Crunching Numbers for Success

If you see what numbers and stats I have loaded in my client's confidential files, you would be surprised.

Shocked, to say the least.

Somehow, we thrive on numbers. One kilogramme up or down, 10 seconds better than last week, one more hour of quality sleep. Or, in my case, reps versus sets going 5% heavier with a 10% steeper incline ;-)

Other numbers I recently went through, after reading some peer-reviewed papers and inspirational YouTube videos from prolific speakers on the health front, are similarly (un)healthy. These statistics change from day to day, so don’t hammer me down on misquoting the facts.

• 96% of the world population discontinue with their New Year Resolutions by the end of January. Talking about accountability...;
• Being only for 5 minutes in the gym every single day without moving weights has shown incremental benefits for taking healthier steps;
• 3 beers: approximately 500 calories. An hour of intensive jogging equals to a 500-calorie’ loss;
• Type 2 Diabetes rates almost triple (!) in %, year-on-year, across the world population;
• Productivity levels drop double-digits when chronic stress takes over one’s life;
• The 10,000-step theory is not a myth;
• Taking 20 slow bites before swallowing food benefits health in numerous ways;
• 90 Minutes is seen as the best number to aim for when wanting to do focused work;
• Going for 100% all the time will set you up for 100% failure. Just set your crosshairs for 80/20 as a start before cranking it up to 95/5.

Some numbers, you have under your control. Others tend to slip and slide away over time-based on external factors, and whatever is uncontrollable temporarily blocks your path.

It is nice to know how you can work from where you are now to where you want to head towards. It can be a motivation of immense proportions. Benchmarking and taking averages of what we can achieve may just well stimulate some of my client’s senses.

Be it from a daily beer to not touching beer for 10 days straight yet falling back into an unwanted habit after 10 days is not a failure. It is a numeric victory that clients often do not see.

It is all about that one single per cent better. A tsunami of people do think about their wish to change but don’t take that step.?

What if I say that, when you step into the arena with me to take on that monstrosity called habits, you are one of the 0.5% in the world who dares to take a step in the right direction, how does that make you feel?

200% better?

These numbers are even right on many levels. It shows how little we take action on things we feel are our baseline while we can perform so much better.

Don’t say you do not have 1 hour (equals 4% of your day) of your time to become more productive.?

Those 5 kilogrammes will not dissipate while browsing, on average, for 2.5 hours through your social feeds.

Statistics is the grammar of science |

Karl Pearson