One of my amazing Unicorns Ellen commented this in the group last week…”Maybe things are not going a 100% as I want them to go, maybe I am not doing as much as I would like to do….but I have a lot of lemons at the moment and not enough glasses to make lemonade in so I just make lemonade out of the lemons where I have the glasses for.”

So often we have a ton of things going on and simply not enough time to do as much as we’d like for each of those things.

But we also have to remember that all we can do is give 100% of what we’ve got at that time.

We are CONSTANTLY in the act of balance.

And often our desire to do more isn’t really that we aren’t doing enough…it’s just that we want results faster.

The thing is, and I know I say this a lot, we simply can’t out work TIME.

And while you may want to make more lemonade, you may want to do more, there is really only a finite amount of time in a day…a finite number of glasses we have to hold the lemonade.

So at some point, you just have to really take a look at what you’ve done and say, “I’ve done as much as I can.”

And then simply let TIME and CONSISTENCY work their magic.

Amazingly enough too, sometimes doing less, but doing things in a way we can keep repeating the habits day in and day out, pays off more.

Because often we burn ourselves out simply trying to do more when we really don’t have the time or energy to maintain that pace.

Embrace the balancing act.

Embrace small changes and doing what you can.

And then trust the process and remember that results snowball.

Progressions are earned…

Often we feel like because we “can” do something? We should do it or we deserve to do it.

But the question is…are you really doing it WELL?

Are you actually optimizing the movement or doing it just for the sake of doing the “harder” variation?

Are you putting a “bandaid” on the true problem? Applying a quick fix just to get through the workout?

I don’t like doing something to progress a movement we haven’t EARNED.

Like putting your hands behind your lower back during ab movements, specifically leg lower movements

Sure it allows you to do that harder movement right then, but it’s also probably why you consistently tend to feel your lower back in other moves you shouldn’t.

You’re allowing yourself to “cheat” to pass the test…but you’re not actually learning the information you need to pass the next test…or the next one…or succeed long term because you’ve actually BUILT your knowledge on the subject.

You just sought out a quick fix.

And I’m sorry, but at some point that catches up with you…which in this case, means INJURY.

Instead you need to REGRESS TO PROGRESS.

Build that strong foundation.

Establish that mind-body connection.

EARN those harder moves so you can avoid those aches and pains and move better overall!

Sometimes we have to take that step back to move forward, as sucky as it is.

And often, when we do step back, we get better results faster because we’re optimizing our movements.

This optimization often helps us get better results from the hard work we are already putting in!

Here are a few questions to ask yourself BEFORE you even progress a move to make you more intentional with your training….

1. Where do I feel working?
2. Am I doing a harder variation of a move just to do one?
3. Am I just trying to “get through” my workouts?
4. What is the goal of what I’m trying to do?

You get started because of motivation.

But you ultimately succeed because you’ve created habits.

When we fail at staying consistent with something, we often blame our willpower. We say we just don’t have as much self control as someone else.

But honestly that’s not really the case.

The truth of it is, we didn’t create new habits we enjoyed enough to stay consistent with them. New habits that actually took away the need to use will power to stay consistent.

Motivation is fleeting. Self control isn’t infinite.

What makes changes last and results truly build is that we’ve created new habits that, to some extent, don’t really take effort.

So when we are first motivated and all gung-ho and go to extremes? We may be setting ourselves up to fail.Because we are relying purely on motivation to carry us through.

Motivation that will burn out…especially often the more intense and restrictive we are to start.

Instead we’ve got to use that initial motivation to help us create new habits we enjoy even if it means not doing as much as fast.

As cliche as it is…it really is true you’ve got to find a way to enjoy the journey.

And that means creating new habits that do fit your lifestyle to some extent. Habits that you enjoy enough to keep repeating until they require no self control to do.

Now…You won’t enjoy every habit to start that you have to implement – change does require change and for us to be uncomfortable. 

BUT the more you can create new habits with things you DO enjoy, finding maybe new activities to do, new healthy restaurants to eat at, the more you’ll accept some of the things that aren’t as easy to implement to start.

All about that balance!

Here are 3 tips to help you create those new habits to carry you through!

#1: Tweak your current lifestyle.

We need to create new routines and habits if we want to make the changes sustainable. 

The easiest way to do that is to start with small tweaks to what we are currently doing. Small adjustments to things we love.

I know I like to eat out once a week, so Ryan and I found a healthy way to do so.

Know you really like to enjoy meals with your family so having to prep your own thing won’t work long term? Start by working backward from your family meals to tweak other meals. This way you’re keeping yourself in a routine you enjoy that you’ll ultimately want to do!

Love wine? Find a way to include it in your macros on certain days.

The key is realizing there has to be a balance. 

And that part of what makes creating new habits easier is piggybacking off of habits we already enjoy while changing ones that aren’t as ingrained!

#2: Challenge yourself to explore!

