FHP 604 – The Best Workouts For Fat Loss – Strength vs CardioFHP 604 –

by Cori Lefkowith | Jan 16, 2024 | podcast

LISTEN HERE

WATCH HERE

TRANSCRIPT

OPEN TRANSCRIPT

00:00
Hey guys, it’s Cori from Redefining Strength. Welcome to the Fitness Hacks podcast. This is a show where I share all my free workout and nutrition tips. I’m not going to ever fill this episode with sponsorships or ask you to buy anything. All I ask in return is, if you’re enjoying the podcast, to leave a review or leave a five-star rating or, even better, share it with someone you think it might help. This will only take a few minutes and would mean the world to me and possibly change the life of someone you know. So let’s jump right in.

00:29
The best workouts for fat loss are not necessarily cardio workouts. They might actually be strength workouts, and it’s because, even though your goal may be fat loss, you want to focus on building muscle with your workouts. So often we do think of them just as a chance to burn more calories, and this is ultimately what sabotages our long-term success, because you cannot exercise your diet. You can’t just try and burn more calories, create the deficit through your training alone. You need to adjust your nutrition. So if you want fat loss, you’ve got to adjust your nutrition. But then, when our workouts complement it and all the systems work together, we see better results, faster and lasting results, and part of what helps us see those fat loss results faster from our nutritional changes is the fact that we’re building lean muscle, which helps keep our metabolism healthy. It also means that we don’t have to slash our calories as low, because so often when we cut our calories super low and then we add in more cardio, we end up losing muscle, which means we’re burning fewer calories at rest, which means we need to eat less. Try and keep creating the deficit through our diet. But if we actually focus on building muscle with our training, then we’re going to increase our metabolic rate. We’re going to need to even increase our calories while staying in that deficit, because we’re burning more calories at rest.

01:35
So your focus, if you want to lose weight with your training, should be on building lean muscle, and I wanted to give you six tips to really help you design those workouts that work, because one size doesn’t fit all and we do have to recognize too that it’s not cardio or strength. There’s a whole spectrum and continuum we can really work on or work along as we’re designing our workouts. So just remember that you can get cardiovascular benefits while improving your muscle mass and doing that strength work, and you can also be improving your cardio and also build strength in that aspect too. So there are a lot of different ways you can design to make it really work for your time, your schedule, your goals. Now, I’m not telling you not to do cardio if you are an endurance athlete or you really enjoy it, but if you are solely focused on improving your training regime for fat loss, these tips will help.

02:17
So, number one, see your workouts as a chance to build muscle, which is sort of what I just went over. But I bring this up because I want you thinking about how can I lift heavier, not how can I cut out more rest and feel more slaughtered and see my calorie burn be higher in my watch. The more you are focused on building strength, okay, and then building lean muscle, and that means using a variety of rep ranges. I know often we think I only should go lower rep range or stay in the hypertrophy rep range, but they’ve shown that a diversity is really key, which I’m going to touch on a little bit more shortly. But you want to focus on building strength because as much as yes, maximal strength is that one to five hypertrophy reps, that sort of six to twelve and 15 to 20 is that strength endurance, all those things build together, because if you can lift more weight and move more weight because you’ve worked on maximal strength, you’re gonna move more weight during that hypertrophy of your rep range. You’re just gonna see better results. And if you have that strength endurance, you’re gonna be able to do more reps to failure which is gonna help you recruit more muscle fibers, which is gonna help you see better results as well. Not to mention, you’re gonna recover a lot faster between different rounds of your strength work which will ultimately pay off. So you want to think about how can I build muscles efficiently, which means focusing on loads lifted, okay, and not just making yourself feel completely destroyed. You actually sometimes you want to feel like you’ve recovered so much the next round you can go to true 100% intensity, versus like feeling like the same weights are even heavier than extra on whether to feel light or like you can go up okay and challenge yourself.

03:34
Tip number two is use a diversity of rep ranges and realize pushing to failure is key. They’ve shown that really there’s nothing necessarily magical, but only staying in that six to twelve reps. Well, that can be really good in terms of creating the right training density for you. While moving heavy loads, we do want to use a variety of rep ranges and we can’t say, oh well, I’m trying to get bigger, you know, build muscles, so I’m not gonna do the higher rep ranges. Okay. Often we don’t do that because even myself as a lifter, I like to pick things up and put them down right. I try and avoid higher up ranges on some moves because they’re uncomfortable. But you need those higher rep ranges, especially after heavier lifts, to really work that muscle to failure, failure. But no matter which rep range you use, you want to focus on that failure point. Okay.

04:11
This doesn’t mean you have to feel absolutely destroyed, like you can’t even like lift the weight at all, but it does mean that you can’t just stop because it felt hard and you hit the top of the rep range. That’s actually something I wanted to touch on. Is that double progression? Because I see so often we just think about lifting a heavier weight or using a harder variation and we don’t really understand the nuance and the rep range we’re given. Usually you are given a rep range of three to five if it’s maximal strength, or six to twelve, that if it is in hypertrophy, even eight to twelve to keep you in that higher rep range or 15 to 20, right. And so we’ll say, okay, I can do the top end of the rep range. Great, I felt. Challenge, that’s good.

