operate in that middle ground will struggle indefinitely.

In Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT), this is recognised as one of the core cognitive distortions (thinking patterns that are irrational but feel completely true). And it rarely travels alone. All-or-nothing thinking often comes packaged with catastrophising (“I missed one workout, I’ve ruined everything”), should statements (“I should be further along by now”), and mental filtering (only seeing failures, ignoring successes).

Here’s what makes it worse: all-or-nothing thinking is often reinforced by the fitness industry itself. Think about how we talk. “Cheat meals.” “Falling off track.” “Being good” or “being bad.” This language creates a moral framework around behaviour that shouldn’t have moral weight. You’re not a good person because you ate chicken and broccoli. You’re not a bad person because you had pizza.

But beyond the thinking patterns, there’s a physiological component we need to address. Decision fatigue feels real, and it matters more than most coaches realise. Every decision you make throughout the day feels like it depletes a finite resource of willpower. By the time your client gets home from work after making a hundred decisions, their ability to choose the workout over the couch feels genuinely impaired.

This connects to cognitive load theory from educational psychology. Your brain’s working memory (the mental workspace where you actively process information) has limited capacity. George Miller’s famous research suggested we can hold about seven (plus or minus two) pieces of information at once. Every decision, every choice point, every option to evaluate takes up space in that limited workspace.

Now imagine your client. They’ve been exercising self-control all day; resisting the donuts someone brought to the office, holding their tongue in a frustrating meeting, choosing water over fizzy drinks at lunch, etc. By 6 PM, their cognitive bandwidth is depleted. Their working memory is full. And you’re asking them to make one more self-controlled choice: go to the gym instead of relaxing on the couch.

This is why environment design and systems matter so much. We need to reduce the number of decisions required and make the desired behaviour as automatic as possible. But we’ll get to that.

The third psychological factor is identity, and it’s the most powerful of all. People act in accordance with who they believe they are. If your client sees themselves as “someone trying to get healthy,” that’s an unstable identity. It’s temporary by definition. But if they see themselves as “someone who trains” or “an athlete” or “a person who prioritises their health,” that identity drives behaviour even when motivation is low.

James Clear talks about this brilliantly in Atomic Habits. Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you want to become. Miss one workout? That’s one vote. Not a big deal. But miss twenty workouts in a row, and you’re casting repeated votes for an identity you don’t actually want. The goal is to help clients build an identity through consistent small actions, not massive unsustainable efforts.

Here’s the thing though, identity change doesn’t happen overnight, and it doesn’t happen through affirmations or vision boards. It happens through repeated behaviour. Your client becomes “someone who works out” by working out consistently, not by deciding to be that person. The identity follows the behaviour, not the other way around.

This is where Self-Determination Theory (SDT) becomes incredibly useful. Developed by Edward Deci and Richard Ryan, SDT identifies three fundamental psychological needs that must be satisfied for sustained intrinsic motivation: autonomy, competence, and relatedness.

Autonomy means your client needs to feel they have choice, not that they’re being controlled or forced. When you dictate every aspect of their plan without their input, you undermine autonomy. When you collaborate and give them options within structure, you support it.

Competence means they need to feel capable and see progress. This is why celebrating small wins matters so much. If they never feel competent, motivation dies.

Relatedness means they need to feel connected to something bigger; to you as their coach, to a community, to a purpose beyond themselves, etc. Isolation undermines this need.

When all three needs are met, clients develop genuine intrinsic motivation. When any are neglected, they rely on willpower and external pressure, which is unsustainable.

The Neuroscience of Habit: Why Your Brain Craves Consistency

It helps to dig deeper into what’s happening in your client’s brain when they’re building consistency. Because understanding the neuroscience doesn’t just inform your coaching, it gives you language to help clients understand their own experience. Habits are formed in a part of the brain called the basal ganglia, a cluster of structures deep in the brain that’s responsible for procedural learning and automatic behaviours. When you first learn a new skill, whether it’s a squat pattern or meal prepping on Sundays, your prefrontal cortex is heavily involved. You’re thinking consciously about every step. This requires significant mental energy.

But as you repeat the behaviour consistently, something remarkable happens. The basal ganglia starts to take over. The behaviour becomes encoded as a chunk; a sequence of actions that can be executed automatically with minimal conscious thought. This is what we call a habit, and it’s neurologically distinct from a conscious decision.

Charles Duhigg’s research, popularised in The Power of Habit, identified the habit loop: cue, routine, reward. The brain learns to anticipate rewards and automate the routine that produces them. Your client’s brain learns: gym clothes on the chair (cue) → drive to gym and workout (routine) → endorphins and sense of accomplishment (reward).

This matters for consistency because once a behaviour is genuinely habitual, it requires dramatically less willpower. It’s not that disciplined people have more willpower, they’ve just automated more of their desired behaviours. The consistency becomes effortless because their basal ganglia has taken over.

But here’s the catch: this encoding takes time and repetition. The famous “21 days to form a habit” is a myth. Research by Phillippa Lally at University College London found the average time to habit formation is 66 days, with a range from 18 to 254 days depending on the complexity of the behaviour and individual differences.

This is why your first three months with a client are critical. You’re not just helping them see results, you’re helping them encode habits into their basal ganglia. If they quit before the automation happens, they never experience the ease that comes with true habit formation.

Neuroplasticity (the brain’s ability to rewire itself) is the mechanism underlying all of this. Donald Hebb’s principle, often summarised as “neurons that fire together, wire together,” explains how repeated behaviours strengthen neural pathways. Every time your client chooses the workout over the couch, they’re strengthening the neural pathway that makes that choice easier next time.

The beautiful reality here is that your brain doesn’t care how old you are. Neuroplasticity continues throughout life. Your 55-year-old client can build new habits just as effectively as your 25-year-old client. It’s not age that determines success, it’s consistency.

There’s also a neuroscience insight about feedback and dopamine that matters enormously here. Dopamine isn’t the “pleasure chemical” as it’s often mischaracterised. It’s the “prediction and motivation chemical.” Dopamine spikes happen when you encounter an unexpected reward or when you’re anticipating a reward. This is reward prediction error; the difference between what you expected and what you got.

This is why progress photos work. Why celebrating small wins matters. Why tracking can be motivating. Each time your client sees unexpected progress or gets acknowledged for effort, there’s a dopamine spike that reinforces the behaviour. You’re literally rewiring their brain’s reward system to crave the behaviours that lead to their goals.

Control What You Can, Release What You Can’t

Before we talk about perfection, we need to talk about control. Because one of the deepest sources of client frustration is the confusion between what they can control and what they can’t. The ancient Stoics, particularly Epictetus, had a framework that’s shockingly relevant to modern coaching. Epictetus wrote: “We cannot choose our external circumstances, but we can always choose how we respond to them.” He called this the dichotomy of control, and it’s the foundation of Stoic philosophy.

Here’s how this translates to coaching: Your client cannot control what the scale says tomorrow morning. They cannot control their genetics, their height, where they store fat, how quickly they build muscle. They cannot control what their co-workers bring to the office, whether their spouse supports their goals, or what the person next to them at the gym is lifting.

But they can control their effort. They can control their choices. They can control whether they show up to training. They can control what they put on their plate. They can control their attitude toward setbacks.

This distinction is everything. When clients obsess over outcomes they don’t control (the scale, how they look in photos, what other people think), they create suffering. When they focus on processes they do control (their training consistency, their nutrition choices, their sleep habits), they create agency.

I teach this explicitly with clients. We make two lists:

What I Control:

• My effort in workouts
• My food choices
• My sleep schedule
• My response to setbacks
• Whether I show up
• My attitude

What I Don’t Control:

• The scale tomorrow
• How quickly I see results
• My genetics
• Other people’s opinions
• Perfect conditions

The goal isn’t to stop caring about outcomes. The goal is to redirect your focus and energy toward what you actually have power over. Marcus Aurelius, another Stoic philosopher (and emperor), wrote in his Meditations: “You have power over your mind, not outside events. Realise this, and you will find strength.”

When your client obsesses over the scale and it doesn’t move, they feel powerless and frustrated. When they focus on hitting their protein target four days this week (and they do it), they feel capable and effective. Same week, different focus, completely different emotional experience.

This connects beautifully to locus of control from psychology. People with an internal locus of control believe their actions influence outcomes. People with an external locus believe outcomes are determined by outside forces. Research consistently shows that internal locus of control predicts better adherence to health behaviours.

The Stoic framework helps clients develop an internal locus of control in the right places. Yes, you control your effort. No, you don’t control every outcome. This paradoxically reduces anxiety while increasing consistency.

There’s also a daily practice from Stoicism that I’ve adapted for clients: morning intention-setting and evening reflection. In the morning, you set your intention: “Today I will control my effort in training and my food choices. I will not let the scale or other people’s comments affect my commitment.” In the evening, you reflect: “What did I control well today? What could I have controlled better? What was outside my control that I worried about unnecessarily?”

This simple practice, done consistently, rewires the brain’s focus from outcome-obsession to process-orientation.

Perfection is the Enemy of Consistency

Now that you understand the science behind why consistency works, we need to address the single biggest obstacle standing between your clients and sustainable progress: the pursuit of perfection. 

This might be the most counterintuitive concept in all of coaching, that aiming for perfection actually undermines results. But once you see this pattern in your clients, once you understand how perfectionism creates the very inconsistency it’s trying to avoid, you will open the door to becoming a world class coach. You’ll stop designing plans that demand flawlessness and start building frameworks that accommodate the messy reality of human life. Because the truth is that your client’s ability to be imperfect and keep going is a far more powerful skill than their ability to be perfect temporarily.

Voltaire Was Right: Perfection is the Enemy of Good

I want you to picture two clients. We’ll call them Alex and Jordan.

Alex trains five days a week, hits their protein target about 80% of the time, gets seven hours of sleep most nights, and occasionally skips a planned workout when work or family demands it. They’re not perfect, but they’re consistent. They’ve been doing this for eight months.

