There’s a fine line between knowing what the obstacles, pitfalls, and dangers are and using them as an excuse not to go after what you want, or to enjoy the blessings that you have right now. Most people are doing way more excuse-making and fear-focusing than they are careful strategizing and navigation, or appreciation. They just look for the worst possible outcome and use that as the reason not to do something, or not to be in the moment. Here’s a quick way to check how fear-focused you are. You are driving and narrowly miss having a collision with another car. After the hit of adrenalin has passed, do you tell your family, friends, coworkers–and maybe even strangers–all about the crazy driver that almost hit you, how scary it was, or how close you were to disaster? Or do you think, talk, and focus more on how blessed you are that you’re safe, how often you move through life unscathed, and how grateful you are for your healthy body and fully functioning car? Can you feel the difference? This doesn’t mean that you don’t pay attention to where you are and where you are going, but it does mean putting problems and obstacles into perspective (how likely is the worst possible outcome, anyway?) and then figuring out how you would navigate around it should you encounter it. Often, we just take the word or experience of others to keep us from moving forward. For instance, I have a friend who won’t let her husband get on the roof to clean out the gutters because she knew someone who fell off their roof and was severely injured. That was a tragedy for sure, but how often […]
Look How Far You’ve Come
You’ve come a long way. This is true regardless of who you are or where you are in your life. Think about the things you’ve overcome, what you’ve learned, how you’ve changed. Even the experiences you had yesterday have added to Who you are. Too often people compare themselves to others or where they think they ought to be. This leads to self-doubts, self-criticism, and frustration that they’re not further along. What happens if you stop for a moment and really look at how far you’ve come and let yourself appreciate where you are right now? How different does that feel? How much more empowering is that new feeling? That feeling is the difference between negative catabolic energy that holds you back and positive anabolic energy that enables you to move towards achieving your goals. Comparing yourself to you versus someone else or where you think you should be gives you a much more accurate progress assessment. For instance, if you’re dieting, what you learned yesterday helps you know more about how your body responds to food, what thoughts and emotions may trip you up, and what helps you succeed. And where you are today will be a measurement to assess your progress tomorrow, or a week, month, year or lifetime from now. Even if you are 20 pounds (or more) heavier than you want and you feel like you’ve lost ground, you haven’t. You’ve gathered information that will help you move forward towards your goals and Who you want to be. That time and experience was not lost or wasted. Even if all you have is a clearer picture of what you don’t want, that is valuable. Sometimes you have to know that before […]
Create A “No Regrets” Policy
I haven’t been perfect this weekend. While I got all my workouts in, my eating has been a little on the high-calorie side, as is apt to happen when family gathers and we celebrate a birthday—in this instance, my husband’s. In the past, a splurge like I experienced this weekend would have been enough to derail me. I used to suffer from a severe case of perfectionitis where if I didn’t do my diet and exercise perfectly, I would be so hard on myself that I would give up. Fortunately, I now have a personal “No Regrets” policy. This gives me the ability to start each day with a fresh opportunity to do the very best I can, and to celebrate those actions that are moving me towards my goal. Being more tolerant and supportive of myself has helped me lift the “all or nothing” requirement that I used to have for success. This feeling that you have to do your diet and exercise program perfectly or you’ve “blown it” is very common amongst dieters and is one of the primary reasons that people fail to meet their weight-loss goals. The good news is that you don’t have to be perfect. If you eat a cookie or two, it’s not the end of your diet. But if you give up then and down a pint of ice cream on top of it—well that’s going to be much harder to recover from and your progress for the week will likely be stymied. Too many weeks with no progress and the motivation to continue seeps away and dies. If you slip, it’s much better to pick back up right where you are. One way to do this […]
My Secret to Extreme Exercise Commitment
I had lots of excuses I could have used to skip my workout this morning. My folks are in town and our guest-suite encompasses my usual workout area. We have a full schedule with more family visits planned. I have stayed up past my usual bedtime most of this week, and there is work to get done before I can fully relax and enjoy the weekend. But I was committed and I woke up at 3:30 a.m. and did a 30 minute meditation before getting up at 4 to get my hour-and-a-half workout underway by 4:30 a.m. My guess is that many of you think that is just plain crazy. So I asked myself, “Why am I so committed to getting my workout in?” There are definitely things that contribute—I’ve set a physical and time-focused goal that I want to meet, I want to be an authentic example of striving for optimal wellness for all you fabulous readers and my clients, and in all honesty, I want to maintain and improve how I look. But the true reason that makes my eyes flutter open at 3:30 a.m. without the aid of an alarm clock and gets my bum out of a very warm and appealing bed is the anabolic physical energy I get from moving my body, which impacts every single area of my life. Feeling physically well has not been something I’ve been able to take for granted since I was about 10 or 11 years old. I was a sickly and sensitive kid that suffered from food allergies, and later chronic back problems and migraines. Truly this was a gift in disguise as it forced me beginning in my early 20s to begin […]
Keeping Yourself on Track When You Have Been Less Than Perfect
