You woke up late. Your alarm didn’t go off. The kids took longer to get ready than usual. There was traffic.

You’re off your game and feeling a bit frustrated with running behind.

You’re late starting your workout.

And while usually you’d do 5 rounds of your circuit, you only get in 2.

You then have to rush off for the rest of your day.

But all day you’re slightly frustrated because you didn’t get in your full session.

You feel GUILTY.

And maybe even a bit grumpy about not doing what you’d ideally like to have done.

Your meal prep starts to look worse and worse to you.

It would be so easy to grab those chips, those crackers, that candy, instead.

I mean, who cares right? Your days already off. Wouldn’t it be better to just start over tomorrow anyway?

If you can’t be perfect with things…

BOOM.

That thought right there, that thought we’ve all had…this desire for perfection…is so often what holds us back.

Even just hearing this story, we all think BUT you still did SOMETHING.

Yet in the moment it is so easy to let our failure of achieving perfection with implementing of our plan completely sabotage us from still doing what we can.

While we “know” logically something is better than nothing it doesn’t always feel that way when we WANT to be perfect.

Because most of us DO want to do what we feel we should. We want to excel in those habits.

We want to do everything we can to achieve results.

But we have to recognize that while we can strive for perfection, we also have to embrace good enough at times.

While it’s hard in the moment to step back, we have to realize that if perfection is on one side and do nothing/completely sabotage ourselves/use poopy habits is on the other, good enough may be enough on that “perfect” side of the continuum to keep us moving forward.

And ANYTHING is better than not only doing nothing, but even consciously doing the habits that hold us back.

I think it’s when we really step back to see it as that continuum we can start to see that anything we can do to stay closer to that perfect side will really help us allow our results to snowball.

So sure, the workout may have only been half of what we wanted, BUT that’s good enough to be darn near perfect.

Heck sometimes we even need to think it is better than what we could have done…because we could have skipped the entire thing!

And then had we embraced that being good enough and eaten our meal plan we would have stayed even more on that perfect side of the continuum.

However, by feeling like we’d failed just because we weren’t perfect, and then NOT eating foods or macros in line with our goals we start to slide down that continuum toward poopy habits.

Because I know I’ve done this personally and I see this all or nothing attitude with clients often, I wanted to share some questions I think are key we consider.

1. Why do we fear good enough?

I say “fear” because I feel like we feel that good enough is failure. And most of us do not like to fail. There is definitely a fear of failing when we start something new.

And I think often when we aren’t perfect with something, we sabotage ourselves instead of feeling like we failed. Because when we just give up, even though we did fail, we feel a control in it. We gave up. We chose not to do it.

While often we can ultimately still feel guilty, which can lead to more self sabotage, there is an odd sense of control.

So I think we need to recognize that good enough isn’t a failure.

It’s a win.

Instead of looking at the things we didn’t do, we need to realize how much more we’ve already done than we would have at another time.

Focusing on those 1% improvements and the times we are “better than” we would have been in the same situation in the past, the more we can recognize and celebrate our growth to keep ourselves moving forward!

2. Why don’t you set a minimum?

Yes we all want results yesterday. But think about how often life really is perfect.

Think about how often a lack of time, a lack of energy, a lack of focus…basically a bazillion and 1 excuses don’t pop up?

The simple fact is…there is always something.

And honestly the more we want a perfect time, the more likely it is we will find an excuses. We are almost looking for a reason at times that things won’t work out, just because they haven’t in the past.

So often with clients I like to really recognize the fact that life doesn’t often work with us.

It often does its best to get in the way!

So instead of planning always for the ideal, sometimes it is best to plan for the worst.

Find minimums you can always return to.

Because if you set the minimum, you know you can be PERFECT with that.

Sure the perfect isn’t with your ideal.

But sometimes we need to rock being perfect with just good enough.

And that is what leads ultimately to the perfectly consistent enough that gets us results.

SUMMARY:

We are human. I know perfect isn’t in my DNA.

But I can find ways, and so you can you, to be perfectly good enough.

So today even, consider minimums for those daily habits and routines that you can do to stay on track even when a bazillion reasons not to do anything are thrown your way.

Consider ways things you can do to stay in a groove doing something…

Because small steps forward are still steps forward! And good enough keeps the momentum building!

Just tell me what to do!

I know most of us have thought this when struggling to figure out what actions to take to reach our goals.

Especially when we feel like we’ve been working really hard to not see any progress, or such up and down progress, we want to give up.

There are truly so many options out there.

We just want a set DO THIS THING AND you’ll see results.

But what if this is actually the thought that is KEEPING YOU STUCK.

This idea that there is just one thing to do, one plan we can follow forever that will get us the lasting results we want?

Because honestly this thought of just wanting everything mapped out for us, does hold us back from making sustainable changes.

And I see this most often when it comes to meal plans.

So while meal plans can be a great way to start making changes, we have to recognize their limitations.

They do give us an idea of how to hit our goals – the portions we need, recipes we can use, ways to quickly and easily meal prep.

BUT they don’t teach us to include foods we will ultimately want to eat.

Or show us how to balance our actual lifestyle with our goals.