Jordan trains six days a week when they’re “on,” hits macros to the gram, goes to bed at exactly the same time every night, and won’t deviate from the plan under any circumstances. But Jordan can only maintain this for three or four weeks before life intervenes. Then they completely stop for a few weeks, feel terrible about it, and eventually restart the perfect plan. They’ve been in this cycle for eight months.

Who do you think has better results? Who do you think is happier? Who do you think is still going to be training a year from now?

Perfection is seductive. It feels righteous. It feels like commitment and dedication and seriousness. But in practice, perfectionism sabotages more transformations than laziness ever could.

Voltaire, the French Enlightenment writer and philosopher, wrote that “le mieux est l’ennemi du bien” which translates to “the perfect is the enemy of the good”. He wasn’t talking about fitness, but he might as well have been. When we demand perfection from ourselves or our clients, we create a standard that’s impossible to maintain. And when that standard inevitably isn’t met, the whole structure collapses.

Unfortunately, perfectionism is correlated with worse outcomes in health behavior change. Perfectionism generally lead to lower exercise adherence over time. Perfectionism in eating behaviours is generally  associated with increased disordered eating patterns, not better nutrition.

This is why we teach our clients that 80/20 Rule. This is a principle from economics that’s found its way into nearly every domain. Vilfredo Pareto observed that 80% of effects come from 20% of causes. In coaching, 80% of your client’s results come from 20% of their efforts. The basics done consistently (adequate protein, regular resistance training, reasonable sleep, manageable stress) will produce the vast majority of results. The perfect meal timing, the optimal supplement stack, or the ideal training split, these are marginal gains. They matter at the elite level, but for most clients, they’re a distraction from what actually moves the needle.

I’ve had clients transform their bodies and their lives hitting their plan about 75% of the time. They missed workouts. They had imperfect meals. They had weekends where things got loose. But they kept showing up. They didn’t let imperfection derail them. And the compound effect of that consistency over months created results that would make any perfectionist jealous.

This is what I now call the optimisation trap: the pursuit of the perfect plan prevents you from starting the good-enough plan. Clients spend weeks researching the optimal approach, the best macro split, the perfect training program. And while they’re researching, they’re doing nothing. Meanwhile, the person who started with a decent plan three weeks ago is already building momentum.

Reframing Success: Progress Over Perfection

One of the most important shifts you can create with a client is how they measure success. Because if success only counts when everything goes perfectly, they’re going to feel like a failure most of the time. And people who feel like failures quit.

I teach clients to measure success on a spectrum, not a binary. Here’s what that looks like in practice:

A perfect day might be hitting all their macros, getting all their planned workouts in, sleeping eight hours, managing stress well, and drinking enough water. That’s a ten out of ten. And it happens sometimes. But it’s not the standard for success.

A seven out of ten day might be hitting protein but not tracking everything else, getting one solid workout in even though two were planned, sleeping six and a half hours, and being reasonably on top of stress. That’s still a successful day. That’s progress.

Even a five out of ten day (where they squeeze in a twenty-minute workout instead of the planned sixty, eat mostly whole foods but don’t track anything, and sleep is rough) is still a win compared to doing nothing.

This reframe is powerful because it makes success achievable every single day. Your client can always do something. They can always make the next choice a better one. And when they start seeing these moderate efforts as wins rather than failures, their entire relationship with the process changes.

I call this the Consistency Continuum, and it’s become one of my primary coaching frameworks:

0-25%: Chaos (no pattern, random effort, no foundation) 

25-50%: Inconsistent (sporadic effort, frequent restarts, high variability) 

50-75%: Emerging Consistency (building momentum, patterns forming, occasional setbacks) 

75-90%: Strong Consistency (sustainable progress, habits encoded, resilient to obstacles) 

90-100%: Mastery (automaticity, effortless adherence, identity-level change)

The goal isn’t to live at 100%. The goal is to operate consistently in the 75-90% range, which produces extraordinary results over time while remaining sustainable for real human beings with real lives.

The danger of Instagram-worthy transformations is that they create an unrealistic standard for what progress should look like. Your client sees someone who lost fifty pounds in twelve weeks, got shredded, and transformed their life. What they don’t see is that person’s full-time job is their fitness, or that they’ve been training for a decade and this was a cut phase, or that the timeline is exaggerated, or that the person crashed afterward and regained it all.

This connects to the evolutionary psychology of social comparison. Humans evolved to care about relative status, not just absolute well-being. In a tribe of 150 people (Dunbar’s number; the theoretical cognitive limit on meaningful social relationships), you could accurately assess where you stood. But now your client is comparing themselves to millions of people on social media, most of who are showing carefully curated highlight reels.

The comparison circuitry in your client’s brain is being hijacked. They’re comparing their chapter three to someone else’s chapter twenty, their behind-the-scenes to someone else’s highlight reel, their full reality to someone else’s best moment. This is a recipe for perpetual inadequacy.

Real transformation is messy. It’s non-linear. There are weeks where the scale doesn’t move or even goes up. There are periods where life gets chaotic, and the plan goes out the window. There are moments of doubt and frustration, and wanting to quit. But if you can stay in the game, if you can keep showing up imperfectly, the trajectory over time will blow your mind.

I had a client once tell me, “I feel like I’m not doing enough. I’m only making it to the gym three times a week, and I’m not perfect with my food.” I pulled up her data from six months prior. She’d been working out zero times a week and eating fast food most days. Three workouts a week and mostly whole foods was a revolutionary change for her. But because she was comparing herself to some imagined perfect version, she couldn’t see her own progress.

That’s why we celebrate imperfect action. Did you only have time for a thirty-minute workout instead of an hour? That’s a win. Did you eat a balanced breakfast even though lunch and dinner were chaotic? That’s a win. Did you get back on track after a rough weekend instead of waiting until Monday or next month? That’s a massive win.

Every single imperfect action is a vote for the identity you’re building. And those votes add up.

Effective Goal Setting That Actually Works

You’ve learned why consistency matters more than intensity, and you understand why perfection undermines consistency. Now we need to talk about how to actually structure goals in a way that drives consistent action instead of creating pressure and paralysis. Most coaches think they know goal setting (SMART goals etc.). But traditional goal-setting frameworks miss crucial elements that separate goals that inspire daily action from goals that sound good on paper but produce nothing. The way you set goals with your clients will either set them up for sustainable success or trap them in cycles of motivation and burnout. 

But if you are to truly utilise the fact that consistency is the prerequisite to all results in your coaching practice, we need to rebuild your goal-setting framework from the ground up, starting with what’s broken in the traditional approach.

Why SMART Goals Aren’t Enough

Every coach learns about SMART goals in their certification: Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time-bound. It’s a very solid framework. I use it, and we teach it in our courses. But if you stop there, you’re missing critical pieces that make the difference between goals that drive behaviour and goals that sit in a notebook gathering dust.

The problem with traditional goal setting is that it’s usually outcome-focused. Lose twenty pounds. Deadlift 140kg. Fit into those jeans from college. These outcomes do matter, and often they’re the reason your client hired you, but they’re not what drives day-to-day behaviour. And worse, they’re not entirely within your client’s control.

Your client can’t directly control whether they lose twenty pounds this month. They can’t force the scale to move. What they can control is whether they train four times this week, whether they eat adequate protein today, whether they go to bed on time tonight. These are process goals, and they’re the secret to sustainable progress.

This connects directly back to the Stoic dichotomy of control. Outcome goals violate the principle, they focus on what you don’t control. Process goals honour it, as they focus on what you do control.

When I sit down with a new client, we absolutely talk about outcome goals. I want to know what they’re working toward, what success looks like, and why this matters to them. But then we immediately shift to process goals. What are the daily and weekly behaviours that will get them there?

A client might have an outcome goal of losing thirty pounds. Great. Their process goals might be training four times per week, eating protein at every meal, drinking eighty glasses of water daily, and being in a calorie deficit six days a week. These are the actions they control. These are what we measure and celebrate.

Outcome goals can be demotivating when progress is slow or non-linear, which it almost always is. Your client might do everything right for two weeks and lose one pound or even gain weight due to water retention. If they’re only measuring outcome, that’s discouraging. But if they’re measuring process and they hit their training and nutrition targets, they’ve had two perfect weeks. You know that the outcome will follow, and you are rewarding what they do actually have control over.

The other missing piece in traditional goal setting is personal meaning. Your client’s goals need to be theirs, not yours and not what they think they’re supposed to want. I can’t tell you how many times a client has told me they want to lose weight, and when I dig deeper, what they really want is to feel confident, or have energy to play with their kids, or feel strong and capable in their body.

Weight loss might be part of that, but it’s not the core motivation. And when things get hard (like when the alarm goes off at 5:30 AM, and they’re tired, when everyone else is having pizza, and they’re eating chicken again), they need a reason that’s bigger than a number on a scale.

I ask clients: Why does this goal matter to you? And then I ask why again. And again. Usually, by the third or fourth why, we get to the real motivation. That’s what we anchor to. That’s what we come back to when consistency wavers.

This connects to what Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) calls values versus goals. Goals are things you want to achieve, they’re finite endpoints. Values are how you want to live, they’re ongoing directions. “Lose twenty pounds” is a goal. “Be someone who takes care of their body” is a value. Goals can be completed or failed. Values can only be lived or not lived, moment by moment.

When clients connect their process goals to deeper values, adherence skyrockets. They’re not just tracking workouts. They’re living out their value of discipline. They’re not just eating protein. They’re embodying their value of self-care. This transforms the daily grind from an obligation to an expression of identity.

These tools are quite helpful if you wish to go deeper here:

• ACT Hexaflex Assessment Tool
• Wheel of Life Self Assessment Tool
• Triage Values Assessment Tool
• Triage Goals-Values Congruency Tool
• Triage Personal Values & Life Priorities Assessment
• Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs Assessment

Position Before Submission: The BJJ Approach to Foundations

I train Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, and there’s a principle in BJJ that revolutionised my coaching: position before submission.