The more you do, the more you do.

The more you accept getting a bit uncomfortable in other areas of your life, the more you become open to changes.

And when making changes to your diet or workouts, why not explore other areas of your life that could introduce something new and fun and better promote the lifestyle you want to live?

Plus often we find activities and such that only make us want to stick with the new habits more.

Instead of just going out to dinner on a date night, why not try a new fun activity?

Instead of a Sunday morning just going to brunch and drinking, why not try adding in a hike with friends?

Explore other fun activities. You may be surprised by how much fun you can have finding a new activity you enjoy that only promotes the other lifestyle changes you want to make.

Not to mention, the more you get comfortable with change?

The more diet and exercise changes won’t feel so overwhelming.

Plus the more you create an overall new lifestyle, the more all of the habits fall into place together!

#3: Realize you won’t always want to do the things you should.

Even habits we’ve done for decades, we don’t always want to do.

And recognizing this is key.

We are human. 

But recognizing when we have lost motivation even in habits that once felt easy, is key. It may be time to try something new and slightly different.

It may be time to do some sort of reset.

Like maybe you do just need a day to skip your workout and not track.

BUT doing so consciously is key so you can get back to it.

Or maybe you realize you just need something new to jazz things up.

Creating a lifestyle doesn’t mean doing the exact same routines the exact same ways forever.

We can create routines and habits, but always constantly be running little experiments to keep things fun.

That’s the beauty of life. There are always new things to learn and ways to explore.

Routines and habits shouldn’t be inflexible.

One of my amazing Unicorns asked, “I was wondering if there were general “success” habits that you’ve noticed yourself and/or all clients who’ve met / exceeded their goals practice consistently on the daily?”

One of the things I told her that I think is actually at the heart of whether or not we succeed is…

We have to remember that we will NEVER be perfect with anything.

It’s about learning to recognize the detour more quickly to get back on track!

She summarized this thought so nicely as…

Shift as soon as I notice drift.

Exactly!

Detours are going to happen. There will be things that get us off track, whether it’s life events popping up or simply stress.

But success isn’t dependent on us never having these deviations.

It’s dependent on how quickly we can recognize we are off course and get back on track.

How quickly can we “right the ship” so to speak.

Because the quicker we can just sort of note the slip up or mistake, not JUDGE ourselves and then just simply do what we can to move forward?

Often the less those detours really even register or matter.

But the more we sort of make ourselves feel guilty for them, the more we end up actually continuing along the detoured path, getting further and further away from what we need to be doing.

We actually allow ourselves to continue steering in the wrong direction.

So how can you shift as soon as you notice drift?

Here are 3 Tips to help you out:

#1: Don’t judge.

Often it isn’t the mistake that is the issue. It’s our own internal hater judging us that leads us down a dark path.

That one cookie becomes 10. And then it becomes “Screw it I’ve messed up today so may as well just eat bad the rest of the night.” Which then even sometimes becomes, “Well it’s Thursday so may as well just wait to start over Monday because I’ve messed it up!”

This can lead to us basically driving ourselves miles out of our way instead of just turning the car around at that first place to make a U turn.

So what if you had one thing and your macros won’t be perfect?

Better to do what you can and get CLOSE over completely writing the day off!

Mistakes are going to happen. You’re human. Get used to it.

When they do, just do what you can to correct them over making yourself feel guilty or stupid!

#2: Assess.

Often we just ignore or avoid what happened over facing the mistake head on while assessing why it occurred.

The more we can understand the WHY behind the things that happen, the more we can address the true causes and even learn how to handle situations before they happen.

Like if you know you tend to reach for something at the end of the day when you’re stressed and tired.

Maybe you plan in a treat so you don’t feel deprived, even working backward from that.

Or maybe you just realize you can’t even have any of those snacks in the house, at least to start.

Or maybe you just know you need to make a macro friendly sweet treat to keep you on track.

There are so many ways to help yourself overcome potential pitfalls, but the first key is assessing and learning why they happen in the first place.

We will never be perfect, but the more we can improve our understanding of ourselves? The more we can create systems and routines that really work for us!

#3: Pick one small thing to move forward – even just mentally.

If we can’t do something perfectly, we act like it isn’t worth doing.

But if you have a detour?

Just do what you can to get back to it.

Even if you can’t hit your macros and your calories are way off, do something MENTALLY to get back on track.Even if you skipped the workout and are about to go to bed?

Roll out for 5 minutes just so you know you still did something that could even help you tomorrow.

It doesn’t have to be big.

But we want to do something as soon as possible to get the momentum going back in the right direction!

Just remember the key isn’t never slipping up, never making a detour. Those things are going to happen.

The key to success is just recognizing it more quickly and doing what you can to move forward ASAP!

When we start a new program we of course have “expectations” about what we’ll get out of it.

But what if the reason we’ve never fully seen the results we want is because of our “expectations” of what the outcome will be?