They’re a short term fix.

They are the reason we get bored or feel restricted or eventually fall off our habit changes…

Because we don’t learn.

So if we choose to use a meal plan, we want to realize it is meant to be a short term fix.

And as we implement it, there are some strategies we can use to transition over time to fully learning how to make those sustainable changes…

We can start by tracking the meal plan to see the portions to then make swaps with other foods we enjoy.

We can tweak the recipes in the plan or even take the macros and search for other recipes we like or already use that match, even adapting our current favorites to work.

We can include meals out where they work in.

But the key is we take that framework and see how we can slowly tweak it based on what is realistic for us.

Because we need to see making changes less as us forcing ourselves to fit a mold and more as there are different ways to use the mold to also fit our needs.

We have to balance doing the “right” habits with what we can also do consistently!

And this can even mean creating our OWN meal plan…

To create your own meal plan…

1. Track a current day to see where your ratios are at and build off of the foods you love.
2. Make one small change to a recipe to adjust macros
3. Try entering in a different recipe for a meal to help you hit your ratios while having fun
4. Create leftovers and meals you can prep ahead
    1. This also allows you to use this meal plan for a few days
    2. Even say use dinner leftovers as a lunch the following day with a different dinner meal so you can see how you can reuse meals in different ways
5. Map in meals out so you can even avoid meal prep but know how those things can be planned in
6. Keep things simple by prepping protein to use in a variety of different ways over the week.

The key is planning ahead and setting meals you all know work together to repeat. And then even as your ratios change, think in terms of tweaking them.

Maybe your taco bowl becomes tacos on one ratio or a taco salad on another!

Honestly succeeding at anything in my opinion is hard. It often means doing things we don’t like.

Sticking with things even when there doesn’t seem to be progress.

Not only putting up with failures but embracing them and learning from them…

There is lots of not so fun things along the road to success…but you have to find ways to embrace these things if you want to see results and maintain them.

That’s why I wanted to share some “truths” I’ve found that I think taking ownership of is key if you want to see long-term success….

1: You’ll Always Have Doubts – Everyone Does

We will always doubt our own progress, doubt if something is working.

We will always doubt OURSELVES and our abilities.

Doubt isn’t bad.

As long as we see it as a chance to productively question and learn over dooming ourselves with doubt.

And I think the first step in embracing doubt to use it constructively is to realize that EVERYONE has doubts.

2: It’s Always A Balancing ACT

You’re never going to be perfect with your habits, with your plan.

We always will get caught in the immediate at times over the long term.

The key is realizing that there will be swings in our balance at times and that it is OK to sometimes go off track.

The key is always learning from it to see how we can keep creating something more balanced for ourselves.

Heck it is even at times realizing that a swing one way, while unbalanced, is needed to restore focus and balance.

Sometimes we need to let things slide a bit, say during the holidays, to be as dialed in as we want at other times of the year.

Embracing and learning about yourself through these ebbs and flows is key.

And realize your balance may change over time as your priorities shift!

3: There Will Always Be Steps Back

Progress is never linear. And the more successful you become at anything, the more you will realize your weak links or issues that snuck in there that you hadn’t noticed.

So the more you’ll even WANT to embrace and preemptively even take steps back.

Regress to progress is one of my favorite sayings and with good reason.

We are never above dialing in those basics.

We can always use those reminders.

We can all use at times being that beginner and taking ourselves back to that learning phase.

Sometimes we will take steps back consciously and other times we will be forced to. But the key is always seeing it as an opportunity to use these times to ultimately move forward faster.

Don’t let your ego slow you down because you’re unwilling to step back.

4: Stop The “Why Didn’t I Do This Sooner?!”

We’ve all thought this…we’ve all fought a habit because it felt overwhelming or hard to start only to finally do it and realize “Holy moly…this is the best thing ever!”

And then we’d wished we’d done it sooner.

You can’t ever fully avoid that. We don’t like change.

HOWEVER, I think knowing that what feels natural and instinctual and sustainable to start is just what we’ve always done and that no change will ever feel that way until we give it time…

We can catch and stop ourselves from avoiding doing the hard and having that thought after of why didn’t I do this sooner.

When you feel yourself wanting to shy away from the new, assess why.

Assess why something doesn’t feel sustainable and realize it may be just because it isn’t what you’ve always done.

And even if you think it won’t be sustainable long term, it is at times key you experiment with an end date! Maybe you just at least try it out because you know it will kickstart things.

Moving forward and doing a bit more at times to get the ball rolling can help you ease back to something more moderate but help you even make some changes you wouldn’t have embraced if you hadn’t done MORE to start.

5: Realize You’ll Never Be Done.

The curse of wanting more is you’ll always want more.

There will always be things to improve, to make more efficient, to make better.

However you have to find the balance of enjoying your success and being ENOUGH while still wanting to always strive to grow and learn.

Life is never standing still and we never have to say enough is enough BUT we can’t gloss over what we’ve achieved or we will always be searching for something to make us happy.

No amount of achievements will make you happy if you aren’t enjoying the learning process to some extent.

So realize it is ok to always want more but you can’t gloss over your victories along the way!