04:43
But if you can do that top end of that rep range at any point with any weight, you need to go up in weight the next round until you hit even a weight, especially the more experience you are. You can barely do that bottom end of that rep range and maybe even on that final round of that week you can’t do the bottom end of the rep range like I love when a client hits eight reps consistently and on that final round they can’t do eight without a rest pause where they do six and then pause and do eight or two to get that eight, because that means that they really maxed out with that load and took it to failure. And so the next week I might have them stay at that and they might get nine, nine, nine and then finally hit that eight on the last one, right. And then once they work up in that rep range, that we might add loads from there as well, depending on how advanced you are, how much you really want to work on that maximal strength and you feel comfortable with your form or recruitment patterns. You might stay lower in that rep range, consistently, making sure that you’re always sort of adding weight to max out only a rep or two above the bottom. But if you’re hitting that top end of the rep range, I can tell you right now, no matter how hard it feels, you need to go up, okay, and if you can still hit it, go up again. But don’t fear. Also with this, when you’re doing the two different rep ranges or multiple different rep ranges, doing the back-to-back, you want to think about, yes, potentially lifting heavier, doing more compound movements with the lower reps because you can move more loads, and then, as you go over your workout, potentially doing more isolated movements for the higher reps or for the stubborn areas. But you can also think about using things like compound burners where you’re doing that, you know, hypertrophy rep range of even 8 to 12 reps for a compound them. Or you’re going heavier followed by a higher rep move where it’s more isolated, because then you’re really working a muscle group to failure and that work to failure is going to create that muscle growth which will ultimately help you look leaner, be stronger, functionally more fit, have a higher, healthier metabolic rate.

06:18
Okay, and it becomes harder, guys, to build and retain muscle as we get older, because the hormonal stimulus is not as optimal as it was when we were younger. Often we have to make adjustments to our fueling. But we also want to do more in our training. We need almost more of that stressor in our workouts to create the same stimulus for growth and that same muscle building response. Okay, so you got to use those rep ranges. Sometimes you got to do the higher reps. Even if you only like to lift for lower reps, okay, you can’t fear them. But that doesn’t mean going light for those higher rep ranges because you don’t want to turn it just cardio. No weight should ever be light. Okay, even with higher rep ranges. That should challenge you for those reps. So it should always feel heavy for whatever reps you’re doing.

06:54
Tip number three is focus most on compound moves, and I bring this up because isolation exercises are super key for stubborn areas. We need to include them. But so often when we’re short on time, we do those things and then we don’t burn the maximum amount of calories we can. We don’t build the maximal amount of muscle we can. In that time, if you can move a heavier weight, you are going to see more muscle growth from it. Okay, with compound moves, we are using more big, large muscles all at once to move the weight. We’re gonna see better benefits. Okay, that’s why we want to focus on those. However, yes, if you do really want to build more muscle in your arms or build your glutes or build your quads or build a specific aspect, that’s where you’re going to use those isolation moves to help take that muscle group to failure. But if you are especially short on time, focus on those compound movements. They’re bigger bang for your buck. You’re going to move heavier loads and that quality movement of heavier loads is what is going to stimulate muscle growth, stimulate the best metabolic response.

07:44
Then, tip number four don’t do body parts splits. I have no problem if you really can train for hours in the gym because you have the ability to have the rest periods. If you really like that workout design, doing body parts splits where you’re doing chest one day, back another day, arms another day, but this is the least efficient schedule possible. When you’re working some of the smaller muscle groups, you’re really not going to end up burning as many calories in the day. We don’t want our workouts just to be about calories burned. This isn’t optimal if we are looking for efficient workouts to lose fat and gain muscle and create a better hormonal environment, especially as we’re getting older. Think about how you can work more large muscle groups in each and every session. Again, going through menopause, we need to create the stimulus for muscle growth through a bigger stressor. We want to work larger muscles in each session if we can. That might mean we do upper lower to give our body a break. It might mean we do full body splits. Focus more anterior, posterior over the week. We want to think about how can we work at least one or two large muscle groups before we even isolate if we do have stubborn areas. Can’t just do body parts splits if you really want the most efficient thing, especially as you’re getting older.

08:49
Tip number five use cardio strategically. As much as I say, don’t turn your workouts into cardio. As much as I say cardio is not the best thing for fat loss. Even though we tend to turn to it, this doesn’t mean you want to avoid it. Cardio has great health benefits and it can even be used to create the stimulus for growth. We can make it again on that continuum. It doesn’t have to be cardio or strength.

09:08
We can make our conditioning more strength-oriented or we can make our strength work more metabolically oriented by how we include cardio. This might mean doing more circuits where you rest in areas in another area of work so that your blood does get pumping as you’re alternating areas, especially if you’re short on time. That can be great. It can be using intervals over just set reps and sets. Sometimes when we do an interval of work we do more reps than we would have done had we just had eight to 12 reps. We force ourselves to use rest pause technique and eat things out. It does work on that. Strength endurance takes us potentially more to failure. Then we also want to think how can we use sprints even after our strength work, especially when we’re short on time. If we add in that little five-minute burner at the end, that might be more metabolically focused, more conditioning-focused. That’s going to help us recover faster so we can get more out of our strength training routines. It’s going to help us bring that heart rate down faster if we do that conditioning.

09:57
Thank you for the little short intervals. This can be more like sprint training or it can be more like speed training. I’m going to separate those two out because with sprint training, you might have 10 seconds of work with 15, 20 seconds of rest or even only 10 seconds of rest. It might not be a longer rest to work, but you’re keeping those intervals very short so you can go to high intensity even though you’re not fully recovering, which is a great stressor for your body and can really be helpful during menopause. If you want to work on that speed and that true recovery, you’re going to think, how can I do 10 to 30 seconds interval work with two to three times the rest? Because you actually want to be training speed so you don’t fully recover, you’re going to be training slowness because you’re not going to be able to go as fast as you did before. You need that longer rest interval between. Consider even just five to 10 minutes of that sprint work, sometimes after a strength routine. Or consider how you’re designing your strength workouts to be a little bit more metabolically focused with that circuit training, the density sets, or the intervals.