In grappling, a submission is the finish; the choke or joint lock that ends the fight. But if you try to submit someone from a bad position, you’ll often fail and probably end up in a worse position. The secret is to establish a dominant position first (mount, back control, side control), and only then attempt the submission. Position before submission.

The parallel to coaching is striking. The “submission” is what your client wants (the outcome goal, the transformation, the dramatic result). But if you chase it from a bad position (inconsistent habits, poor foundations, unstable lifestyle) you’ll fail. Worse, your client will end up in a worse position than when they started: more discouraged, more convinced they can’t change, deeper in the all-or-nothing cycle.

Position before submission means we establish the foundations first. We build consistency. We encode habits. We create sustainable systems. We get the client into a dominant “position” where the results (the submission) become almost inevitable.

This is why rushing fails. You can’t skip the position-building phase. You can’t go straight for the submission. The attempt will fail, and you’ll lose the position you had.

Floor and Ceiling Goals: The Range-Based Approach

Floor and ceiling goals are one of the most powerful tools I’ve ever implemented with clients, and it’s simple enough that I’m almost embarrassed it took me years to figure out. This approach to goal setting and actually implementing goal setting in practice is actually deceptively simple.

Instead of giving clients a single target that they either hit or miss, we set a range with a floor and a ceiling. The floor is the minimum viable version; what they can do even on their worst days. The ceiling is the ideal; what they’re aiming for when life is going smoothly. And anywhere in that range is a win.

Let me give you a concrete example with training frequency. Instead of saying “You need to work out four times a week,” we might set a floor of two workouts and a ceiling of five. On a terrible week where work is chaos and they’re barely sleeping, two solid workouts is success. They stayed in the game. On a great week, they might hit five. Most weeks, they’ll land somewhere in the middle with three or four.

This framework is game-changing because it eliminates all-or-nothing thinking. There’s no such thing as failure as long as you hit the floor. And hitting the floor is always achievable because you designed it to be.

This is what I call structured flexibility. It sounds like an oxymoron, but it’s not. You have clear guidelines and targets (structure), but you also have built-in room for adaptation (flexibility). The floor provides security. The ceiling provides direction. The range in between provides breathing room for real life.

Here’s how this plays out across different areas:

For nutrition, maybe the floor is eating protein at two meals per day and the ceiling is hitting all macros perfectly. For sleep, the floor might be six and a half hours and the ceiling is eight. For steps, the floor is five thousand and the ceiling is ten thousand.

Most of the clients you will work with will have spent their whole lives thinking in binary: on the plan or off the plan, good or bad, success or failure. Floor and ceiling goals gives them permission to be human. To have hard days and medium days and great days, and all of them count as progress.

The key is setting the floor at a level that’s genuinely sustainable even when life goes sideways. I tell clients that the floor is what you can do when you’re sick, stressed, travelling, or dealing with a crisis. It can’t be aspirational. It has to be realistic. And the beautiful thing is that most clients hit the ceiling or middle of the range most of the time once they know the floor is there. The floor provides security, which reduces anxiety, which actually makes it easier to aim higher. But on the weeks when life gets real, they have a fallback that keeps them in the game.

From a choice architecture perspective (the study of how the way choices are presented influences decisions) floor and ceiling goals create what behavioural economists call “choice bracketing.” Instead of evaluating each decision in isolation (did I work out today? yes/no), clients evaluate within a range (where did I land in my range this week?). This broader framing reduces the psychological impact of individual “failures” and increases overall adherence.

The Minimum Viable Habit

Related to floor goals but worth discussing separately is the concept of the minimum viable habit. This is the smallest version of a behaviour that still counts, still maintains the chain, still reinforces the identity.

The idea comes from entrepreneurship where a minimum viable product is the simplest version you can create that still delivers value. Applied to habits, it’s the smallest action that still moves you toward your goal and maintains your identity. For a workout, the minimum viable habit might be putting on your gym clothes and doing five minutes of movement. For nutrition, it might be eating one palm of protein. For sleep, it might be turning your phone off thirty minutes before bed.

These sound almost laughably small, and that’s the point. On the days when you absolutely cannot do the full version, you can still do something. And that something keeps the chain unbroken. It keeps the identity intact.

This is a ratchet against backsliding. A ratchet is a mechanism that prevents backward movement. Your minimum viable habit is a ratchet in your behaviour change system; it prevents complete relapse even when full execution isn’t possible.

The psychological principle here is lowering the barrier to entry so much that you can’t justify not doing it. It’s hard to talk yourself out of five minutes. And often, once you start, you do more than five minutes anyway. But even if you don’t, five minutes beats zero minutes.

This connects to BJ Fogg’s research on Tiny Habits. Fogg found that the key to behaviour change isn’t motivation or willpower, it’s making the behaviour tiny enough that it’s easy even when you don’t feel like it. Make it so small it’s almost stupid. That’s the minimum viable habit.

Now, I could spend an age talking about effective goal setting, but needless to say, goal setting and consistency go hand in hand. Without effective goals, then consistency is unlikely. As consistency is the prerequisite to all results, we have to be clear in what “results” actually means, and you do that through goal setting. 

Combating All-or-Nothing Thinking Through ACT and CBT

Now, we’ve talked about why perfectionism kills consistency, but we haven’t yet addressed the deeper cognitive pattern that drives perfectionism: all-or-nothing thinking. This is the mental framework that turns a missed workout into “I’ve blown it,” that transforms one imperfect meal into “the whole day is ruined,” that convinces clients to wait until Monday instead of starting right now. 

All-or-nothing thinking is perhaps the most pervasive and destructive pattern in health and fitness coaching, and if you can’t recognise it and intervene effectively, you’ll watch clients cycle through the same self-defeating patterns indefinitely. Fortunately, psychology has given us powerful tools from Cognitive Behavioural Therapy and Acceptance and Commitment Therapy that can rewire these thought patterns.

Recognising the Red Flags

If you’re going to help clients overcome all-or-nothing thinking, you first need to get good at spotting it. And trust me, once you know what to listen for, you’ll hear it constantly. Here are the phrases that should set off alarm bells:

“I already ruined today, so I might as well…” “I’ll start fresh on Monday.” “If I can’t do it right, I’m not going to do it at all.” “I’ve already blown it.” “I’m either all in or all out.” “I was so good all week, and then I messed up.”

Notice the language. It’s binary. It’s absolute. There’s no middle ground, no shades of grey, no room for imperfection.

With clients with all-or-nothing thinking patterns, you will hear a lot of: “I was perfect Monday through Thursday, and then I had pizza on Friday so the whole week was a waste.” Think about the logic there. Four days of solid nutrition and training, completely negated in their mind by one meal. That’s not rational, but it’s incredibly common.

So, in your client conversations, listen for extremes. Listen for words like “always,” “never,” “ruined,” “perfect,” “totally.” These are clues that you’re dealing with someone who’s categorising their behaviour in binary terms.

This is what CBT identifies as a cognitive distortion, which is a thinking pattern that’s irrational but feels completely true. And all-or-nothing thinking rarely travels alone. It often comes with catastrophising (“I missed one workout, now I’ve ruined all my progress”), should statements (“I should be able to stick to this perfectly”), and mental filtering (only noticing the days they “failed,” ignoring all the days they succeeded).

High achievers are especially vulnerable to this pattern. They’re used to excelling. They’re used to hitting targets. In their careers, there’s often a clear standard for success and failure. They bring that same mindset to health and fitness, not realising that human behaviour doesn’t work the same way.

I’ve worked with lawyers, surgeons, executives, and entrepreneurs who crush it in every other area of their lives but struggle with fitness because they can’t accept anything less than perfection. And perfection in all this health and fitness stuff is impossible.

So, when you spot this pattern, name it. “Hey, I’m noticing some all-or-nothing thinking here. Can we talk about that?” Most clients aren’t even aware they’re doing it. Once you make it conscious, you can start to shift it.

The CBT Thought Record: Restructuring Cognitive Distortions

One of the most practical tools from Cognitive Behavioural Therapy is the thought record. It’s a structured way to identify and challenge irrational thoughts that drive counterproductive behaviour.

Here’s how I use it with clients:

Situation: What happened? (Missed a workout on Monday)

Automatic Thought: What went through your mind? (“I’ve already failed this week. I’m never going to reach my goals. I have no discipline.”)

Emotion: How did that thought make you feel? (Discouraged, ashamed, defeated)

Evidence For: Is there any evidence this thought is true? (I did miss the workout)

Evidence Against: Is there evidence this thought isn’t true? (I’ve hit my workouts consistently for three weeks. One missed session doesn’t erase that. I can still train Tuesday-Friday this week and hit my target.)

Alternative Thought: What’s a more balanced way to think about this? (“I missed Monday, but I can still have a strong week. Missing one workout doesn’t define my commitment.”)

Outcome: How do you feel now? (More motivated, more balanced, ready to refocus)

This process teaches clients to catch and challenge the automatic negative thoughts that trigger all-or-nothing spirals. The goal isn’t positive thinking or denying reality. It’s balanced thinking; seeing the full picture instead of just the negative distortion.

I don’t necessarily have clients write this out every time, but we walk through it verbally when they’re spiralling. Over time, they internalise the process and start doing it automatically.

There’s also the concept of “should statements” from REBT (Rational Emotive Behaviour Therapy), developed by Albert Ellis. When clients say “I should be further along” or “I shouldn’t have eaten that” or “I should be able to stick to this perfectly,” they’re creating arbitrary rules that generate guilt and shame when violated.

The alternative is what REBT calls “preferential thinking.” Instead of “I should work out five days a week,” it’s “I prefer to work out five days a week, and I’ll do my best, but I’m not a failure if I don’t.” This removes the moral weight and the crushing sense of obligation.

ACT in Action: Psychological Flexibility as a Coaching Superpower

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) has become one of my most useful coaching frameworks. It’s built on six core processes that together create what’s called psychological flexibility, which is the ability to be present, open to experience, and committed to valued action even in the presence of difficult thoughts and feelings.

