The best way to truly experience anything in life is to immerse yourself into it, subject yourself to the highs and lows it brings, and consciously ride the wave.

If it’s important, has the ability to change you for the better, and improves your way of life, why would we do anything but?

Having worked with 1000s of members of all backgrounds as a team over the past decade, there’s very little we haven’t seen, or come across. We’ve also seen a lot of commonalities between the members who achieve the truly outstanding results, and those who never quite live up to their full potential.

Much of this is to do with their readiness to change, their ‘why’, how aligned their priorities are, and if they’ve got their ‘body transformation pillars’ in place (something I discuss in detail in this article here).

I’ve always liked the saying, ‘we change our behaviour when the pain of staying the same becomes greater than the pain of changing.’

While it may not apply across every aspect in your life, for health, fitness and transforming your body, it most certainly does.

This ‘pain’ becomes your ‘why’. And the stronger this is, the more you’re willing to throw yourself under to create the transformation you’re after.

Which is why when it comes to starting your transformation for the first time under professional guidance, it’s critical you go all in.

Don’t just dip your toes. Jump in and ride the wave. Because the first wave is always the best wave.

During discussions with fellow RNT coaches, we all agreed this to be true. In 99% of people, their results will always be the best during their first wave.

What Do I Mean By The First Wave?

I’m referring to the initial buzz that comes with first embarking on or signing up to a transformation program.

This is the time you make drastic changes to your lifestyle with training, nutrition and general activity.

This is the time you have the chance to take advantage of your strong ‘why’, and implement habits, routines and thought processes that can last a lifetime. Especially when you see the positive impact these changes can have in your life.

This is the time to build what I like to call the ‘gathered momentum’ that I truly believe to be the ‘magical pill’ that drastically accelerates your results after 8-10 weeks. When people ask why their body changes so drastically in the last 4-6 weeks of a fat loss phase, it’s because of this exact phenomenon.

However, what we see on some occasions is the opposite. And I think this a real shame. Having signed up, got initially set up, they never quite leave the ground. There’s always something that deters them, and they never quite build the consistency required to take off.

It may be a lack of strength in their 'why', or it may be that it’s not a high enough priority. Or it could be something a little deeper, something as deep rooted as the fear to change. Or more superficial, in that they thought it’ll only require 50% effort 50% of the time; which we have the quick fix culture to blame for.

This doesn’t make it a failure. If you don’t ride that first wave, there’s always another one. I just know based on experience that if you can catch the first wave when it’s rising, your results over time are going to be greater. It’s also far more efficient!

Something special happens when you time your enthusiasm, motivation and emotions all with the first wave. Your results go through the roof, and the confidence you build from this, combined with the excitement of catching the first wave, means you carry it forward, spread it in your communities, and build the consistency required to garner the power of gathered momentum.

How To Catch A Later Wave

There will be times the first wave doesn’t work out. Getting on the second wave is always more difficult, but it can be done.

If I was talking theoretically, I’d say you’d need to spend time internally on your 'why' and addressing your priorities. And I do believe this to play an integral part.

Although what tends to happen with second wavers is something external triggers the ‘pain’ I referred to earlier to grow exponentially, and cause you to jump back on. This can be powerful, and you’ll often see these people come back with a vengeance sporting a noticeably different attitude to the first wave.

How To Ride Later Waves…

For those who catch and ride out the first wave that typically revolves around fat loss, what we’ve noticed is they’ll catch the second, third, fourth and fifth waves with ease too.

This stems back to the ‘ideal RNT journey’ I’ve spoken about. Which is where we work with people to cycle between phases of fat loss, consolidation, and muscle building to continually make improvements to their physique.

The beauty of catching that first wave is you’ll engrain the habits that will carry you through later phases with ease. You’ll begin to love the lifestyle, and will find it second nature to strength train 3-4 days a week, eat protein with each meal, and drink lots of water.

The habits you pick up can be transferred to any goal, and the quicker you can instil these lifestyle changes, the easier you make the process for yourself.

The Three Phase Formula To Transforming Your Body

I’ve always thought of a body transformation to consist of three parts:

1. Catching the first wave to build lifestyle habits

This is what we’ve spoken about today. It’s about creating the behaviour change that will last forever, and carry you through the next parts, and the next waves. You’ll use your emotions, pains and initial motivation to go all in, and set yourself up for the future.

2. Embracing the ‘dip’ and ruthless consistency

The dip, a term coined by Seth Godin, refers to the lull period during any journey where you feel your efforts aren’t reflecting your results. This is when the honeymoon phase is over, where there may be a dip in motivation, and when you have your first sign of a plateau. But it’s at this point that it’s critical you persist, ‘lean in’ to the dip, and have the self-belief to grind through to come out with the transformation you’re after. The better you catch the first wave, the easier it is to foster the belief to embrace and push through the dip.

3. Harnessing the power of gathered momentum

This is where the magic happens. You’ve spent months building habits, ticking the boxes everyday and being ruthlessly consistent on all fronts that your body rewards you. Not every ‘dip’ in life is worth pursuing, but transforming your body is one of those that is worth the grind.

There’s always a tipping point during a transformation where you take a set of photos or catch yourself in the mirror with a bit of shock. This is when you know you’ve come out of the dip, and you’re ready to harness the power of gathered momentum. Weeks and months of hard work now triggers your body to go into overdrive, and you start seeing rapid changes on a very frequent basis.

This is also the best time to activate the #VaghelaGrind, take advantage of the surge in motivation, and take your physique to a whole new level!

So if in doubt, catch the first wave.