PEOPLE WHO INSPIRE US - MYFFY GALLOWAY

There are so many people around us achieving HUGE BHAG'S. If you haven't heard that term before it stands for

BIG, HAIRY, AUDACIOUS, GOALS!

We want to celebrate the determination, the goal setting, commitment and follow through of every action it takes to achieve these big goals or the inspiring people in our community. We have picked a few to share their #wins #challenges #hottips! and what got them through when the chips were down.

If there's someone you know that has an inspiring story about achieving goals we would love to hear from you.

Our first inspiration is:

MYFFY GALLOWAY

Co-founder / Impressive Athlete / Young Business Women of the Year 2016

She's 5 foot nothing, but don't let that bluff you. She has one heck of a mind on her shoulders, a heart as big as Pharlap and a beautiful quiet determination that gets her out of bed every morning to achieve huge things. And needless to say, she can lift some VERY HEAVY WEIGHTS!

Here's are some Q& A's from our interview with Myffy!

Which goal would you most like to share?

I would love to share my goal for training for the recent Australian Open Weightlifting Competition in Melbourne that I competed in 17^th of March. Since I retired from professional cycling in 2012, when trying to find a new ‘sport’ to do, I soon realised that I was fit however I wasn’t very functional. I could ride a bike fast for hours at a time but I couldn’t squat below parallel or do a push up. Upon this realisation, I set myself the goal to not let my body stop me from living my life or participating in any sport of my choosing. I set myself the goal to see what my body was actually capable of. I started doing Crossfit style training and competed in a number of local competitions. What stood out to me was my weakness in the weighlifting (Olympic lifting which consists of two movements: the Snatch and the Clean and Jerk) movements. I set myself the goal to spend 8 weeks on improving these and working on turning these weaknesses in to strengths. At the end of that competition was a local weightlifting competition and I decided to jump in for a bit of fun and to be able to test my improved skills. I lifted well enough to have the confidence to jump in to another competition less than two months later. It was at this competition that I qualified for the Australian Open, and subsequently the National Championships. The Australian Open was an international competition and served as a Commonwealth Games Qualifier for those looking to represent their country in the Commonwealth Games next year. While I made some rookie errors in a a couple of my Snatches, I was very proud to come away with a personal best in the Clean and Jerk event. I finished up 9^th overall. This goal is special for me because of the journey that I took to get there. In 2012 I was an endurance athlete who could comfortably ride a bike for 6-7hrs at a time with very poor mobility and flexibility. In 2017 I have transitioned in to a power athlete who can not only do a multiple push ups, but can squat 110kg and throw a 88kg barbell over my head. Your body is capable of amazing things, and I’ve made it a goal to explore exactly what else mine can do.

Did you have any hiccups through achieving your goal?

The course to achieving any goal very rarely runs smooth… Two weeks before the Australian Open, I injured my shoulder. The injury came from a poor lift where I temporarily lost concentration under a moderately heavy load and strained my shoulder. Two weeks out of a competition, you’re typically not going to get stronger. Your focus shifts from ensuring that you arrive to the competition in the best shape possible and so injuring myself two weeks out is pretty much any athletes nightmare!

If so, how did you get through them?

I was able to deal with the hiccup I feel because I had an understanding on how and why it happened, and what was necessary to fix it. My sessions focused on rehabbing and prehabbing my shoulder and spending a lot of time with a soft tissue therapist! As tough a pill setbacks are to swallow, I find it more useful on focusing on the things you CAN do, rather than those that you CAN’T do.

How did you feel at the end of the goal you achieved?

I value achievement very highly. I feel most fulfilled when I have achieved or have helped others achieve. Achieving this goal helped to give me a boost of confidence to realise that I have the resources inside of me to accomplish whatever I want to achieve. It also helped me to realise that it is the same for everyone else. You have the resources inside of you to achieve big, you just may just never have been taught how to use them.

Who keeps you accountable for your goal achieving?

Starting out with any goal that I wanted to achieve, I found I was very reliant on myself to keep me accountable. As I’ve become more ‘experienced’ I’ve learned that by enrolling other people in your vision or in a particular goal, not only do you get their support, you also share in their experiences which can ultimately benefit your own. At the moment I have a mentor (which I pay) for my work in business, I have business partners and a team of employees and clients that help me stay accountable for my work with the gyms and close family and friends who hold me accountable to my own personal goals. I’ve learned that you can go far by yourself, but you can go further, and make the journey much more meaningful, with the support of others.

What's a current goal you are working on? and what's the 'WHY' behind it?