Let me break down how each process applies to coaching:

1. Acceptance: This is the willingness to experience difficult thoughts and feelings without trying to control or avoid them. For clients, this means accepting that motivation will wane, that cravings will arise, that workouts will sometimes suck. Acceptance doesn’t mean giving up, it means not struggling against reality.

When a client says “I shouldn’t feel this way,” they’re refusing to accept their experience. When they say “This is hard right now, and that’s okay,” they’re practicing acceptance.

2. Cognitive Defusion: This is the ability to step back from thoughts and see them as just thoughts, not facts. It’s the difference between “I can’t do this” and “I’m having the thought that I can’t do this.”

The first feels like truth. The second feels like something your mind is doing.

I teach clients to notice their thoughts without fusing with them. When the thought arises “I don’t feel like working out,” they can acknowledge it, “There’s the ‘I don’t feel like it’ thought”, without letting it dictate their behaviour.

A simple defusion technique is to just add the phrase “I’m having the thought that…” before the thought. “I’m having the thought that I’m too tired for this workout.” It creates distance and reduces the thought’s power.

3. Being Present: This is mindfulness; being fully in the current moment rather than ruminating about the past or worrying about the future. For clients, this means being present in their workout, present with their meal, present with their choices.

The past is gone. The future isn’t here. All you have is the next choice, the next rep, the next meal. This connects to what I call the “next right choice” approach, which we’ll explore more later.

4. Self-as-Context: This is the understanding that you are not your thoughts, feelings, or experiences, you’re the context in which they occur. You’re the sky, not the weather.

This gives clients the ability to observe their experience without being defined by it. They’re not “someone who failed.” They’re someone who had a setback. They’re not “weak.” They’re experiencing a moment of low motivation.

5. Values: These are chosen life directions that guide behaviour. As discussed earlier, values are different from goals. A goal is something you complete. A value is something you live.

When clients connect their daily behaviours to their values, those behaviours become meaningful rather than obligatory. They’re not forcing themselves to work out, they’re living their value of self-care.

6. Committed Action: This is taking action guided by your values, even in the presence of difficult thoughts and feelings. It’s doing the workout even though the thought “I’m too tired” is present. It’s choosing the protein-rich meal even though the craving for pizza is there.

ACT doesn’t say the thoughts and feelings will go away. It says you can act in accordance with your values regardless of what thoughts and feelings show up.

An ACT framework I use a lot with clients is called the “Passengers on the Bus” metaphor. You’re driving a bus (your life), and you have passengers (your thoughts, feelings, urges). The passengers are noisy. They’re telling you to turn around, to stop, to take a different route. But you’re the driver. You choose the direction. The passengers can shout all they want, they’re not in control.

When a client says “I can’t work out because I don’t feel motivated,” I ask: “Can you work out with the ‘I don’t feel motivated’ passenger on the bus? Can you do it even though that thought is present?”

Usually, the answer is yes. And when they do, they learn a profound lesson: feelings and thoughts don’t have to dictate behaviour.

The Dimmer Switch: Moving Beyond Binary Thinking

The way I explain this to clients is through the dimmer switch versus light switch metaphor. Most people treat their health behaviours like a light switch; it’s either on or off, perfect or terrible, all or nothing. But life is actually a dimmer switch. There are infinite gradations between zero and a hundred.

Let me give you a nutrition example. At zero, you’re eating fast food three meals a day, no vegetables, way over on calories. At a hundred, you’re hitting perfect macros, all whole foods, impeccable timing, optimised for performance. But there’s a whole range in between.

Fifty might be eating mostly whole foods but not tracking. Seventy might be hitting protein and calories but being flexible with carbs and fats. Thirty might be having one solid meal and making decent choices the rest of the day even if it’s not perfect.

When clients understand this, they stop thinking in terms of on or off. They start thinking in terms of better or worse. And better is always available as an option.

I teach this as “good, better, best” thinking. On any given day, in any given situation, you have options:

Good: Do something, even if it’s minimal. 

Better: Do the moderate version of your plan. 

Best: Do the full, optimal version.

All three are wins. All three move you forward. The only loss is doing nothing because you couldn’t do everything.

Let’s say your client planned a sixty-minute workout but only has thirty minutes. All-or-nothing thinking says skip it. Good-better-best thinking says a thirty-minute workout is better than zero, so do that. They still win.

Or maybe your client planned to meal prep on Sunday, but life got in the way. All-or-nothing thinking says the week is screwed. Good-better-best thinking says you can still make decent choices even without prep, or you can prep just protein and keep the rest simple. You adjust. You don’t abandon.

The power of “and” thinking versus “or” thinking is related. All-or-nothing is “or” thinking. I’m either perfect or I’ve failed. I either stick to my plan or I give up. I either have willpower or I don’t.

“And” thinking creates space for nuance. I can have dessert and stay in a deficit this week. I can miss a workout and still make progress. I can have a hard day and not let it derail my whole week.

This isn’t making excuses. This is creating psychological flexibility, which ACT identifies as the core of mental health and effective behaviour. Rigid thinking breaks. Flexible thinking bends and adapts.

Building Flexibility Into the Plan

Unfortunately, if your client’s plan requires life to go perfectly, your plan is the problem. Life doesn’t go perfectly. Work deadlines pop up. Kids get sick. Relationships have conflict. Stress happens. Energy fluctuates. And if your client only knows how to execute the plan under ideal conditions, they’re going to struggle the moment conditions aren’t ideal.

This is why I build structured flexibility into everything. Structured flexibility sounds like an oxymoron, but it’s not. It means having clear guidelines and targets, but also having built-in room for adaptation. Here’s what that looks like practically:

For training, we might plan four workouts per week, but the specific days are flexible based on the client’s schedule. If they usually train Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday, but work blows up on Wednesday, they can shift to Thursday without it being a failure.

For nutrition, we might aim for a weekly calorie target rather than a daily one. This allows for higher days and lower days, which is how real life works. You can have a bigger meal out on Saturday and balance it with lighter days earlier in the week. The average is what matters.

I also teach clients to have multiple pathways to success. If the plan is to train at the gym for an hour but that’s not possible today, what’s plan B? A thirty-minute workout at home. What’s plan C? A twenty-minute walk and some push-ups. All paths lead forward.

This is what military strategist Helmuth von Moltke meant when he said “No plan survives first contact with the enemy.” The plan will need to change. That’s not failure, that’s just reality. The question is whether you’ve built in the flexibility to adapt or whether the plan is so rigid it shatters on first impact.

The goal is to make it almost impossible to fail. There’s always a version of success available if you’ve built enough flexibility into the system.

One of my favorite questions to ask clients is: “What could get in the way of this plan working?” Then we problem-solve in advance. If travel is an issue, we create a travel protocol. If social events are a challenge, we strategise around them. If injury is a concern, we have modifications ready.

This is implementation intentions in practice (if-then planning). Research by Peter Gollwitzer has shown that people who create implementation intentions are 2-3x more likely to follow through on their goals compared to those who just set goal intentions.

The structure is simple: “If X happens, then I will do Y.”

If I’m too tired for my planned workout, then I’ll do a 20-minute version. If I’m travelling, then I’ll do bodyweight circuits in my hotel room. If I’m at a social event with food, then I’ll have one plate of protein and vegetables first. If I miss a workout, then I’ll do one the next day.

These if-then plans create automaticity. When the obstacle arises, the brain doesn’t have to make a decision because it already has a predetermined response. This dramatically reduces the cognitive load and decision fatigue that often lead to giving up.

But here’s the key: the flexibility has to be built into the plan from the start, not retrofitted after someone feels like they’ve failed. When clients know they have options, they use them. When they don’t, they quit.

Tools to Get Back on Track After Slip-Ups

Understanding that consistency is the prerequisite to all results is essential, but knowledge of this alone doesn’t get clients back on track when they’ve fallen off. You can’t discuss consistency without discussing how to get people “back on track” when they do have little mishaps and slip-ups. This is where the rubber meets the road. When your client comes to you after missing a week of workouts, after a weekend of overeating, after abandoning the plan entirely. How you respond in these critical moments will determine whether they restart with renewed commitment or spiral deeper into shame and avoidance. You need practical tools, not just theory. You need specific protocols for what to say, what questions to ask, and how to rebuild momentum quickly. Because slip-ups aren’t the problem, they are inevitable. However, how long someone stays off track afterward is the problem. It eats into consistency. So, we must deal with it if we are to build consistency.

Normalising the Slip-Up: The Existential Reality of Choice

Your client is going to slip up. They’re going to miss workouts, eat off plan, skip sleep, ignore their stress management. It’s not a question of if. It’s a question of when and how often and how you both respond.

This is the weight of freedom. Jean-Paul Sartre wrote that we are “condemned to be free”, meaning we cannot escape the burden of choice and responsibility for our actions. Your client makes thousands of choices every day, and they won’t always make the ones that serve their goals. This isn’t a character flaw. This is the human condition.

The first and most important tool you have is normalisation. Slip-ups are not disasters. They’re data points. They’re part of the process. They’re normal, expected, and totally manageable. If you treat a slip-up like a crisis, your client will internalise that this is catastrophic. If you treat it like interesting information, they’ll start to see it that way too.

I’ve had clients come to check-ins absolutely devastated because they missed three workouts in a week. They’re apologising profusely, expecting me to be disappointed or angry. And I’m sitting there thinking, “Okay, you missed three. You still did two. Let’s talk about what happened and what we can learn to handle things better in future.”

Your response shapes their response. If you’re calm, curious, and solution-focused, they learn to be that way with themselves. If you’re judgmental or harsh or make them feel like they’ve let you down, they learn to be ashamed. And shame does not drive sustainable behaviour change.

I tell clients from day one that they’re going to have perfect weeks, good weeks, mediocre weeks, and terrible weeks. All of that is normal. What matters is that we stay in communication, we learn from what happens, and we keep moving forward. There is no failure as long as you’re still in the game.

This creates psychological safety for honesty. Because here’s the thing: clients will slip up whether you know about it or not. But if they’re afraid to tell you, you can’t help them. They’ll hide it, feel guilty, spiral, and potentially quit before you even know there’s an issue.

