Disciplined people don’t rely on motivation—they design locations that make execution inevitable.
Joshua Parris, PhD, NSCA-CPT
Victoria Parris, Pre & Postnatal Fitness Specialist
Over the course of the next few weeks, we are digging into six tangible actions that keep us disciplined when motivation fails. These actions have helped us take ownership of our lives, and while they are given in the context of fitness, these six actions will benefit you if applied to other areas of your life as well:
- CONNECTING WITH YOUR “WHY”
- CLAIMING YOUR CLOCK
- FINDING YOUR LOCATION
- ESTABLISHING YOUR STRUCTURE
- LEVELING UP YOUR FOLLOW THROUGH
- DRIVING THE WORK FORWARD
In each article of this series, we will go into each action in more detail and provide you with a “challenge” to apply the action we discuss in a more practical manner. Now that you’ve considered your “why” and thoughtfully considered your time, let’s review the next action– Finding your location. Because where you execute matters just as much as when you execute.
Your Environment Is Not Neutral
You may have noticed that your mind associates certain locations with expected actions. You expect to relax on the couch, cook in the kitchen, sleep in your bedroom, work in your office, get coffee at a coffee shop, and workout in a gym. When a space is poorly designed – cluttered, distracting, inconvenient – it quietly drains your energy and your effectiveness at completing the task before you. Even tasks you enjoy become heavier when friction is high. A cluttered office creates a cluttered mind. A disorganized kitchen makes cooking feel exhausting. An inconvenient training setup turns consistency into a negotiation. Your environment is not neutral, plays a critical role in maximizing your time and effort, and has a strong role in determining whether you’ll establish a new routine. Said differently, discipline improves when your environment supports the action you’re trying to repeat, and disciplined people respect this reality instead of fighting it.
What does this look like in the context of fitness? It depends! There are a multitude of factors specific to your season of life that may impact your choice of a training environment. However, to maximize your time, effort and desire for routine exercise, your location should integrate into your life, be free from distraction, provide you with the equipment needed to achieve your specific goal and attract you to want to return. We’ll use a few examples to highlight the importance of these elements.
Find a Location That Maximizes Execution
Integrating into your life: Start with honesty. If you have taken the time to claim your clock, you know how much time you have for daily action towards your fitness goal. Let’s say you have 30 minutes to workout. Does this time that you’ve allotted for exercise account for any time spent commuting? Can you spend 20 minutes commuting to the gym (40 minutes round trip)? If so, this means you’ve actually allotted 1hr and 10 minutes to working out, and it begs to ask the question of whether you can decrease the commute time and increase the time spent exercising. Disciplined execution requires an honest audit: Is your current training location helping you execute, or quietly giving you an excuse? If your location doesn’t integrate into your life, consistency will always be fragile.
Free from distractions: Distraction isn’t accidental – it’s tolerated. Disciplined people don’t try to “focus harder” in distracting spaces. They remove competing cues altogether. Phones, clutter, noise, and unfinished tasks all pull attention away from execution. If a space consistently distracts you, disciplined execution demands you change the space—not your willpower. The solution is a better environment. Change the space so staying on task requires less effort.
Equipment aligned to your intended outcome: Your location must support your specific goal. The equipment needed for someone who wants to run a marathon may look different than the equipment needed for someone who wants to enter a powerlifting competition (though we would argue that a barbell would do a marathoner some good). Let’s say you want to enter a powerlifting competition, but you find it hard to get to the gym due to a lack of time. You may need to consider outfitting some portion of your home with a squat rack, barbell and some plates – or you need to determine if there is a better time during the day that will allow you to make the round-trip commute to the gym. Aligning your access to equipment that enables you to work towards your intended goal is a key piece of the puzzle that will make your space attractive.
Making it attractive: Disciplined people understand a simple truth: you repeat what you’re drawn to. An environment that repels you will likely never support long-term execution. Your location should inspire you to return and train. While there is something to be said about building a mentality that allows you to get work done regardless of the environment, finding or creating a space that attracts you for the purpose of physical exertion will help build consistency. If you are energized by group-based training, then you will likely be most successful at developing a consistent training routine in a gym that offers group sessions at a time that aligns with your schedule. If you like to hear the rattle of iron weights, then consider purchasing some weights or going to a local gym with an old school flavor. If there is a yoga studio right next to your favorite smoothie bar, get a membership and reward yourself with a smoothie from time-to-time. If you want to train for a marathon and enjoy running with other people, then join a running club and commit to training with other like-minded individuals. The added accountability and camaraderie of the group may be what is needed to make exercise a consistent habit.
While these examples are far from exhaustive, we hope they show you that there is no one-size-fits-all approach to selecting or creating a training environment. Disciplined people don’t force themselves into environments that increase the friction for daily action. They choose locations that make progress possible every day.
Personal example: After I (Josh) determined that I needed to wake up at 4:30 AM every day to pray, read and train, I now had to decide where that training would maximize my time. I wanted to include heavy lifting, however, my basement setup only had space for kettlebells and an Airdyne bike. Also, the space was so constrained that I could barely stand up straight, and it was full of clutter. To make this habit stick, I decided that I needed to find a local gym. Thankfully, a crossfit gym that allowed me to train during open gym at 5:30AM was only a 5-minute bike ride away. The price and location were just right, and I began training the next morning. This is what disciplined execution looks like: Identify friction. Remove it. Commit immediately.
CHALLENGE: Audit your execution space. Ask yourself:
- Does this location fit my real schedule?
- Does it reduce or create friction? In what ways?
- Does it support my actual goal?
- Does it make me want to return?
After answering these questions, make one decisive change to your location this week.
