Want to get leaner, stronger and feel your most fabulous with a lifestyle you love?
Uhm HECK YES!
Sounds too good to be true though…Right?
Well the good news is…it’s 100% possible.
But it does take embracing the learning process and focusing on 5 key nutritional shifts.
Note I said SHIFTS…
Because so often to see results as fast as possible we sabotage ourselves by simply going ON a diet.
We force ourselves into a mold.
Instead of ADJUSTING our diet.
We need to truly SHIFT our nutrition to see lasting changes.
And this, while amazing when we embrace it, is a hard mindset and routine change at the start.
It oddly becomes sustainable but doesn’t feel sustainable to start.
It feels honestly…well…HARDER To do because it isn’t just a jump in and act type plan.
It’s a learn, take action, reflection and adjust type plan.
And that’s not sexy or the fad diet fast fix we want.
I say this to warn you because there is struggle to create true change. But this change will actually have all of your hard work paying off.
While it may even feel like you’re slowing down, it’s a slow down to speed up.
So do the hard thing now so it gets easier later. Because if you avoid the hard now, it will only come back to bite you later!
Now to the good stuff…
SHIFT #1: Dial In Those Macros.
You know why macros are magical? Because they allow you to not make any foods off limits and they allow you to adjust your portions as your needs and goals change.
They help you understand how you’re fueling and how your diet is impacting how you feel and look to then have the power to adjust as you need.
Notice I didn’t say a specific macro ratio with dialing in your macros or demonize any specific macronutrient.
I will tell you that protein is ALWAYS important, especially as we get older to maintain our muscle and strength and look our leanest and strongest…but our ratios will shift.
Even as we work toward one specific goal, we will need to cycle for balance.
And as you shift your goals or even get older or your lifestyle evolves, you have to be open to shifting your portions.
One size doesn’t fit all.
But the key is we understand how much protein, carbs and fats we are consuming to have the power to adjust and address our lifestyle and life stage.
So as much as you may be avoiding tracking your macros, realize you’re avoiding the hard that will fully empower you for a lasting solution to opt for something easier that will keep you stuck in the yo-yo dieting cycle, struggling to know what truly works or what changes are needed next.
Now if you’re thinking, “But I can’t track” or “Tracking is restrictive or overwhelming or too much for my lifestyle”…
I’d urge you to consider…
What is “tracking to you?”
Because maybe it’s just that your tracking method isn’t the right method for you!
SHIFT #2: Choose A Tracking Method That Suits YOUR Lifestyle.
Just like there isn’t one macro ratio right for everyone or even right for us forever, there isn’t just one form of tracking we can use.
Visual portion guides, minimalist macros, full macro ratios…I’ve not only used all of them personally based on the season I’m in, but I’ve used them with clients at different stages as well.
So often we hold ourselves back by viewing habits as having to be done in one form.
But the key is actually adjusting habits to fit what we need understanding their benefit.
And the benefit of tracking is what gets measured gets managed. When we know our accurate portions, we can truly adjust them and then see the benefits of the changes to keep tweaking.
Tracking though can be logging in an app.
It can be taking pictures of our food.
It can be just tracking protein and calories or tracking protein, carbs and fats to hit specific numbers.
We can use our hand as a visual guide to understand that we had a single palm sized portion of protein or weigh food on a scale.
And we shouldn’t limit ourselves thinking we need to track in one form forever.
You may find that in January full macro ratios work well but when you’re traveling more during the summer you need visual portions or even to just track protein and calories.
Be open to adjusting the habit of tracking to give yourself a picture of what you’re doing and hold yourself accountable but with flexibility to match your lifestyle and motivation at the time.
Which actually brings me to SHIFT #3: Cycle Your Nutrition Over Time.
Nothing works forever.
Your body isn’t the same as it was a year ago.
Neither are your mindsets or your lifestyle or even your goals.