What if we are expecting too much? What if our binary definition of success is holding us back?

What if the benefit of each thing we do isn’t as simple as “did we or did we not get (insert outcome here)”?

Now I’m not saying not to expect yourself to work or not have high expectations when it comes to what you want out of things.

But I think too often we set our expectations only on reaching a specific goal and not on the LEARNING PROCESS involved in achieving that outcome.

It’s also why we can get really down and feel like nothing has ever worked for us. We are only seeing victory as did we or didn’t we reach our goal.

If we instead saw each thing we’ve done as a chance to LEARN so we can build upon that next time?

Well we’d end up getting a lot further faster. 

And we’d probably feel like we’re “starting over” a lot less. When we start something new, we need to set our expectations to be what can be LEARNED from this experience? How can we grow?

If our expectations are simply to learn? We’re going to get far more out of every experience.

We need to think of our journey as building a bridge.

Too often in our mind we simple see success as going from point A to point B.

But each thing we do can teach us something about how to truly build that bridge to get us across

Each experience can add a piece to make our bridge more sturdy.

Each experience can show us how to move closer to our goal, even if it is the pitfalls to avoid.

And in doing the habits and implementing the systems to move forward? Often we will reach our goal and before we know it.

Sometimes taking our focus OFF the outcome and putting it onto the building process, the daily habits, ultimately helps us reach our goal faster.

Because we’re putting in the work and doing what we should.

Instead of just focusing on how far we have still to go.

When building the bridge, you don’t want to keep looking up and thinking “Are we there yet?”

You want to think about what next piece you have to lay out to get across!

There are a few terms I hear popping up a lot when we talk about nutrition…that I feel like we don’t fully understand or that we either glorify or demonize unnecessarily.

And I wanted to discuss these terms and what they should REALLY mean to us if we want to get results.

Term #1: Diet

People will hate on you for calling something a diet.

The term “diet” has come to mean something where you starve yourself to lose weight and deprive yourself of all of the foods you love.

Dieting means deprivation.

We often almost treat dieting as punishing our bodies.

But the term DIET actually just means…

“the kinds of food that a person, animal, or community habitually eats.”

Yes with the rise of the “dieting industry” and fad diets, it has taken on these other meanings.

But I mention this because I feel like we need to stop the association between diet and restriction.

We need to recognize we can enjoy foods and achieve results.

We also need to admit to ourselves that we DON’T just treat food as fuel and that eating can also be social and fun and enjoyable.

So instead of seeing a “diet” as something negative, see it as a chance to dial in the foods you habitually eat toward a specific goal – whether that goal is weight loss, fueling better, performing better, gaining muscle or whatever!

Term #2: Sustainable

Sustainable doesn’t mean easy, especially to start.

It doesn’t mean doing whatever you want to do whenever you want to do it.

Often anything new does NOT feel sustainable.

But once we give the new habits a try?

We realize that we CAN create a new routine around them.

But change is hard. And often takes us outside our comfort zone.

What is familiar and easy? That feels sustainable.

But often what has been sustainable has NOT led to the results we want, which is why we are now looking for a change.

So as you search for something sustainable, realize it may be uncomfortable to start.

Recognize it also has more to do with the lifestyle you ultimately want to lead and knowing yourself.

And also realize that if a goal is important to you?

What you will sustain long term may not be anywhere near what you’re doing now.

Sustainable does NOT mean it will be comfortable to start.

And it does not mean there won’t be sacrifices.

It just means you’re considering what you truly want out of life and what, given the chance to create the new habits, will actually be something you can do long term.

And I don’t even mean directly those habits but the underlying systems.

There will always be ups and downs. Creating a new routine that is sustainable means we know what we can always return to!

Term #3: Lifestyle

I find myself now almost shuddering when someone says it has to be a “lifestyle.”
 
This new emphasis on creating a lifestyle, almost makes us believe that we are going to do one thing for the rest of our lives.

But nothing stays the same.

So why would our diet?

Everything has ebbs and flows and variations.

So should our diet.

Your goals change. Needs change. Routines change.

So your diet will change as well.

The key is learning what YOU need to do to fuel.

It’s honestly why I harp on macros so much.

Because when you understand macros? You can create the lifestyle you need AT THAT TIME.

But we have to remember we never do one thing forever. Everything in our life is constantly evolving and so will our diet!

SUMMARY:

With our nutrition, it can be hard to make changes. For some reasons, any time we seek to make a change, we see any sort of tracking or logging as restrictive.

But no matter our goals – from performance to aesthetics to health – understanding our diet better is key. And having data to make tweaks? Only makes it easier.

We are the ones judging ourselves, not the tracking.

And we have to remember, everything in our lifestyle is constantly evolving. What is easy at one point, may not feel sustainable at another. That’s why it is key we take time to really LEARN about our personal needs. So we can constantly be evolving our nutrition to match our ever changing needs and goals!