In such a sense less time it is easy to focus on the here and now or look back and bemoan how we, as a society, got to this place in time. It is also exceedingly difficult to look up and forward in time and see how we as a people and you as an individual can grow from the ashes of this global pandemic.

I originally conceived the idea for this post while on a run long before the virus started making its fateful way across the globe. At that time I was thinking about how stiff and sore my legs were and how I should have stretched more last week, or for that matter last year, when I started feeling the effects of age and the lack of any discernible ‘pre-hab’ to lengthen my athletic ‘career’. I remember that my ‘scatty’ mind immediately lighted upon the childhood book and movie, ‘A Christmas Carol’ by Charles Dickens, and how this thought pattern contributed to the skeletal framework for this article.

Everyone is probably familiar with the concept of the book and movie so I will simply give you a snapshot to frame my thinking with my writing.

The story is set in a bleak, wintery, Christmas landscape with the main character, Ebenezer Scrooge being visited by the ghosts of Christmas past, present and future. They travel in time to show our grumpy antihero how his life is, was and how it will be. They guide his thinking toward a ‘change mindset’ which will ultimately lead to a better future version of himself.

While I have essentially just butchered a classic tale of a redemptive life, the core of my message as it pertains to the title of this article, is valid. By making a stronger connection to your future self you are more likely to make changes to your present self to maximize your overall success. And how the ability to suffer inconveniences now is justified and ultimately accepted by our psyche if we can make a stronger connection with that principle of cause and effect!

As always, if you have made it this far you are probably looking around the rabbit hole and wondering what you just read has to do with endurance sport.

The connection is somewhat simple, and it can be found at the adrenal fueled starting line of any race across the planet! It is my premise that If you are able to harness the energy from your future race day in the weeks and months prior to race day then you are more likely to experience heightened success as your training sessions have more motivation. In theory this is a simple fix but in practice the application is much more difficult. As they say, “if it is that easy, why isn’t everyone doing it?”

Allow me to digress and consider that this would not be a thought article written by me if I did not touch on the theory of evolution and its role in the endurance world. As we engage in this ‘side bar’ consider the questions about why the human being has such a tenuous link between their present and future self? The answer to this perplexing question lies in the acknowledgement that the human brain is designed for instant gratification.

As we stand at the checkout line with a Snickers in one hand and a head of broccoli in the other we know that we are engaged in yet another battle in the 10,000 year war between what is right for us and what is good for us. If you read over that line a couple of times and said good and right a few times and stated, ‘what is the difference’, then you have discovered the secret of our battle. Good and right are in fact remarkably similar but when viewed through the lens of two parts of our brain then we can see two diametrically opposed meanings. These parts of the brain are the prefrontal cortex and the limbic system, and they are the two generals that tussle for control of every decision that we make.

Think of these two parts of your brain as the intelligent younger sibling against the dumb, impulsive yet incredibly influential older sibling. The limbic system, the older sibling, is involved in motivation, emotion, learning, and memory. The prefrontal cortex, the younger sibling, is involved in planning complex cognitive behaviour, personality expression, decision making, moderating social behavior, and controlling certain aspects of speech and language. As you can see both areas of the brain have control over the body but in critically different ways. The limbic system impulsively steers you towards instant gratification of your present self while the prefrontal cortex is considered and focused on providing a better life for your future self. The limbic system steers you toward good. While good usually means something beneficial the limbic system dresses ‘good’ up to be a wolf in sheep’s clothing and sells it with instant gratification. It encourages us to take the Snickers bar and makes us feel good about it. Unfortunately, just like the younger sibling, the prefrontal cortex’s quiet ‘voice of reason’ pleading with us to do the ‘right’ thing and buy the broccoli is lost in the noise generated by the dance party of fun created by the limbic system.

‘Why wait when it can get it now!’ Is the catch cry of the limbic system and this ‘why wait’ mentality is very hard, almost impossible, to ignore when you compare it to the meek voice representing your future self.

“But do not be despondent as mathematics has the solution. ”

I would like to introduce the enlightened Piers Steel and his book The Procrastination Equation as key evidence to posits that motivation or procrastination can be calculated using a mathematical formula.

It is this mathematical formula that I wish to delve into in order to bridge the disconnect between your present self and your future self and give a much-needed loudspeaker to your prefrontal cortex.

While Steel developed this equation to impress upon his readers the importance of motivation and the limiting effects of procrastination to success, I wish to use this equation in order to lessen the distance between your future and present self. In order to do this, I wish to look at the four values on the right hand side of the equation and suggest training approaches that can improve your day to day motivation.

Let us analyze the equation by establishing some simplified parameters and then discuss two scenarios to see the power of this equation in action.

Parameters: Expectancy and impulsiveness will be given a value from 1 – 10 (10 being the highest – 1 the lowest). Value and delay will be given a score of 1 – 3 (3 being high value/delay – 1 being low)

Scenario 1: Tom is currently training for his 12th Ironman, in four weeks, with the view to gain a legacy spot to compete at the Ironman world championship. Tom has raised $120,000 for his local charity and has a high level of support from his community triathlon club which Tom has been a member and president of for the last 17 years. Tom lives and breathes triathlon and his main social outlet is training with his beloved club and its 2000 members.