10:48
Then tip number six, do more mobility. This is the least sexy part of it, I know, but the more mobility work you do, the more you’re going to recruit the correct muscles at the correct times as efficiently as possible, which is not only going to help you avoid falls and fractures in everyday life and be more powerful and more explosive, but this really does improve your strength because of the improvements in my body connection, because being stronger is about how quickly and efficiently you can recruit muscles to the right extents, in the right orders, even to the right amount of muscle fibers being called to do the movement. All of that is efficiency in movement, and that’s what strength truly is. It’s not just brute force. The more we do that mobility work, the more we’re able to work through a full range of motion, the more we’re able then to maintain that full range of motion, but the more we’re able to recruit the correct muscles to the correct extents because the joints are fully mobile. It also includes in the mobility work that activation which establishes that my body connection, and activation alone drives muscle growth. It’s been shown to really improve muscle hypertrophy. So not only are we helping ourselves potentially recover, we’re getting more out of our training sessions, and we’re helping ourselves avoid injury, which means we can train more consistently without being sidelined by different things popping up, which helps us see better results faster. So mobility work has a lot of different benefits, from injury prevention to recovery, to being able to actually go harder, even in our sessions, to see better muscle hypertrophy or gains from those sessions.

12:04
Okay, so, using these six tips, start to make small tweaks, to work on design and then make sure you’re designing a weekly progression that you repeat over and over again, because that’s going to show you the best results, because you’re able to build and know what isn’t isn’t working and even track those numbers over time, because that’s the way to track progress. If you’re randomly stringing things together, there might be one week where, because you did it in a different order, you don’t feel as strong or you can’t go up in weight. Okay. And then, even as you’re adjusting your nutrition, you’ll see how your nutrition impacts things, to even know hey, I have gone on more of a mini-cut, my energy is lower, so then I need to still maintain my numbers from the week before. But here’s how I’m going to do it with rest-pause technique or longer rest intervals or whatever else, so that I’m not going backward on my training. But having that clear progression really allows you to drive yourself forward faster, okay. So don’t randomly string things together. Use these six tips to really design workouts that work for you.

12:52
Thanks for listening to the Fitness Hacks Podcast. Again, this is the place where I share all my free workout and nutrition tips. I’m never going to run sponsorships or ask you to buy anything. All I ask in return is, if you’re enjoying the podcast, leave a rating review or share it with someone you think it might help. This will only take a few minutes, and it would mean the world to me and possibly change the life of someone you know.

FHP 603 – Happy National Quitter’s Day

by Cori Lefkowith | Jan 12, 2024 | podcast

LISTEN HERE

WATCH HERE

TRANSCRIPT

OPEN TRANSCRIPT

Hey guys, this Cori from from Redefining Strength. Welcome to the Fitness Hacks podcast. This is a show where I share all my free work on the nutrition tips. I’m not going to ever fill this episode with sponsorships or ask you to buy anything. All I ask in return is, if you’re enjoying the podcast, to leave a review or leave a five-star rating or, even better, share it with someone you think it might help. This will only take a few minutes and would mean the world to me and possibly change the life of someone you know. So let’s jump right in. So I quit. How many times have we just given up on something right before results are actually going to snowball so often? And January 12th 2024 is National Quitter’s Day. Michelle brought this to my attention actually last night and we decided we had to do a episode on this because so often we are the ones sabotaging our own results by giving up when something might actually working. So, michelle, with bringing this up, I want you to dive into what you think is often the culprit behind us saying I quit.

I think one of the biggest issues is we tend to put so much pressure on the month of January to start and actually implement things, and I think it’s a good reminder, like, as long as you’re trying and you’re trying to improve, it doesn’t need to happen in January, it doesn’t need to. All the change doesn’t need to happen this month. We have a whole year and you don’t need to wait an entire year if something does fail. You just need to readjust and kind of stay on track. So that’s kind of the first thing is don’t put so much pressure on getting everything right in the month of January.

I think that goes for even any other time as well, and I want to sort of bring this out to any time we want to start a goal right, because while the New Year’s resolutions are that time where we’re often most motivated to make big changes, at any point we want to make a change. We do often put our like this pressure on ourselves to be perfect, and so often then that first little deviation makes us give up when we don’t recognize all the changes that were already happening. Right, we were good for like 12 days, 11 days already, or even, if it wasn’t perfectly consistent, eight days. We may change it in eight days and we don’t recognize that we met, recognize the one day that wasn’t perfect, which then says, well, why do anything right, but something is still better than nothing. And the more we try and get consistent with those things, the longer we stick with it. Often the more things build, because we don’t necessarily always need more tactics, we need more time.

Yeah, and that kind of goes into. My next thing too is so many, so often we just take on too much and it’s more than we can chew. Like if you are someone that’s like, okay, I’m getting into exercise, I’m going to hit the gym seven days a week, but the week before you were hadn’t even, hadn’t even gone once, Like that probably isn’t the most realistic goal for you to set. So it’s also just being like, like you mentioned, like we want things to snowball. So if you’re doing a little bit better than you were the previous week, that’s still a win.

But we don’t celebrate necessarily the small improvements because they don’t feel sexy, they don’t lead to the fad-dye results, but they do lead to lasting results and discipline is built.

We’ve had this conversation. A lot like discipline is built, but it’s built on being able to do something and repeat that something for long enough that then you can build more off of it. Because then if you’ve increased let’s just say like 10 grams of protein, and then you can increase the next week 10 more grams and then 10 more grams after that all of a sudden you’re up 30 grams of protein daily. And so then, if you do have life getting the way, there’s a lot more likelihood that you’ll still be up 10 grams, even if you don’t hit your 30 goal, than you would have been had you tried to go to 30 all at once and never sort of slowly built up, because you make those lows less low by sort of building and stacking off of them, because it makes it so easy to replicate a little bit less than what we’re doing currently right, which is often higher than where we were at. So it’s really that habit stack and those 1% improvements that add up.