A current goal that I am working on is developing a programmed designed to teach the community how they can approach life like an athlete. It takes a particular skillset to be successful as an athlete, and a lot of these qualities can be transferred to every day life and are a recipe to achieve success in other areas of your life. This is why I believe a lot of athletes experience success after life as an elite level athlete, because of the skills that required them to get there in the first place.

It saddens me that a lot of people never truly reach their potential in life. We all know someone has ‘all the potential in the World’ yet sits behind a desk working a 9-5 because they don’t see that potential we all see in them.

My goal is to create a program that teaches people how they can gain mental and physical strength and in the process, gain the confidence to realise that they have the resources within themselves to live a happy fulfilling life – whatever that looks like for them. They just have to make the decision to do so.

Myffy, I know you have achieved a lot already in your life, and there are many more big goals you are really proud or that have made the biggest difference in your life. Would you like to tell us about any of these?

One goal I am most proud of is winning the ACT Telstra Young Woman in Business Award in 2016. I joined Functional Fitness Australia with very little experience in running a business. In the 2 years I had been there, I helped create a business model that has facilitated my team of coaches to be able to educate the community on what sustainable health and fitness looks like so that they can live a fulfilling life.

I am proud of this award because for a female in the fitness industry to win an award that isn’t based around looks or instagram followers, I believe it is a big deal. There are a lot of women who work behind the scenes in gyms everywhere, however very rarely are they the face of the business they help support. I am proud of this award because I feel it represents these women and recognises the important role they play in business. I also believe it is recognition for women that you can be respected in the industry for what you do, not simply how you look or how many fans you have.

In general, do you have goals always set for your life? Upto how many years from now do you have goals waiting for you to achieve?

I find it very difficult to set big audacious long term goals. I’m still trying to discover why this is however I do set myself short term goals in areas of mind, career and body. At any one time, I will have a goal to grow my mind (by reading/learning/attending a seminar etc…), to further my career and a particular goal I would like to achieve with my physical body. I believe these short term actions are setting me up for a big long term goal – even if I can’t quite see it yet.

When did you start setting goals?

Even during my career as a cyclist, goal setting was a very foreign term for me. I wasn’t raised with the concept. My family are all high achievers and I believe their success is largely due to their daily work ethic and commitment to a task rather than because they had a set end goal in mind. The harder they worked, the more opportunities presented themselves.

I learned about goal setting in my time with lululemon athletica. Their company is based around setting big goals and developing strategies to achieve them and I believe this was my first ‘formal’ experience with goal setting.

Why do you set goals?

I have learned more recently that if you can language something, you can have it. If you want to get a particular job, such as business owner, and you can verbally say ‘I am a business owner’ – then you have the ability to one day take on that identity. If you can’t verbally say your goals, you are going to find it very difficult to achieve them. I have now started setting goals to assist with this process. I set goals to ensure that I continue to ‘achieve’. To be able to keep progressing in all areas of my life, I need to set myself mini goals and be able to verbally communicate these.

Do you have a bucketlist?

I don’t have a bucket list per say – however my variation of a bucket list is saying ‘yes’ to opportunities that I probably would’ve once said no to. I am still young and feel I can afford to say yes to new opportunities and so by saying ‘yes’ to new things, I am opening myself up to new experiences which I otherwise probably wouldn’t have considered. That is my current form of bucket list J

What is your best advice to those that have never set goals?

If the traditional sense of goal setting doesn’t work for you – that is no reason to give up on it. I remember when my business partner put butcher’s paper on the wall and said write down my ‘goals’. I froze. I had no idea what to write. I couldn’t literally think of ANYTHING that I wanted to achieve.

I am a logical thinker and find it difficult to think creatively, especially when I feel stressed!

"Every destination has a roadmap to get there and you just need to find a method of mapping that journey out that is going to work for you."

It could be in the form of a vision board, writing out a vision of yourself 5-10 years from now. Writing our a list of various things you’d like to achieve or even hiring a coach to help guide you through the process.

For me personally, I have developed goals based upon what I enjoy doing. My goals are ‘feelings’ rather than actions or things. I have come to learn what makes me happy and fulfilled and made a conscious effort to do more of these things and as a consequence, I have been able to turn what I enjoy doing in to a career and a sport. Some of my strengths lie in developing systems. I have found that I am able to turn people’s big ideas in to a reality because I am able to gather information and then develop systems and processes in order to achieve them. I also have found that I really REALLY enjoy doing this – so, I have a career goal to ‘help people do cool sh*t that makes an impact’.

Follow this inspirational lady! She's up to BIG THINGS and aside from that she's so real, down to earth and approachable.

Instagram handle: @ Myffyg

Facebook name: Myfanwy Galloway

Business name: Functional Fitness Australia