But if they know you’re going to respond with curiosity instead of judgment, they’ll tell you. “Hey, I had a rough week. I only made it to two workouts and my nutrition was all over the place. Can we talk about it?” That’s what you want. Because now you can actually coach them through it.

The existentialist Albert Camus wrote about The Myth of Sisyphus, the Greek king condemned to push a boulder up a mountain, only to have it roll back down, for eternity. Camus asks: is this meaningless suffering, or can we find meaning in the repetitive struggle itself? His conclusion is that “One must imagine Sisyphus happy.”

Your client’s journey is Sisyphean in some ways. The transformation will never be “done.” There will always be another meal to choose, another workout to complete, another choice to make. The boulder never stays at the top of the mountain. But there’s beauty and meaning in the process itself, in the daily effort, in the person you become through the repetitive act of showing up.

When your client has a slip-up and the boulder rolls back down, they haven’t failed. They’re just in the eternal cycle of the work. The question is whether they can find meaning in pushing the boulder back up again.

The 24-Hour Reset Protocol

When a client comes to you after a slip-up, the first twenty-four hours of your response are critical. This is where you either help them get back on track or accidentally reinforce the shame spiral.

Here’s my protocol:

First, I acknowledge what happened without judgment. “Okay, you had a tough week. Thanks for telling me.” No surprise, no disappointment, no making it a big deal.

Second, I ask questions that move them forward, not backward. I’m not interested in rehashing everything they did wrong or making them feel worse than they already do. I want to understand what happened and find the path forward.

The questions I ask are:

• What do you think contributed to this?
• What was going on in the rest of your life during this time?
• Looking back, what could have helped?
• What do you need from me right now?
• What feels doable for you this coming week?

Notice the tone. I’m not asking “Why did you let this happen?” or “Don’t you care about your goals?” I’m treating them like a capable adult who had a setback, not a child who misbehaved.

Then we create a plan for the immediate future. Not next month. This week. Sometimes just the next few days. What’s the smallest step back toward their routine? Maybe it’s one workout. Maybe it’s just getting protein in at breakfast. Maybe it’s going to bed on time for three nights. Whatever it is, it needs to feel achievable. Because we’re rebuilding momentum, and momentum starts small. Consistency is the prerequisite to all results, and consistency requires momentum.

This connects to what I call the next right choice approach. You can’t undo what happened yesterday or this morning or five minutes ago. All you can do is make the next choice a good one. That’s it. That’s all you have to focus on.

Client missed a workout this morning? The next right choice might be taking a walk at lunch. Ate fast food for dinner? The next right choice is drinking some water and going to bed on time. This keeps them present and prevents the rumination that leads to giving up.

The mindset shift I’m creating is from shame to curiosity. Shame says, “I’m terrible. I have no willpower. I always do this.” Curiosity says, “Huh, that didn’t go well. I wonder why? What can I learn? What would I do differently next time?” Shame is paralysing. Curiosity is activating. And the way you respond to their slip-up teaches them which one to choose.

I had a client once who missed two weeks completely. Just fell off. When she finally texted me, she was so apologetic and convinced I was going to fire her as a client. I wrote back: “Hey, life happens. I’m glad you’re reaching out. Let’s hop on a call and figure out what support you need to get back into it.” She later told me that response changed everything for her. She’d been expecting me to be disappointed, and instead I was just practical. It gave her permission to be practical with herself.

Self-Compassion: The Research-Backed Alternative to Self-Criticism

Now, despite what you might have been exposed to in the health and fitness world so far, the reality is that self-compassion is more effective than self-criticism for behaviour change. The research is pretty clear on this. Generally, self-compassion (i.e treating yourself with the same kindness you’d show a friend who’s struggling) predicts better adherence to health goals, lower rates of emotional eating, and more sustainable motivation.

And yet, the fitness industry is obsessed with accountability, discipline, and toughness. We tell people to push through, to be harder on themselves, to stop making excuses. Sometimes that works. But often, it backfires spectacularly. Your client is already beating themselves up. I promise you. They don’t need you to pile on. What they need is to learn how to talk to themselves in a way that supports continued effort rather than giving up.

I teach clients to notice their self-talk. When they slip up, what’s the voice in their head saying? For most people, it’s brutal. “You’re so weak. You have no discipline. You’ll never change. Why do you even bother?” Would you talk to a friend that way? Would you talk to your kid that way? Of course not. Because you know it wouldn’t help. So why do we talk to ourselves that way? Usually because we think we deserve it, or because we believe being harsh will motivate us to do better. But the research says otherwise.

Instead, I teach them to respond to slip-ups the way they’d respond to a friend. With understanding. With perspective. With encouragement to try again. “Okay, this week was hard. You’re dealing with a lot. You did your best with what you had. What’s one small thing you can do tomorrow to take care of yourself?”

That’s self-compassion. And it’s not the same as making excuses or letting yourself off the hook. It’s treating yourself like a human being who’s worthy of kindness, even when you’re struggling. There’s a beautiful framework from self-compassion research that I use with clients. Self-compassion has three components:

1. Self-kindness vs. Self-judgment: Treating yourself with warmth rather than harsh criticism when you fail or make mistakes.

2. Common humanity vs. Isolation: Recognising that struggle and imperfection are part of the shared human experience, not signs that you’re uniquely flawed.

3. Mindfulness vs. Over-identification: Holding your experience in balanced awareness rather than either suppressing it or being consumed by it.

When a client has a slip-up, I walk them through this:

Self-kindness: “How would you talk to a friend in this situation? Can you talk to yourself that way?”

Common humanity: “Everyone struggles with this. You’re not alone. This is part of the process for everyone.”

Mindfulness: “Yes, you had a hard week. Can you acknowledge that without making it mean something catastrophic about your future?”

The accountability piece still matters, but it works better when it’s built on a foundation of self-compassion. You can hold someone accountable and be kind at the same time. Actually, you have to. Because harsh accountability without compassion just creates fear and shame, which are terrible motivators.

I want my clients to keep going because they care about themselves, not because they hate themselves. The former is sustainable. The latter is not.

Practical Recovery Strategies

Beyond the mindset work, clients need practical strategies to get back on track. Here are the ones I use most:

The Next Right Choice Approach (already discussed): Focus only on the immediate next decision. What’s one thing you can do right now that moves you forward?

Implementation Intentions for Recovery: We create if-then plans specifically for getting back on track:

• If I miss a workout, then I’ll do one the next day.
• If I overeat at a meal, then I’ll get right back to my normal eating the next meal, not tomorrow.
• If I have a bad week, then I’ll text my coach before Sunday to check in.

These pre-planned responses reduce the cognitive load of recovery and create automatic pathways back.

The 72-Hour Rule: Never go more than 72 hours without doing something toward your goal. This creates a maximum acceptable gap. If you haven’t trained in three days, you train today. This prevents the drift that turns a slip-up into a relapse.

Building a Personal Recovery Toolkit: With each client, we create a set of strategies they’ve tested and know work for them when they’re struggling.

For one client, their recovery toolkit includes: calling a friend who supports their goals, doing a ten-minute meditation, re-reading their why statement, looking at progress photos, or simply going to bed early and starting fresh tomorrow.

For another client, it’s going for a walk, listening to a specific playlist, cooking a healthy meal, or texting me for a pep talk.

The point is, these are personalised strategies that they can deploy when they feel themselves slipping. They’re not waiting for motivation to strike or for Monday to come around. They have tools in their pocket ready to use.

The Pre-Mortem Exercise: This is a technique from psychology where you imagine failure before it happens to prevent it. Before starting a challenging phase, I ask clients: “Imagine it’s three months from now and you’ve quit. What happened? What went wrong?”

They might say: “Work got crazy and I didn’t have time” or “I got injured and couldn’t train” or “I went on holidays and never got back on track.”

Now we design specifically to prevent those failures. For work getting crazy, we create a sustainable floor. For injury, we have modifications ready. For holidays, we create a travel protocol.

By imagining failure in advance, we can build ratchets against it.

Now, all of these are helpful when your clients slip up, but what really matters is having a rock solid foundation in place that actually allows consistency to flourish.

Systems and Structures That Support Consistency

​​We’ve covered mindset, psychology, and recovery strategies, which are all crucial. But even the most psychologically resilient client will struggle if the systems and structures around them are working against their goals. This is where we move from internal work to external design. The brilliant insight from behavioural economics and systems thinking is that you don’t need to rely on willpower or motivation when you can engineer environments that make the right choices automatic. 

Most coaches, when they first learn about behaviour change, focus exclusively on what happens inside the client’s head. Elite coaches also focus on what surrounds the client: the physical environment, the tracking systems, the social structures, the defaults and friction points that invisibly shape every decision. This is where good coaching becomes great coaching, because you’re not just helping clients fight against their environment, you’re helping them redesign it entirely.

Environment Design: Making Good Choices Effortless

Your client’s environment is either working for them or against them. There’s very little middle ground. And the coaches who help clients design environments that support their goals rather than sabotage them have a massive advantage.

This is where understanding some behavioural economics and choice architecture becomes super helpful. Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein’s work in Nudge shows us that the way choices are structured (the “choice architecture”) dramatically influences what people choose, often without their conscious awareness.

The basic principle is simple: make the desired behaviour the easiest behaviour, and make the undesired behaviour harder. If you can do this, you will drastically improve consistency.

This is the Consistency Equation I use with clients:

Consistency = (Motivation × Ability) ÷ Friction

You can increase motivation (though it fluctuates). You can increase ability by making the behaviour easier. Or you can dramatically reduce friction. Often, reducing friction is the highest leverage point.

Let’s start with training. If your client has to drive twenty minutes to the gym, change clothes in a locker room, navigate a crowded facility, and then drive home, that’s a lot of friction. Every piece of friction is a decision point where they might bail.

What if instead, they had a few pieces of equipment at home and a simple routine they could do in 30 minutes? Or what if they laid out their gym clothes the night before and packed their bag so all they had to do was grab it? We’re removing friction.