Yeah, and that’s exactly it you have to recognize and we don’t give ourselves enough credit because we are our worst critics you have to pause and give yourself that recognition and that gold star when there has been an improvement. If your goal was to hit the gym seven days a week and you hit it five, that’s still a lot better than the week before. So really recognizing those 1% differences and even though that 1% may not seem like a big change, it is and it can really add up.

And not only can it add up in a positive direction, but it can also hold us back when we don’t recognize some of the deviations that are sort of play in. Because I think another thing that leads to us saying I quit is that we don’t see changes happening fast enough and we feel like we’re working really, really hard right, because even small changes can feel a little overwhelming and the pain of staying stuck has to outweigh the pain of change and sometimes, when the pain of change is really pushing back, it’s hard to keep doing things right. So we get this feeling of, well, I’m working so hard and not seeing the results I deserve, and we start to overlook those inconsistencies. And I’d actually brought up on an earlier call we were doing, you know, the 1% deviations and how much they can really add up. So if we think we’re doing all the right habits but we don’t look at the actual consistency, we might not notice that we’re slowly going off course. And Ryan made us Google the example, so I didn’t butcher it, which I might still butcher it anyway.

But if you’re on a flight from JFK to Tokyo, right, and you’re just off by that one degree, that 1%, you’ll end up in the middle of the ocean instead of getting to your destination, which would not be good. Right, we don’t want to land in the middle of the ocean. And the same thing happens with our goals. If we’re off by that 1%, what might not seem like a big deal of not logging one meal or one snack or one bite, lick or nibble right, all of a sudden becomes two or a whole day unlocked or other things going to play in. So all of a sudden, we’re nowhere near the habits we once thought we were doing, even if we’re doing just enough to feel like we’re working hard with them. So it’s this weird thing of like the feelings aren’t data sort of, so to speak, but also 1% deviations that lead us, off course, to feel like we’re working hard but not seeing results snowball, yeah, and you really.

And part of that is to truly have success, you have to be very specific with your goal. So it’s not. You know, you hear so often like, oh, I’m going to eat healthier, I’m going to exercise more, okay, that’s great. How, how often are you going to go to the gym? What workouts are you actually going to do? If you’re going to eat healthier, where are you going to start? What’s going to be your main focus?

So often people generalize these goals and I think truly, we tend to go off of goals that we feel like everyone is doing and we want to fit the mold.

And it is recognizing that sometimes that probably isn’t going to work for you because you have to individualize it. It’s fine to have health goals and of course, we want everyone to have health goals and improve, but you have to individualize that health goal for you. So if all of a sudden, you’re like, okay, you know, my friends are all doing this goal and their goal is to hit X amount of protein throughout the day, that’s great For you. Probably the main focus is this is the meal that I struggle the most to get my protein at. I’m going to focus here first to start increasing my protein needs, and that is really kind of the big thing of trying to avoid that white knuckling your way through whenever you’re trying to do anything new or trying to create new habits is being extremely specific with it and, as you mentioned, like even if you’re off on other days or even if you’re didn’t get a complete day done, you still have that specific thing that you hit for that day.

But it’s even in having that very specific goal, you’ll notice those one-present deviations to correct course before you just completely keep making them. And on top of that, I love that you bring up how okay. I think that question is something we don’t ask enough. And I don’t have the devil and the angel on my shoulder. I have an annoying little kid poking at me being like how, why, how, why Right? Anytime I’m like looking at something and I want to write something off or give up on something, I always go back to that questioning too. And the how question, I think, is so important because we say I want to increase my protein Cool. That’s a great habit to focus on. How right? Well, I’m going to eat more protein and meal. Okay, how right.

The more we break it down and give ourselves something specific to do, the easier we make things.

And going back to that whole pain of staying stuck has to outweigh the pain of change.

Right, if our goal is significant to us, we’re going to embrace more sacrifices, but at some point priorities in life are going to make it feel not as significant, not as worthwhile, especially if the pain of some of the changes become really uncomfortable with other stressors we have going on in life and if that happens, instead of trying to find a way to make you know your goal more significant to yourself which sometimes we can’t do, we can’t feel the potential of even having achieved it we have to break down those habits so they’re less painful, so to speak. So it feels like we’re making less sacrifices because all stress goes in one bucket and if that bucket is overflowing with stress, you can’t just keep putting more stuff in right and some of the priorities in life stresses in life you’re not going to be able to necessarily stop, but you can make those changes less stressful so that you can still do more of them than you would do otherwise. So it is breaking things down and really personalizing, as you said.

And what I really like about this too is like, if you are right now in that state of mind where you’re like I have not been hitting my new year’s resolution goals or whatever, if you’ve attempted a new habit at any point and you’re like I’m just not hitting it, instead of having the mindset of like well, I’m just going to quit, I’m giving up, it’s too hard, have the mindset of okay, this has been difficult, I’m on the verge of quitting. I need to reevaluate and truly kind of take stock of what is going to be the most beneficial for you that’s going to still give you some of those wins but is taking into consideration where you’re actually at in your life, where you are, how you are handling with current stressors, and sometimes taking a step back and kind of having an easier goal is still going to help you work towards, you know, that finish line.