Based on this scenario you can assign Tom the following values.

Expectancy – 9. Tom has had experience with the race distance. He simply needs to finish the race so there is no pressure to train for a time specific goal. The reason that it is not a 10 is because the race has many variables that is currently playing on his mind.

Value – 3. As Tom gains social and emotional fulfilment for training, and has a good backing from the community to gain his Kona slot, his reward is very high for completing the required training to finish this race.

Impulsiveness – 1. Tom lives and breathes training as it is his main social and emotional outlet. Tom will attend training as he has multiple motivators to appear and has little to no distraction to take his focus off the goal at hand.

Delay – 1. Tom could complete the race today as he has already completed 11 races and has 17 years of consistent training under his belt.

Overall: Tom has been given a motivation score of 27 out of a maximum score of 30.

Scenario 2: Terry is currently training for his 1st Ironman, in 30 week’s time, with the view to completing a drunken New Year’s Eve bet that he made with his mates at the local pub. Terry has no athletic background apart from being anchor leg in his 4 x 100m high school track team 7 years ago. Terry is amazingly confident and has no doubts that he will be able to complete the event in the required 17 hour cut off. Terry does not own a bike, nor a pair of goggles and has a pair of all white adidas ultra-boost shoes that he goes clubbing in.

Based on this scenario you can assign Terry the following values.

Expectancy – 7. Terry has amazing self-belief and has a reputation amongst the ‘lads’ of being the can do ‘jackass’ who always follows through with whatever dare is thrown at his feet. Having said this Terry was heard to comment “I have to run a marathon after all that” So we have deducted 3 points as he has no idea what he has got himself into.

Value – 1½ . If Terry pulls this off, he will be a hero. But he also knows jumping from a plane without a parachute will get him much more kudos and not take nearly as long.

Impulsiveness – 10. Terry has the box set of the Jackass movies and proudly runs the YouTube channel ‘Donkey-Jack’ a homage to the Jackass glory days where he recreates the best moments of the 6-movie franchise.

Delay – 3. 30 weeks! Hard to maintain focus for that long.

Overall: Terry has a motivation score of 0.35 out of a maximum score of 30.

If you were a betting person you would put your house on Tom finishing his 12th Ironman and leave the money on the table for a double or nothing bet that Terry will jump out of a plane without a parachute to avoid doing a single minute of training.

So that brings us to my traditional take away section for my rambling musings. How can this formula help me bridge the disconnect between my present self and my future self and maximize potential success? How can I give my prefrontal cortex more of a say in the decision that count and be able to control the dance party limbic system by being able to turn it on and off when needed?

As can been seen with Piers formula the answer lies in being able to maximize expectancy and value and simply reducing impulsiveness. There are a multitude of ways to achieve a positive mindset without having to wait up for the ghost of Christmas past, present and future to rouse you from your slumber. I will start the process by giving you 7.

1. Lock in a race within a 24-week window. Any longer and you will lose focus any shorter and you will rush the process. 24 weeks gives you 4 x 6-week blocks to work your build into. (Reduces the delay rating)

2. Look at your planning in three distinct stages – Long term (24-week, holistic map), Medium term (each of the 4 build stages of your program), short term. In this short term stage you need to invite the three ghost from a Christmas Carol to have a weekly meeting with you to discuss what happened last week, what you want to happen next week and what you have to do this week to make it all happen. (Reduce impulsiveness rating)

3. Get a coach. Or more importantly get an athlete consultant that listens first then makes suggestions after reviewing all the data, both qualitative (how you feel) and quantitative (what the numbers say). (Increases your expectancy score)

4. Divide your training into sub tasks. ‘A man can’t eat a whale in a single bite.’ Look at the whole process like you are building a stone wall. Some stones will be bigger (key long sessions) and some will be smaller (recovery session – massage) but all are important. Treat all as vital cogs in the final product. (Increase your expectancy rating)

5. Join a squad. Gives a sense of belonging and builds a placebo team around you with common desires. (Increases the value score)

6. Gamification of your training. Enter a virtual world to gain rewards for your hard training. I am currently exploring ‘my virtual mission’ where your logged miles from strava gets you running virtually around the planet and earning some ‘kit’ and some ‘bling’ to motivate you. (Increases the value score)

7. Sickies. All around the world employees engage in a ‘sickie’ when life and work get a little too much and we need to step off the planet for a day and re-center. Same is true in training. The mental anguish of constant training and listening to your prefrontal cortex and your limbic system arguing in the room upstairs can grind you down. So, allocate yourself a couple of sick days commensurate with the length of time you are training. Take a day and simply smell the roses, eat chocolate ice cream in bed, and catch up on Netflix. (Increases value and belief and decreases distraction scores)

Which version of Ebenezer are you going to be today!