On the flip side, if they’re trying to avoid late-night snacking but there’s a cupboard full of crisps and cookies, that’s an environment working against them. Every time they walk by, they have to actively choose not to eat it. That’s decision fatigue in action. But if those foods aren’t in the house, there’s no decision to make. The friction of having to get in the car and go buy something is usually enough to prevent the behaviour.

This isn’t about willpower. It’s about design. Don’t rely on willpower to overcome a bad environment. Design a good environment.

I work with clients to audit their environment across multiple areas:

For nutrition:

• What food is in the house? (Keep only foods that serve your goals easily accessible)
• What’s visible on counters? (Fruit bowl vs. cookie jar)
• How easy is it to grab protein versus grabbing junk? (Pre-portion protein, hide junk)
• Is meal prep set up to be simple or complicated? (Simplify systems)

For training:

• Where is equipment? (Visible and accessible)
• Is there space to work out? (Remove barriers)
• Are gym clothes easily accessible? (Lay them out the night before)
• Is the gym location convenient? (If not, create a home option)

For sleep:

• What’s the bedroom environment like? (Dark, cool, quiet)
• Is the phone charging in another room or on the nightstand? (Move it out)
• Are blackout curtains up? (Optimise environment)
• Is the temperature right? (Cool is better for sleep)

For stress management:

• Is there a space to meditate or journal? (Create dedicated space)
• Are those tools visible and easy to use? (Journal on nightstand, meditation app on phone home screen)

We also use the concept of defaults to help improve consistency. What’s the default option? If your client gets home and the default is sitting on the couch because it’s right there and easy, that’s what they’ll do. But if the default is gym clothes already on because they changed at work, the workout is more likely to happen.

We also use commitment devices; strategies that “lock in” future behaviour. These come from behavioural economics but my favourite example is the story of Ulysses and the Sirens. Knowing the sirens’ song would tempt him to steer toward the rocks, Ulysses had himself tied to the mast. He couldn’t trust his future self, so he constrained his future choices.

For clients, commitment devices might include:

• Pre-paying for a training package (financial commitment)
• Publicly announcing their goals (social commitment)
• Scheduling workouts in their calendar as non-negotiable meetings (time commitment)
• Betting money on themselves through platforms like StickK (loss aversion commitment)

These work because they make the cost of not following through higher than the cost of following through. You’re using your present self to constrain your future self in helpful ways.

Small changes compound. Move the fruit bowl to the counter and the cookies to a high shelf. Put your running shoes by the door. Charge your phone outside the bedroom. These seem trivial, but they shift the path of least resistance toward the behaviours we want.

The goal is to create an environment where good choices are effortless and bad choices require deliberate effort. This is how you overcome the evolutionary mismatch; you’re redesigning the modern environment to align with how the brain actually works.

The Neuroscience of Tracking and Feedback Loops

What gets measured gets managed, but only if you’re measuring the right things and using the data correctly. Tracking can be an incredibly powerful tool for consistency. It creates awareness, provides feedback, and builds accountability. But it can also become obsessive, stressful, and counterproductive if you’re not careful.

Here’s my philosophy: track the minimum necessary to drive behaviour and provide useful feedback, and nothing more. For most clients, that means tracking process metrics, not just outcomes. Are they hitting their training sessions? Are they eating protein at most meals? Are they getting reasonable sleep? These behaviours drive results, and they’re within the client’s control. Remember the Stoic dichotomy of control: focus on what you can control. Process metrics are controllable. Outcome metrics often aren’t.

There’s fascinating neuroscience about feedback and dopamine that matters here. Dopamine isn’t the “pleasure chemical” as it’s often mischaracterised. It’s the “prediction and motivation chemical.” Wolfram Schultz’s research on dopamine neurons showed that dopamine spikes happen not when you get a reward, but when you encounter an unexpected reward or when you’re anticipating a reward.

This is called reward prediction error; the difference between what you expected and what you got. When reality exceeds expectations, dopamine spikes. When reality meets expectations, dopamine is moderate. When reality falls short, dopamine drops.

This is why progress photos work. Why celebrating small wins matters. Why tracking can be motivating. Each time your client sees unexpected progress or gets acknowledged for effort, there’s a dopamine spike that reinforces the behaviour. You’re literally rewiring their brain’s reward system to crave the behaviours that lead to their goals.

But the key is that the reward has to be somewhat unpredictable to maintain dopamine response. If everything becomes predictable, dopamine response diminishes. This is why I mix up how we celebrate progress; sometimes it’s verbal acknowledgment, sometimes it’s looking at data trends, sometimes it’s progress photos, sometimes it’s performance improvements.

However, we want to use data to reinforce progress, not create pressure. When I review a client’s tracking, I’m looking for trends, not perfection. I’m celebrating what went well. I’m curious about what didn’t. I’m asking what they learned.

If I see a client hit their training goal four weeks in a row, that’s worth acknowledging. “Hey, you’ve been nailing your workouts. How does that feel? What’s making that work for you?” This positive reinforcement strengthens the behaviour through multiple mechanisms (dopamine, identity reinforcement, and social validation).

If I see inconsistency, I’m not scolding them. I’m problem-solving. “I noticed training dropped off in week three. What was happening then? What got in the way?” We treat it as information.

Some clients benefit from more detailed tracking like full food logs, workout performance, sleep quality, mood, energy, etc. This can reveal patterns. Maybe they notice they sleep poorly the night after late workouts, so we shift the timing. Maybe they realise they’re more consistent when they train first thing in the morning.

But other clients find detailed tracking overwhelming. For them, we keep it simple. Did you train today? Yes or no. Did you eat protein? Yes or no. That’s enough to create awareness without creating stress.

The wrong way to use tracking is as a report card where the client feels judged. The right way is as a conversation starter that helps you both understand what’s working and what needs adjustment.

From systems thinking, this is creating effective feedback loops. A feedback loop is when the output of a system influences its own input. Positive feedback loops amplify change. Negative feedback loops dampen change and maintain stability. For behaviour change, we want to create positive feedback loops around desired behaviours: Success → Tracking shows success → Acknowledgment and celebration → Increased confidence → More effort → More success.

And we want to interrupt negative feedback loops around undesired behaviors: Failure → Shame → Avoidance → More failure. We interrupt this by replacing shame with curiosity and avoidance with engagement.

The Evolutionary Power of Community and Accountability

Humans are social creatures. We evolved in tight-knit groups, and we’re influenced by the people around us, whether we realise it or not. And isolation undermines consistency in ways that are hard to overcome alone. From an evolutionary perspective, our survival depended on belonging to the group. Ostracism was a death sentence. This is why social connection and approval are such powerful motivators; they’re wired into our deepest survival circuitry.

Robin Dunbar’s research suggests humans can maintain about 150 meaningful relationships, this is often referred to as Dunbar’s number. In our evolutionary past, we lived in groups of roughly this size. You knew everyone. You were accountable to everyone. Social pressure and support were constant. Now, your client might live alone, work remotely, and train solo. The social structures that once supported consistent behaviour are gone. This is another aspect of evolutionary mismatch. If your client is trying to transform their health while surrounded by people who don’t support those goals, they’re swimming upstream. Not impossible, but harder.

Now, community and accountability can take many forms. It might be a training partner who meets them at the gym. It might be a group coaching program where they see others going through the same struggles. It might be a supportive spouse who meal preps with them. It might be an online community where they share wins and challenges.

The key is that it’s not about shame-based accountability. “I don’t want to let people down so I better not mess up.” That’s fragile and anxiety-inducing. It’s about support-based accountability. “These people believe in me. They’re cheering for me. When I struggle, they help me get back up.” That’s sustainable.

I’ve seen some clients make more progress in group coaching than they ever did one-on-one. The programming wasn’t any better in the group coaching, but they succeeded because they felt part of something. They saw others struggling with the same things. They didn’t feel alone. And when they wanted to quit, the group kept them going.

This taps into what evolutionary psychologists call tribalism, which is our tendency to form in-groups and derive identity from group membership. When your client sees themselves as part of “the community of people who train” or “the people working on their health,” that identity becomes self-reinforcing.

Even just one person can make a difference. I encourage clients to tell someone they trust about their goals and ask for support. Not someone who’s going to police them, but someone who’s going to check in, celebrate progress, and offer encouragement when things are hard. There’s research showing that people who have social support for health behaviour change are more successful. People who have a support partner for weight loss lose significantly more weight than those who go it alone.

But the nuance here is that the community has to be supportive in the right way. If it’s a community that promotes all-or-nothing thinking, comparison, or shame, it’s counterproductive. The community needs to normalise struggle, celebrate imperfect action, and create psychological safety.

That’s part of your role as a coach. You’re not just programming workouts and nutrition. You’re creating a culture around your clients that either supports consistency or undermines it. Make sure it’s the former.

The social comparison aspect cuts both ways. Yes, comparing yourself to others on Instagram can be demoralising. But comparing yourself to others who are one step ahead can be motivating. These act as aspirational peers rather than distant individuals who you know nothing of their life story. It shows what’s possible. It provides a roadmap.

This is why I sometimes connect clients with each other who are at similar stages. This is not to compete (although a bit of friendly competition can actually be helpful), but to relate. To share strategies. To normalise the struggle. To create the tribe that evolution designed us to thrive in.

Your Role as the Consistency Coach

You’ve learned the science, the psychology, the frameworks, and the systems. But all of that knowledge is useless if you can’t apply it skillfully to the unique human being sitting across from you. This is where coaching becomes an art as much as a science. 

Your role isn’t to be a program dispenser or a meal plan writer; it’s to be a guide who helps someone navigate the messy, non-linear path of behaviour change over months and years. That requires reading people accurately, communicating effectively, knowing when to push and when to pull back, and having the humility to adjust when something isn’t working. 

Ultimately, the best coaches aren’t the ones with the most knowledge, they’re the ones who can translate that knowledge into action through skilled, adaptive, human-centred coaching. So let’s talk about what that actually looks like in practice.