And even taking that step back and saying, hey, I often say nothing will ever work for me. Right, with the I quit it usually comes nothing ever works for me, no program will ever work for me. Trust me, I’ve done that whole moop pow, feel bad for myself, you know, go sit on the couch thing. And often in that moment, in order to truly move forward and see the results of all, sometimes I have to be like am I just repeating the same pattern? Am I saying I quit, nothing will ever work for me? But is nothing ever working? Because at this point, six weeks into something about six to nine weeks, is where I find I usually fall off, or where even clients generally fall off.

At that point where you’ve worked hard enough for long enough and results, yes, I’ve snowballed, but either you’ve gotten a little complacent or maybe they’re just about to sort of really hit that momentum point right. We give up, we quit before things can actually be achieved. And so I like to assess is this that stick point? Is that this is that hard point where I want to give up, where the challenges are becoming a little more than I truly want? How can I double down on the things that are working to keep pushing through, because often, if we do sort of stop and assess, it is just that hard point in that journey where you’re over that initial motivation. You’ve been doing things long enough, you’ve seen results snowballed, maybe they’re slowed, you’ve gotten complacent, whatever else, but things have slightly slid and you have the opportunity now to sort of refocus, reset, keep pushing forward. But so often we turn back and it is that like assessment and that setback we really need to take to realize that we’re repeating sort of the same cycle.

And sometimes I think it requires an outside perspective to see if you are falling victim to the same cycle that you’ve repeated that has caused you to fall off. Because sometimes, again, we think we know how to do things and we think that we have it figured out and we know, like we know, the basics of, okay, to be healthier, to exercise more, to do all these things. This is what it takes. But again you kind of take your own perspective out of it at it and sometimes hearing other people be like, hey, this is a challenge, this is, this is one way that I stick to my diet or this is one way that I make sure that I am in improving my movement or getting the most out of my workouts, is actually relying on others for help.

I think so often we we want to kind of struggle on our own and I think part of that is we don’t want to share our struggles with others because we feel like we should kind of be able to take care of our own body. But there’s so there’s so many people out there. That just gives a different outlook. So this is really where I think coaching honestly, if you were someone that’s really feeling like you’re really struggling. This is really where coaching comes into play, because that we can. You can get that outside perspective and kind of potentially get new tips that you hadn’t even really thought. Or maybe it was so basic that you’re like oh yeah, I’ll do that, but you never actually do because you haven’t seen it actually put in a plan to work.

It’s hard to trust a change that feels really uncomfortable and we do search for this thing that’s sustainable. But what’s sustainable is what we’ve always done. And if you really think about that phrase, when you look back at something, oh that wasn’t that bad, it’s because you embrace the hard changes. But at the time it probably felt really uncomfortable and wasn’t sustainable. And I think even in that, like looking for that accountability, we need that outside perspective at times, because we’re really good at justifying our excuses. I know I am that that whole. But well, I could just buy, you know. But even with coaching it was actually funny someone posted on there how do you become more coachable? And I, you know, went through different things and she’s like, yeah, this is all well and good, but, right, we put in that.

But to justify almost not making a change, because change is scary, it’s hard, we don’t want to fail, right.

We don’t even sometimes realizing, realize we’re justifying because we are going back to priorities or things that have held us back in the past, realizing that ultimately, still, it’s really our choice as to whether or not we make a change and view something differently. And, you know, take that different perspective, embrace coaching in a new way. Right, and tell you, for me it was a hard thing, oddly, to do after growing up with a lot of coaching, for some reason, you know, as I got into adulthood I was like, oh, I don’t need a coach for this, I can do it on my own. Okay, well, sure, but look at how much time I just wasted when I could have had a cheat sheet. And now I’m like I won’t work with a coach who doesn’t believe in coaching, because I want someone who has that, because also makes you a better learner. Right, it’s more coachable. But it is something where we are very good at justifying our perspective, like it’s a safety mechanism. So if we don’t have that outside perspective, sometimes we can’t see and know what we don’t know.

And I think a big part of getting that outside perspective is and this is probably gonna ruffle some feathers but if your main goal and your only like way of seeing if you’re successful or not is weight loss, I’m gonna say it’s gonna be a lot harder for you because every I have not had a person come to me for help that has said Okay, my goal isn’t weight loss. I’ve never had that like. Even when they’re like Well, I’m not that concerned about about the scale, but I do want to improve. They still are looking at those clients Even are still stepping on the scale and using it as a form of okay, is this working? Is this not working? But the problem is is Rarely, is the skill actually the reason so truly. I think sometimes having that outside perspective Forces you to kind of have some Interpection in her may have said that word wrong but and actually look within to see well, what is the real reason.

Because I mean, of course, like a scale is a good and can be an indicator. But why do you truly want to have a chain? Are you just going for weight or are you trying to gain muscle? Is it really to reduce chronic joint pain and you know if you’re at a little less weight you’re going to have, you’re gonna be more flexible You’re you’re not gonna have as much pain. Is it to have more energy or a body that’s able to do things that you enjoy longer, like hiking, biking, playing or playing? You know, playing with your kids, playing with your grandkids there’s so much more than just the kind of the surface level and I do think, like you know, we talked about that newest perspective of getting in the habit. But sometimes I feel like really getting down to the core, why you’re here or why you initially wrote those changes down. That is going to help you actually stay focused on that goal and Raise.

Recently, for me, I’ve been thinking more of things and I heard it somewhere and I don’t remember I may have been one of our coaches actually said it and it kind of stuck with me on A call, but it’s what are you putting your deposit in for?

So every day you have your, you have that, these funds that you’re given, and you’re either depositing in for your health or you’re kind of depositing, you know, kind of the negative, like you’re putting this, you’re dropping this in kind of the negative bucket, and this has been kind of a shift for me recently, and this is kind of a silly thing.