My eating has been less than perfect this week. It hasn’t been horrible, but it hasn’t been spot on, either. What I love reflecting on is that in the fairly recent past, not being perfect would have meant giving up altogether. My thinking would have been along the lines of, “I’ve blown it,” followed by a lot of really harsh self-criticism that would have resulted in regaining the weight I had just lost. That old negative, catabolic assault on my mind, body, and spirit felt terrible! It truly was verbal abuse inflicted on myself. I’m so glad I don’t do that anymore! But this morning, I became aware of a slight undercurrent of catabolic thoughts and feelings (guilt) resulting from a few higher calorie food choices. Since I am aware of it, I’m going to address it right here and right now. The main thing I want to remind myself is that optimal wellness is about taking care of me for the long-run. While I have set some goals for an 18-week transformation challenge, my wellness goals will not end there. I do not have to be perfect to meet my short and long-term goals. What matters most is that I am making progress, and I am definitely doing that. Yesterday is done. Forget about it. Focus on the choices I am making today. Yes, this weekend will be challenging being with my folks, traveling, and it being my husband’s birthday, but I have the skills and determination to make the best possible choices—and still allow myself to have a good time and truly appreciate what I am eating. As Tony Horton says, “I will do my best and forget the rest.” And I am […]
Mental Stress Relief
Last weekend, I was listening to a teleclasses while eating breakfast, checking and responding to email, contemplating a client session, and reviewing and taking notes on a white paper written by Bruce Schneider on spiritual, mental, emotional, and physical energy. As I read a passage in “Driving Engagement: Sustaining Success Through Core Energy Dynamics and the Core Energy Coaching Process” suggesting that multi-tasking, stretching oneself too thin, doing too many things at once, and having conflicting demands may impact mental energy, I literally laughed out loud. Guilty on all counts. How often do you catch yourself focused on or doing more than one thing? Do you ever have conversations where you are so distracted you can’t remember what was discussed? Do your conversations jump around from topic to topic? Do you ever forget what you set out to do because you got distracted by something else? Often, people blame this on aging or outside influences. In truth, we are fragmenting our own mental energy creating mental stress. According to Schneider, mental energy involves how much brain power you have available at any given moment, your ability to be present in the moment, and to be alert, focused, and clear. These are necessary for harnessing your mental faculties for decision-making, idea generation, performance–truly all areas of life. Mental engagement is a matter of focusing your brainpower on a specific goal, role, project, or task. You know you are fully mentally engaged when you are in the reputed “zone” or “flow” where you lose track of time, physical needs, and are totally and joyfully absorbed in what you’re doing. In a society that encourages split mental focus, is it any wonder that many people are often mentally […]
Tips for Training Your Inner Critic
During my workout this morning, my inner critic showed up and started telling me that I was never going to achieve my fitness goals. I blew my internal whistle. I took my rightful place as the Coach calling the plays of my life and reminded my Gremlin that it’s a member of my team. “Your job,” I told it, “is to help me give this workout my all.” And it did. Each rep it reminded me of my form, asked me if the weights I was using were challenging enough, and pushed me to squeeze out one more rep, in many cases going beyond what I thought I could do. That’s more like it! One of the reasons so many people let that internal voice that tells them they aren’t good enough dominate their inner monologue is they don’t know their own power. They don’t realize that their Gremlin’s job is actually to help them, not hold them back. When you give all your power to the Gremlin, it gets a little greedy and controlling. What player left in charge of the team wouldn’t start to believe they’re calling the shots? What’s more, the Gremlin likes being in charge! This can result in a bit of an internal power struggle when people do start to claim the right to create their own lives. There are ways to not only make this process easier, but to increase your ability to successfully reclaim the position of Coach in your life. Here are some tips to recruit and begin to train your inner critic to become the motivational voice that encourages you to move past your believed limits. Look for the Truth. Those negative things the Gremlin is […]
What Did You Decide?
Yesterday’s blog was on figuring out your heart-felt reasons Why you want to achieve your goal. The next step is to decide. Not only are you deciding how you will proceed, but most importantly you are deciding how intensely you will proceed. The power of your decision behind going after your goals will determine your level of success. For instance, if you decide, “I think I’m going to lose weight,” that’s the level of commitment you bring to the process. It’s fairly tepid and you may lose a little weight, but chances are you won’t keep it up long-term. If you decide, “It’s important to me for these reasons to lose X amount of weight,” your commitment will likely be stronger. You may get discouraged or derailed, but you are more likely to meet your goals. If you decide, “I am going to do whatever it takes to lose X amount of weight and achieve these measurable goals because of these heart-felt reasons,” then your chances of success skyrockets. With this momentum behind you, if you stumble or face a challenge, you are much more likely to pick yourself up and keep going. What often gets in people’s way is they think decisions are made once. Each moment of every day, you are deciding. You must be aware of these decisions and continually decide to move towards our goal. Decisions like, “In this moment of this workout, am I going to give it my all, or ease up? Am I going to plan my meals, or am I going chance it? Am I going to eat what is on my plan, or am I going to have a little treat? Am I going to go […]
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