Meeting Them Where They Are: The Transtheoretical Model

One of the biggest mistakes I see newer coaches make is having a standard approach that they apply to everyone. Same program structure, same expectations, same level of intensity.

But clients don’t come to you in the same place. Some are ready to completely overhaul their lives. Others are barely ready to add one workout a week. And if you treat them the same, you’re going to lose the ones who aren’t ready for your standard approach.

This is where assessing readiness for change matters. There’s a psychological model called the Stages of Change (also known as the Transtheoretical Model of Change), developed by James Prochaska and Carlo DiClemente, that outlines how people move through behaviour change:

Precontemplation: Not yet considering change. (“I don’t think I need to change.”)

Contemplation: Thinking about changing but haven’t started. (“I should probably do something about this.”) 

Preparation: Making small steps toward change. (“I’m getting ready to start.”) 

Action: Actively changing behaviour. (“I’m doing it!”) 

Maintenance: Sustaining the change over time. (“I’ve been doing this for months and it feels normal.”) 

Termination/Relapse: Either the change is fully integrated or the person has reverted to old patterns.

You need to coach differently based on where they are. For someone in contemplation, you’re educating and exploring motivation. For someone in preparation, you’re removing barriers and building confidence. For someone in action, you’re building habits and providing accountability. For someone in maintenance, you’re helping them navigate obstacles and prevent relapse.

If you try to push someone in contemplation into aggressive action, they’ll resist or quit. If you don’t challenge someone in action, they’ll get bored or frustrated.

Assessing readiness honestly means asking questions and listening to the answers. “On a scale of one to ten, how ready do you feel to make this change? What would make it a ten? What’s getting in the way?”

It also means scaling expectations to current capacity. If a client is working sixty-hour weeks, going through a divorce, and barely sleeping, maybe now isn’t the time to train six days a week and hit perfect macros. Maybe we start with two workouts and eating breakfast. We meet them where they are, not where we wish they were.

This is the art of coaching: knowing when to push, when to support, and when to simply hold space. It’s reading the person in front of you, not just following a template. But the art of challenging without overwhelming is a delicate balance. You want to push clients just beyond their comfort zone as that’s where growth happens. But push too far and they break. Not far enough and they plateau. We want to keep them in that zone of proximal development.

I think of it like a video game. If the level is too easy, it’s boring. If it’s too hard, it’s frustrating and you quit. The sweet spot is just hard enough that you have to try, but achievable enough that you can succeed. That’s what keeps people engaged.

With clients, this means adjusting based on feedback. If they’re sailing through everything, add a bit more. If they’re struggling consistently, pull back. The goal is sustainable challenge, not chronic overwhelm.

From Self-Determination Theory, remember that competence is one of the three fundamental needs. If clients never feel competent (if they’re always failing at an impossibly hard plan), their intrinsic motivation dies. But if they’re succeeding at an appropriately challenging plan, competence is satisfied and motivation thrives.

Communication Strategies That Reinforce Consistency

The way you talk to clients shapes how they think about their journey. Your language either reinforces the mindsets that support consistency or undermines them.

Here are language patterns I use deliberately:

Instead of “Did you stick to your plan?” I ask “How did the week go?” One sounds like a test. The other sounds like curiosity.

Instead of “You need to…” I say “What feels doable for you?” One is prescriptive. The other is collaborative. It honours autonomy, one of the three Self-Determination Theory needs.

Instead of “Don’t eat that,” I say “What would serve you better here?” One is controlling. The other is empowering.

I also normalise struggle proactively. I don’t wait for them to fail and then tell them it’s okay. I tell them from the beginning that this will be hard, that they’ll have rough days, that progress isn’t linear. So when it happens, it’s not a surprise or a crisis. It’s expected.

When they do miss a week or a month, what I say matters enormously. Here are responses I avoid:

“What happened?” (sounds accusatory) “I’m disappointed.” (creates shame) “You need to get back on track.” (sounds critical)

And here are responses I use instead:

“Good to hear from you. What’s been going on?” (opens conversation) “That sounds like it was a tough week. What do you need right now?” (offers support) “What feels like a good first step back in?” (focuses forward)

I also celebrate process wins constantly, not just outcome wins.

“You showed up to all your workouts this week, that’s a huge win.” “You texted me when you were struggling instead of disappearing, I’m proud of you for that. Old you would never have done that.” “You hit your protein target six out of seven days, that’s consistency right there, and that is how we will succeed.”

These process wins are what build the identity and the momentum. The outcomes follow, but the day-to-day grind is about showing up. So that’s what I acknowledge.

When to Adjust the Plan: Reading the System

There’s a fine line between sticking with something long enough for it to work and persisting with something that’s fundamentally not working. Good coaches know the difference. We need to look at the system holistically, not just the surface events. Donella Meadows, in her influential work on systems thinking, identified leverage points, which are the key places to intervene in a system.

The least effective leverage point: changing parameters (e.g., “just work out more”). 

The most effective leverage point: changing the paradigm or mental model underlying the system.

When a plan isn’t working, surface-level adjustments often miss the real issue. You need to understand what’s happening at deeper levels.

This is where the Iceberg Model from systems thinking helps:

Events (surface level): Missed a workout 

Patterns (below surface): Inconsistent exercise over weeks 

Structures (deeper): Chaotic schedule, no set workout times 

Mental Models (deepest): Beliefs about discipline, all-or-nothing thinking

If you only address the event (“just work out tomorrow”), nothing changes. If you address the structure (create set workout times) or mental models (shift from all-or-nothing to good-better-best), you create lasting change.

Here are signs that something needs to change:

If a client is consistently hitting 50% adherence or less, the plan is probably too aggressive. We need to scale back until we find a level they can sustain at 70-80%.

If a client is frequently stressed, overwhelmed, or talking about quitting, the plan is creating more harm than good. We need to adjust even if the plan is “optimal” on paper.

If the client’s life circumstances have changed significantly (new job, new baby, injury, family crisis, etc.), we need to adjust to the new reality.

If they’ve been consistent for months and progress has completely stalled, we might need to progress the program or adjust the approach.

The key is reading the signs and being willing to pivot without undermining their confidence. The conversation isn’t “This plan failed” or “You failed at this plan.” It’s “This plan isn’t serving you right now, so let’s find what will.”

I frame it as experimentation, which ties back to the pragmatist philosophy. John Dewey, one of the founders of American pragmatism, saw learning as an experimental process. You try something, observe what happens, adjust based on results, and repeat. In coaching: “We tried this approach and here’s what we learned. Now let’s try something slightly different and see how it goes.” It’s iterative, not pass/fail.

Sometimes the adjustment is temporary. Life gets crazy for a month, so we go into maintenance mode. Then when things settle, we ramp back up. Sometimes it’s permanent. We realise training six days a week isn’t sustainable for this person, so we build around four days instead.

Either way, adjusting the plan isn’t defeat. It’s coaching. It’s meeting the client where they are and building something that actually works for their life.

This is the OODA Loop (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act) developed by fighter pilot John Boyd. The side that can cycle through this loop faster wins. In coaching, you need to constantly observe what’s happening, orient to new information, decide on adjustments, and act quickly. The coach who adapts faster gets better results.

Don’t rigidly stick to a plan that’s clearly not working just because it’s “optimal.” Be like water, as Bruce Lee said, formless, adaptable, able to take the shape of any container.

Advanced Frameworks and Thought Experiments

At this point, you have a comprehensive toolkit for building consistency with your clients. You hopefully understand that consistency is the prerequisite to all results, and you have the beginnings of a coaching practice that optimises for consistency. But great coaching isn’t just about applying techniques, it’s about helping clients see their journey through new lenses, shifting their entire frame of reference for what success looks like. 

The frameworks and thought experiments in this section are designed to create those perspective shifts. These aren’t just intellectual exercises, they’re tools that bypass the rational mind and speak directly to something deeper. These are some of the concepts I return to again and again with clients, because they cut through confusion and create clarity. Let me share the ones that have been most transformative in my experience.

The Discipline Paradox: Systems Over Willpower

A paradox that most coaches don’t understand is that true discipline isn’t forcing yourself to do what you hate, it’s building a life where the right choices are easy.

We worship discipline and willpower in the fitness industry. We tell stories of people who wake up at 4 AM, who never miss a workout, who have iron resolve. And we conclude that if you’re not doing the same, you lack discipline.

But that’s backwards. The most successful people I’ve coached don’t rely on discipline. They rely on systems. They’ve designed their environment, their schedule, and their defaults so that healthy behaviors are the path of least resistance.

This is what BJ Fogg means when he says “Make it easy.” And what James Clear means when he talks about environment design. And what the Stoics meant when they talked about living in accordance with nature; not fighting against your nature, but working with it.

The client who trains consistently at 6 AM doesn’t do it through willpower. They do it because:

• Their alarm is across the room so they have to get up
• Their gym clothes are laid out
• They have a training partner meeting them
• They go to bed early so they’re rested
• They’ve been doing it so long it’s encoded in their basal ganglia

The system creates the discipline. Not the other way around.

When clients struggle and say “I just need more discipline,” I redirect: “You don’t need more discipline. You need better systems.”

The Two Paths: A Thought Experiment

Here’s a thought experiment I use with clients to shift perspective:

Imagine two versions of yourself one year from now.

Version A trained perfectly for six weeks: hit every workout, nailed every macro, executed the plan flawlessly. Then life got hard and Version A stopped. For the remaining 46 weeks, Version A did nothing. One year later, Version A looks and feels essentially the same as today, maybe slightly worse.

Version B never trained perfectly. Version B missed workouts regularly, had plenty of imperfect meals, struggled with consistency. But Version B never quit completely. Over the year, Version B averaged three workouts a week and hit protein and calorie targets most days. Nothing special. Just persistent, imperfect effort.

One year from now, which version are you more proud of?

Which version has actually changed?

Which version has built sustainable habits?

Which version is more likely to be training five years from now?

The answer is always Version B. And yet, most clients are trying to be Version A. They’re chasing perfection, and when they can’t maintain it, they quit entirely.