But I have a race that I want to sign up for and my husband was kind of challenging me because he’s like well, remember, the last two races you signed up for, you didn’t train and you just kind of jumped in, which is true, and I would never suggest anyone to do that, but I felt I felt victim to that and so part of my new year’s thing was like, okay, I’m gonna prove to him that, like I’m gonna be serious about my training and I have like a mileage goal this this month. And it was kind of like every time I get on the treadmill or go out to run, I feel like I’m putting my deposit in for my race, like I was like putting this in so I can buy this race later, and it’s kind of having that perspective with your health in general. You’re putting your deposit in so you can Continue to do things longer that you enjoy, you can continue, continue to have that active lifestyle for as long as possible. I.

Love that visual and I even think that that could be something helpful, where you do your habit and you put, maybe, a deposit in a piggy bank or you put a rock in a jar so that you can see those results accumulating. But it’s it’s Recognizing too that, like what you think your, your goal is, isn’t necessarily the only significance to it. Like even a goal that we might decide is, you know, people say it’s vain or oh, that’s, you know, not that important, it doesn’t impact them any things. Like a lot of times, those do have more significance and the more we dig into them, the more we will embrace some of the hard changes we have to make, which helps us stay more consistent. So really digging deep into your why is very, very important. But then setting those outside things to keep you accountable, right, like you have that habit goal so that you’re training for the race, yes, yes, which is motivational, it’s your end goal. Right, it’s a deadline, which are all great things. But you have those habit focuses each and every week to help you see success.

Because the more ways we measure success, the more ways we have to show ourselves the success we’re actually achieving, versus so often we don’t recognize it and I think even a part of that is so often we run from the negative spot we might have been in right, those before pictures we don’t want to share or whatever else.

And instead of running from them, instead of not wanting to take them, take them and keep them in your rear view mirror, keep that perspective of how far you’ve actually come, because I think so often it’s just like, oh, I don’t want to be here, okay, but that shows you the distance of your progress already, to keep you moving forward, to get more space between it. Whereas if we lose that perspective Like what is the saying? Like if you don’t learn from history, you’re bound to repeat it. Right, we don’t repeat it. So we want to keep how far we’ve gone, to give ourselves that perspective, because it’s very easy to get caught up in just how much further we have to go. So I think the habit goal is the visuals, the reminder where we started, and really owning the significance of what we want is just so freakin key.

Yeah, and it’s like, like we’ve mentioned multiple times, but it’s never just giving up and not having that all or nothing mindset, like you said. Like keep things in your, in your rear-view mirror and but don’t be afraid, if you do backslide, you can always take that step forward, or that two steps forward.

More like a side step right, we make the mistake. Besides step around, we keep moving forward. Life isn’t a video game where you get to start over and Know all the lessons you’ve learned and just go from the beginning fresh, start right. Everything we’ve done prior is still there, so we just have to keep moving forward, learning those lessons to constantly improve. Thanks for listening to the Finisax podcast again. This is the place where I share all my free workout and nutrition tips. I’m never gonna run sponsorships or ask you to buy anything. All I ask in return is, if you’re enjoying the podcast, to leave a rating review or share it with someone you think it might help. This will only take a few minutes and it would mean the world to me and possibly change life of someone you know.

FHP 602 – The Real Secret To Success

by Cori Lefkowith | Jan 11, 2024 | podcast

LISTEN HERE

WATCH HERE

TRANSCRIPT

OPEN TRANSCRIPT

Hey guys, this is Cori from Redefining Strength. Welcome the Fitness Hacks Podcast. This is the show where I share all my free workout and nutrition tips. I’m not going to ever fill this episode with sponsorships or ask you to buy anything. All I ask in return is, if you’re enjoying the podcast, to leave a review or leave a five-star rating or, even better, share it with someone you think it might help. This will only take a few minutes and would mean the world to me and possibly change the life of someone you know.

So let’s jump right in. I was trying to think about what the real secret to building a lifestyle, the secret to success, really was, and in reflecting on it I realized that’s the secret to success: Constant reflection and constantly trying to improve that self-awareness. So when we’re thinking about building a lifestyle, it’s always about assessing who and what we are and what we need to move forward from where we’re at currently.

I think so often we do set that end goal. We set a vision of what a program should look like if you find some ideal but we never actually consider who am I, what do I need, how do I respond to things and where am I starting from currently to set that GPS so I can actually achieve the location that I want to go to.

So if you’re just starting out, if you’ve been struggling to see the results that you want, instead of searching for a new perfect plan, instead of trying to fit yourself into some mold, assess what mold do I really need, based on who and what I am. Focus on building that self-awareness.

I tell clients all the time in the coaching program I don’t even want you to come out of this coaching program so much saying I know how to do this macro ratio or I know how to do this workout and I know that prehab is important, as important as prehab is. I want them to come out having a better self-awareness because they’ve had that outside perspective to question some of their beliefs. Because so often we do get caught up in making the same mistakes, because we’re not really reflecting on why those setbacks have occurred.

We get caught up in looking at things in the same way we always have, because that’s what potentially worked in the past, even if it was a short-term fix. So if we’re trying to build a lifestyle, we have to recognize that things are constantly going to be evolving and changing and shifting and that the most important thing we can do is say, hey, how is what I’m doing right now truly? How am I truly responding to it? How is it truly moving forward? Is it actually moving me forward?

Right? And the more we reflect on how things are truly working, the better off we’re going to be, because then we can say, hey, at this stage of life maybe with it being the busy season of work or busy season with family I can’t do these same things that once worked. I’ve had even clients say you know, like when I was single, I was doing all these workouts and I was going to the gym and meal probably in this way, and now, with the family, it doesn’t work this way. Or when I had kids, at this stage it was different than now being retired and potentially having a lot more free time, where you think it would be easier.