As things evolve, we need to be open to evolving our diet to meet ourselves where we are at right now.
This means addressing hormonal shifts, the changes we see with getting older and even changes in our training or goals.
But it also means being open to adjust with the seasons as our motivation may change as well as our priorities.
I think this last component is especially important to note…our motivation and priorities.
We often think about adjusting our diet and workouts for our goals but we never consider what is realistic for our current motivation and priorities.
Sometimes we do need to put our focus elsewhere. Sometimes our fitness goals aren’t as big a priorities as they may have been at another time.
Embracing this is key. It’s how we actually keep moving forward and ultimately make more progress.
Too often we try to force January habits on our summer or holiday seasons. And that’s why we feel like dietary changes aren’t sustainable.
We feel like we don’t have the willpower or self control needed.
When really we just haven’t owned that our diet needs to cycle.
Change up how you’re tracking. Change up the macros you’re using.
Even change up the types of foods you include.
Stop forcing some arbitrary perfect clean eating standard on yourself. That is ultimately what sabotages us more than anything.
Often I’ll embrace seasons where I’m going to work in more fun foods. But that ultimately helps me include more quality fuel over the entire year and want to make more sacrifices at other times.
Too often we don’t realize that by trying to be 100% on point for a 21 day challenge, we cause ourselves to end up at 0% for more time than we were actually “good.”
This leads to us feeling like we work really hard when really our consistency long term isn’t there in the slightest. We end up eating worse overall.
Instead if we owned what we needed, we would have been 80% consistently to be better off long-term and use those times we worked in foods we love to make us want to eat healthier at other points!
We also want to recognize that by cycling, we can match what our body needs now. Getting older doesn’t doom us to gain weight. The menopot or that weight gain around our middle during menopause isn’t just something that HAS to happen.
That’s why SHIFT #4 is Match Your Life Stage.
Too often we blame hormonal changes or even health concerns for our weight gain.
And guess what? They do have an impact.
But our diet also has an impact on the symptoms we experience.
And sometimes we’ve even caused hormonal imbalances by how we’re fueling.
So instead of just writing off your goals, control what you can control.
Adjust your diet to match your life stage.
This means shifting your macros to account for what your body needs now but also taking a look at the types of foods you’re including and your micros.
We can develop intolerances to foods as we get older or even have nutritional gaps despite eating “healthy” overall.
Sometimes we simply need more of something because of hormonal shifts, lifestyle changes or our genetics.
Sometimes we can develop intolerances to foods, like dairy during menopause, when we never had problems before.
Even healthy foods sometimes aren’t right for us if we have certain health concerns – like even broccoli may be eliminated if you’re struggling with thyroid health.
This is why SHIFT #1 and #2 are so key.
When we track macros and track in general, we can note how we feel with foods and notice the impact to make small changes that add up to help us feel our most fabulous at every age!
And finally…SHIFT #5: Prioritize Sustainability Over Restriction.
We get good at what we consistently do.
Restriction may make us see results quickly, which is why we are drawn to it as miserable as it can be.
Not to mention, we slightly equate something being “miserable” or “hard” as meaning we’re doing more so it will be better.
We equate effort and hard with more control.
But that isn’t the case. It often is what leads to us not actually making true changes to our habits and routines.
We basically just light the fuse of a bomb that will explode at some point.
This approach pushes us so far outside our comfort zone we end up getting yanked back.
Instead we need to see pushing into discomfort as slowly expanding our comfort zone.
Embrace your lifestyle and even own your mindsets and views of different habits to address them.
Recognize your priorities to work around them.
Because if we don’t own our priorities they become our excuses.
The more we build off our current lifestyle instead of trying to reinvent our lifestyle, the more we make changes that stick to see lasting results!
Slow shifts add up! Stop repeating the cycle just forcing another plan!
Dial in your diet to match your workouts and build your leanest, strongest body ever, implementing these 5 nutritional shifts, with my Metabolic Shred…
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