This thought experiment creates a visceral understanding of the consistency paradox. Perfect effort for short periods produces less than imperfect effort sustained over time.

The Identity Question: Behaviour as Self-Expression

Here’s another powerful question I ask clients:

“If someone followed you around for a week and observed your actual behaviours, not your intentions, not what you wish you did, but what you actually do, what would they say about who you are?”

This is uncomfortable. Because there’s often a gap between the identity we claim and the identity we’re voting for through our actions.

You say you’re “someone who prioritises health,” but your behaviours vote for someone who doesn’t. You say you’re “disciplined,” but your actions vote for someone who isn’t.

This isn’t judgment. It’s data. And it’s incredibly clarifying.

The question then becomes: what identity do you want to build? And what’s the smallest vote you can cast for that identity today?

This ties into Aristotle’s concept of virtue ethics. Aristotle believed that we become what we repeatedly do. Excellence is not an act but a habit. You don’t become virtuous by aspiring to virtue, you become virtuous by acting virtuously, again and again, until it becomes who you are.

Your client doesn’t become “an athlete” by deciding to be one. They become an athlete by training like one, consistently, until the identity is undeniable.

Every workout is a vote for the athlete identity. Every protein-rich meal is a vote for someone who takes care of their body. Every time you get back on track after a slip-up, you’re voting for resilience.

The votes accumulate. The identity emerges.

The Tortoise and the Hare: Ancient Wisdom on Consistency

Aesop’s fable of The Tortoise and the Hare is perhaps the oldest story about consistency versus intensity, and it’s still perfectly relevant.

The hare is fast, talented, and confident. The tortoise is slow, unremarkable, but steady. The hare sprints ahead, then gets distracted, takes a nap, assumes victory is assured. The tortoise just keeps plodding along. And the tortoise wins.

The moral: “Slow and steady wins the race.”

Your flashy client who goes all-in for three weeks is the hare. Your consistent client who just keeps showing up is the tortoise. And over the course of months and years, the tortoise wins almost every time.

This isn’t just folk wisdom, it’s backed by everything we know about habit formation, neuroplasticity, and sustainable behaviour change. The compound effect of small, repeated actions outperforms sporadic bursts of exceptional effort.

Tell your clients: be the tortoise. Be boring. Be steady. Be consistent. That’s how you win.

The Jab: Small Actions That Set Up Everything Else

In boxing, the jab is the most important punch. It’s not the knockout blow, that’s the cross or the hook. But the jab sets up everything else. It gauges distance, disrupts the opponent’s rhythm, creates openings, and controls the pace.

Every great boxer has a great jab. It’s not flashy. It’s not what highlight reels are made of. But it’s the foundation.

In coaching, your client’s “jab” is their daily small habits. The morning protein shake. The ten-minute walk. The consistent bedtime. These aren’t transformative on their own. But they set up everything else.

The morning protein shake (the jab) sets up protein intake for the day (the combination). The consistent bedtime (the jab) sets up energy for tomorrow’s workout (the knockout).

Most clients want to throw power punches all day: big workouts, aggressive diets, dramatic changes. But without the jab, the power punches don’t land.

Teach them to fall in love with the jab. The small, consistent, unglamorous actions that create the conditions for bigger wins.

The 72-Hour Rule and The Ratchet Effect

I’ve mentioned the 72-hour rule: never go more than 72 hours without doing something toward your goal. This creates a maximum acceptable gap and prevents drift.

But let me connect it to the concept of the ratchet effect. A ratchet is a mechanical device that allows movement in one direction while preventing movement in the opposite direction. Think of a socket wrench, you can turn it forward, but it won’t turn backward.

In behaviour change, your minimum viable habits and floor goals are ratchets. They prevent backward movement even when forward movement slows.

The 72-hour rule is a ratchet. Even if you can’t do the full workout, you do something within 72 hours. You never go backwards to zero. You might not move forward much, but you don’t slide back.

Over time, these ratchets compound. You’re building a floor that keeps rising. Your worst weeks now are better than your best weeks used to be. That’s the ratchet effect in action.

Aristotle’s Golden Mean: The Middle Path

Aristotle taught that virtue exists in the mean between two extremes. Courage is the mean between cowardice and recklessness. Generosity is the mean between stinginess and wastefulness.

In coaching, consistency is the mean between laziness (doing too little) and burnout (doing too much). Your client who does nothing has fallen into one extreme. Your client who does everything perfectly until they crash has fallen into the other. Neither is virtuous. Neither is sustainable.

The golden mean is the middle path. Enough effort to make progress. Not so much effort that it’s unsustainable. This is the 75-90% range on the consistency continuum. This is good-better-best thinking. This is floor and ceiling goals.

Aristotle called this phronesis (practical wisdom). It’s the ability to judge what’s appropriate in each situation. Not a rigid rule, but a flexible principle applied with wisdom. As a coach, you’re teaching phronesis. You’re teaching your clients to find their golden mean: the sustainable middle path between extremes.

Consistency is the Prerequisite to All Results: The Long Game and Conclusion

How many times have you heard a client say “I’ll start fresh on Monday”? There’s something psychologically appealing about clean starts. New week, new month, new year. But this is often a manifestation of all-or-nothing thinking in disguise. It’s the belief that you need perfect conditions to begin.

The fresh start effect is real, and research shows people are more likely to pursue goals after temporal landmarks like New Year’s or birthdays. But it can also be a trap. Because life is always messy. There’s never a perfect time to start. The next right choice is available right now. Not Monday. Not next month. Now.

I challenge clients on this. “What if you started right now instead? What’s one thing you could do today that would move you forward?”

Usually they can think of something. And that something is more valuable than waiting for Monday, because it breaks the pattern of procrastination and removes the psychological weight of “needing” a fresh start. The most successful clients don’t wait for fresh starts. They create continuity. They see time as a continuum, not as discrete blocks of “on” and “off.”

Let’s return to Aristotle one more time, because his concept of eudaimonia is the ultimate frame for long-term coaching. Eudaimonia is often translated as “happiness” or “flourishing,” but it’s deeper than that. It’s living in accordance with virtue, realising your potential, becoming the best version of yourself. It’s not a feeling, it’s a way of being.

When you coach for eudaimonia, you’re not just helping clients lose weight or get strong. You’re helping them become more excellent versions of themselves. You’re helping them develop virtues (discipline, resilience, self-knowledge, compassion). The weight loss is a side effect. The real transformation is in who they become through the process.

This is why I care so much about how clients respond to setbacks, how they talk to themselves, how they relate to struggle. These are character-building moments. These are where excellence is forged. Aristotle believed that we achieve eudaimonia through the practice of virtue over a lifetime. Not through a twelve-week transformation. Through years of consistent, intentional living.

That’s what you’re coaching toward. Not the before-and-after photo. The decades-long journey of human flourishing.

And none of that happens without consistency. Everything we’ve explored in this article from the neuroscience, the psychology, the philosophy, the systems, the frameworks, all of it points back to the same fundamental truth: consistency is the prerequisite to all results. It’s the foundation upon which everything else is built.

So, if you take nothing else from this article, take this: your ability to help clients stay consistent will determine your success as a coach far more than your knowledge of exercise science, nutrition, or supplementation.

I’ve been doing this long enough to see the pattern. The coaches with the best client retention and the best transformations aren’t necessarily the ones with the most certifications or the most cutting-edge programming. They’re the ones who’ve mastered the human side of coaching. They’re the ones who understand that behaviour change is psychology wrapped in physiology, not the other way around.

Client retention follows consistency, not flashy programs. People stay with coaches who help them achieve sustainable progress, who support them through the hard times, who celebrate their imperfect efforts, and who make them feel capable rather than broken. That’s what builds loyalty and long-term success.

This is the long game. In a world of thirty-day challenges and twelve-week transformations, you’re teaching people how to change their lives over years, not weeks. You’re building foundations that last. And that requires a completely different skill set than writing a workout program.

So here’s my challenge to you: become a consistency expert, not just a programming expert.

Study behaviour change. Learn psychology. Practice the communication skills that build self-efficacy and self-compassion. Get comfortable with the messy, non-linear reality of how humans actually change. And most importantly, model this yourself. You can’t teach consistency if you’re not living it.

Remember, perfection is the enemy of good. Your clients don’t need you to have all the answers or be flawless in your own journey. They need you to be human, honest, and committed to their long-term success over quick wins.

Every time you help a client get back on track after a slip-up, you’re teaching them a skill that will serve them for the rest of their life. Every time you normalise struggle, you’re giving them permission to be imperfect and still succeed. Every time you celebrate small wins, you’re reinforcing the identity they’re building.

This is the work that matters. This is what transforms lives. Not the perfect program. Not the optimal macros. Not the most advanced training technique. Consistency. Showing up. Trying again. Making the next right choice.

If you can help your clients master that, you’ll change their lives. And you’ll build a coaching practice that’s sustainable, fulfilling, and genuinely impactful.

Small, consistent actions will always outperform sporadic perfection. That’s true for your clients, and it’s true for you as a coach. Keep showing up. Keep learning. Keep refining your approach. The compound effect will blow your mind.

Having said all of that, you do still need a working model of physiology, nutrition and training to actually get results. Otherwise, you’re just doing unstructured tinkering and calling it science. So, for those of you ready to take the next step in professional development, we also offer advanced courses. Our Nutrition Coach Certification is designed to help you guide clients through sustainable, evidence-based nutrition change with confidence, while our Exercise Program Design Course focuses on building effective, individualised training plans that actually work in the real world. Beyond that, we’ve created specialised courses so you can grow in the exact areas that matter most for your journey as a coach.

If you want to keep sharpening your coaching craft, we’ve built a free Content Hub filled with resources just for coaches. Inside, you’ll find the Coaches Corner, which has a collection of tools, frameworks, and real-world insights you can start using right away. We also share regular tips and strategies on Instagram and YouTube, so you’ve always got fresh ideas and practical examples at your fingertips. And if you want everything delivered straight to you, the easiest way is to subscribe to our newsletter so you never miss new material.