It’s not right, but different stages of life require us to do different things and what used to work may no longer work simply because of those lifestyle shifts. So the more we can assess what we need at this time, the better off we’re going to be.

So through self reflection, we can really learn about ourselves and it’s not just saying, oh well, how do I like this, is this good? Or? Oh, this doesn’t feel sustainable. Right? We have to reflect on both our failures and our successes, and I say both because I think a lot of times we think we’ve reflected on things, but we haven’t truly really gotten into the nitty gritty of why things worked or why they didn’t. And with success, often we blow past it oh great, that worked, we achieved a result. We don’t say, well, why did that work?

Right? So the first thing I want you to sit down and do if you are starting a new program, a new plan, you’re frustrated by your lack of results. You want to see better results is really assess past successes. Why do you think you succeeded in that case? Why did something work for you? Why did that diet feel sustainable at that time, right? Maybe you do say, okay, what was the motivation of the time of year? Or I didn’t have some of the busyness that I have right now.

Think about what your lifestyle actually looked like when you were implementing that program or plan or doing those different things that led to success. What was even your pain of staying stuck? I think a lot of times we don’t think about the motivation that drove us forward at the time, right, that we maybe had some health concerns, or that we really couldn’t fit into our clothes, or that someone else made a comment that really resonated with us, right?

And so the motivation now is different than it was then, which might not drive us forward. Or even thinking about the changes that happen with menopause and the frustrations there. Maybe this pain is very different than the pain when you lost weight before, right? Or even you’re seeing impacts to your mood and your sleep and all these different things, and that is impacting the pain of staying stuck.

So think about these different things, because while we can’t always change the pain of staying stuck, and if that motivation is different, we can’t approach in the same way we can break down the habits, so the pain of change is less. So really assess what drove you forward at that time. How might that be different than what’s driving you forward right now?

And then think about the guidance and support you had. Who did you have in your life that was maybe promoting those healthy habits? Who even led to the sabotage of them, right? But think first about the success, like what drove you forward? Who helped you on your way? What were you reading? What were you looking at? What videos were you watching?

Even what helped lend itself to you feeling motivated and sticking with things through times that were tough. But think about the support. Think about your family, how they contributed, how maybe you’ve let some of those healthy habits even slide and how you can go back to that right. Think about the differences in your life and even your friendship groups that might be impacting things.

But think about what really made you successful in terms of the accountability and support and then think about what was the hardest change. So what was the hardest change that you made? That you succeeded and pushed through the pain of, or pushed through the discomfort of, and got more comfortable being uncomfortable in that way, like, how did you actually overcome those challenges that you saw in the past?

Because as much as we look back and say, well, I succeeded, then you know what’s wrong with me now. There was something that was hard that you managed to overcome beforehand, Even when we look back and say, oh, it wasn’t that bad. Right, there was something hard, there was something different than what you were doing, because in order to see a new and better result, we have to embrace change. So think about how did I overcome those challenges? What were they? How did I overcome them?

And then think would that still be a challenge now? Is that part of why I’ve struggled to see a lifestyle truly built? Is that that was a challenge that I could only overcome short term? So think, would that still be a challenge for you now? Because if it is, and maybe it’s something that you did overcome for a really long time and now you can see, okay, well, this is how my lifestyle shifted, this is how I can overcome this again. You can use that previous knowledge of your success to help you overcome the same challenge or obstacle now. And if you know it isn’t an obstacle now, even better.

Right, you can move forward on to the next thing. But at least we won’t repeat the same mistake, because we’ll be learning from the past and then think how can you use even the lessons that you’ve learned from past challenges, that you’ve overcome past hard changes, to overcome something new now? A lot of times I might be reflecting on okay, well, this is how I really overcame that, not just like, oh, I didn’t eat carbs and I lost weight, type thing, right, but okay, I had the emotional eating problem and you know, with doing this, I made myself more aware of my patterns that I repeated I tried to do distress or prior, so how can I now attribute that to?

Okay, I need to create new systems of my workouts. So maybe I need to write it down because that helped me, and maybe I need to make it conscious that I’m going to my workouts. So I’m going to put an alarm that alerts me, because that visual or that you know reminder right in front of my face really helped make an unconscious pattern conscious, where I’m defaulting to the couch instead of going to workout, right?

So, think about the strategies that you might have implemented with some of those past challenges and how you can even utilize those in different forms to overcome future challenges. Then, think about how you’d meet yourself where you’re at? Because the best changes always happen when we meet ourselves where we’re at currently.

So, how did you break things down to really address what you needed then? Because if you had just been self-controlling and willpowering your way through, those changes probably weren’t sustainable, and that might be something you need to reflect on if that’s why you’re now back in this situation you don’t want to be in.

But think about times you have really succeeded, even if it’s not a weight loss journey or a fitness journey. Think about other areas of your life where you’ve seen the success snowball that you really want in a new area of your life and apply those same principles. Think about how you broke things down to allow yourself to move forward from where you’re at currently. Again, assessing your lifestyle now, like what changes would actually meet you where you’re at. How did you go about making those changes? How did you keep positive mindsets when setbacks occurred? Like what research or learning did you do to help yourself embrace the changes and move forward and trust in the process?

But start to really assess your successes, learn from them. Don’t just blow past them, saying, “Woohoo, good job, I did a habit. Now it’s ingrained, I’m going to keep moving forward.” Think, why do those habits become so easy to repeat? Why are you now looking back at some of those struggles and thinking, “Oh, that wasn’t that bad?” Really assess your successes and then reflect on failures. Okay, I know it’s not fun sometimes to really reflect on why we haven’t seen the results we wanted, why we made that mistake, but the more we can say, “Okay, this is why this happened,” the more we can learn from it and actually leap forward faster. I like to say that failures are just learning. With frustration, they stink. I’m not going to tell you that I like failing, but I can tell you they have been some of the most valuable learning experiences. So I do embrace them as that. You can throw a little temper tantrum when they first happen, but then the second you can go back and reflect on them.

So, in reflecting on failures, think about: Why do you feel you failed? What was the situation that led to the failure? What was the mindset? What were the actions? You know what wasn’t realistic in your plan? Were you cutting out non-negotiables, things you really enjoyed? Were you not owning your priorities? Were you not allowing for changes with changes in the season? Were you trying to only rely on motivation and willpower and not meeting yourself where you’re at? Why do you feel like you failed?

And then think about were you too focused on some ideal? Because I think that happens, right? We see, you know, on social media, especially all these ideals, six days a week, two hours a day in the gym. Do this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this, these bazillion different things. Right, don’t eat this with this, only eat it with that. Right, there are so many details that we can dial in, which is an opportunity, okay, to make things really work for us. But the first thing we need to know is what do we need? Where are we at? Because if we’re trying to force a round peg into a square hole, it’s not going to work. It’s going to be really hard. Maybe we can make it fit for a little while, but it’s not really the right fit.

So, instead of focusing on an ideal, focus on where you’re at and how you can move forward and make better over focusing on just the perfect. And then how would you change the habits you implemented in the past, what habits simply weren’t sustainable or what may have been too much, because sustainable is an interesting word. It might not feel sustainable to start because it’s not what you’ve always done, but you can build up to it feeling sustainable through repetition and consistency. But in order to be consistent with something, we have to be able to do it daily. So if you said, hey, you know, I want to really track macros and I want to track a specific ratio, and every other time you’ve tried to do it, you’ve fallen off within a couple of weeks, well, how did you approach that? Were you trying to force the macros right away and get overwhelmed? Is there something like a minimum of just protein or an increase of protein that you could focus on first, or just tracking to implement that habit? How could you break down those changes to make them less overwhelming so that the pain of staying stuck outweighs the pain of change instead of the pain of change pushing back on you? Think about, you know, how can you even draw on some of your self-reflection in your goals, like I love, setting those strong systems, right, finding the significance, putting targets, creating repeatable actions, optimizing and owning those challenges, setting non-negotiables and then creating that action plan. How can you use your goals to really drive you forward? Or where was there a lack of potentially that, a self-assessment in the past that didn’t allow you to meet yourself where you’re at?

And then, how was your mindset different there from when you’ve succeeded? Often we relate back to only the habits we implemented. Oh, I did this diet plan. Oh, I did this workout right, I had this system that didn’t work Instead of saying, well, what was the mindset difference? Because a lot of times the system was there, even that we could have used, but our mindset wasn’t ready to embrace it. We weren’t ready to embrace the changes. So think about the mindsets you had when you embraced the system, wholeheartedly, embraced the process and trusted in it and gave yourself just over to it, versus constantly questioning, dooming yourself with doubt. But really break down the mindsets behind the differences. You see when you failed with something and implementing new habits and you’ve succeeded because the more you can do that, the more you can say okay, I feel myself approaching these changes, even with this mindset, or I see this mindset creeping in. What can I do differently to sort of shift how I’m implementing things, to work around it or address it right, to save ourselves future struggles?

And then how would you get yourself out of your own way if this is creeping in? Think about, okay, I had this mindset happen in the past when I was implementing these systems. What was it there? So, if I feel that coming back, what can I do? Because sometimes results are an ebb and flow. Sometimes we are going really fast forward and then we have to back off the gas just a little bit. Right, we’re not putting on the brakes, we’re just backing off the gas a little bit, and we almost even do that to keep moving forward faster than if we had to fully push on the brakes.

So think about the mindsets and how you can really help yourself get out of your own way, and even have that questioning in place. I love to have reflection each week, doing all these different things like what really worked for me this week, what were improvements I made, what were obstacles I struggled with. Okay now, in assessing the obstacles, what are opportunities within them, but even put it in place, you know where you have that alert to do this assessment each and every week to help yourself keep moving forward.

Because the simple fact is, the more you know about yourself, the stronger you’ll be because our self-awareness is really our own power to constantly evolve, because nothing is going to work forever, not one macro breakdown, not one workout, and we want to have fun, even experimenting. But the more we own who and what we are, the more we can always address what we need to move forward, because that’s ultimately what’s going to work. Often, we have a lot of great systems, we have a lot of great tactics, we have a lot of great knowledge even there, but it’s taking action on it, and part of how we can take action is better knowing ourselves.

So I want you to think, you know, what’s one thing you really learned about yourself this past year. I know it can be hard to reflect on failures and we can breeze past successes, but take time to really assess one of each. What’s something that didn’t work for you in the past year, in the past month, in the past week? How can you now use that to move you forward faster? And then think, what do I truly need to move me forward? Is it simply action? Because a lot of times it’s not knowing more. It’s action. How can we get ourselves to take action? That’s the key thing. And then what’s an easy change you can make today?

But the more we take time to really assess as awkward as it can be, as hard as it can be, the more we can take directed action to truly move forward. Thanks for listening to Fitness Hacks Podcast. Again, this is the place where I share all my free workout and nutrition tips. I’m never going to run sponsorships or ask you to buy anything. All I ask in return is, if you’re enjoying the podcast, to leave a rating review or share it with someone you think it might help. This will only take a few minutes and it would mean the world to me and possibly change the life of someone you know.