159: Fat to Fit Part 2 – Mindset

159: Fat to Fit Part 2 – Mindset

Ready for part 2 of our Fat to Fit series? If you missed part 1, which was all about fear and nutrition, you can listen to that episode here.

Today we’re diving into mindset. I believe very strongly that fat loss is achieved (or not) only when you conquer the battlefield of your mind.

Unfortunately, most of us spend the majority of our time & energy on trying to white-knuckle changes to our diets or fitness routine. We’d make progress faster if we spent the time understanding & tearing down the barriers between what we want to do & what we actually do in moments of temptation or emotion.

I also shared that between now and the end of April (2016), I’ll be sharing a daily question or mantra on Facebook & Instagram to help you implement these mindset strategies at critical points of decision.

You’ll absolutely want to listen to this episode if you struggle with:

  • Negativity
  • Excuses
  • Frustration
  • Disadvantages (barriers to change or success)
  • Inconsistency

Listen Now

Download Episode

Fat to Fit Part 2: Mindset

The 6 strategies we dive into on today’s episode include:

  1. Self-awareness
  2. Affirmations
  3. Open-mindedness
  4. Defensiveness
  5. Refusal to negotiate
  6. Micro focus

Let me make a strong point here about why the mindset stuff is so critical.

Let’s say that you and I are driving together. You’re in the driver’s seat and I am in the passenger’s seat.

We  are on the on-ramp to the highway, and you’re accelerating. All of a sudden, the engine starts to rev and I can tell you are slamming on that accelerator just as hard as you can. Lots of effort and attention. It’s like you’re trying to use brute strength to make the car go faster.

The car is working hard & so are you.

I glance at the center console and say, “Hey friend, the parking brake is on.

You ignore me.

The RPMs are through the roof. You have the pedal pressed to the metal and I say it again:

“Hey friend, why don’t you pull over for just a second and release the parking brake?”

You say, “No way! We don’t have time to stop”

I raise my eyebrow, confused by the fact that what is so obvious to me is overlooked by you and respond, “Well, we’ll go a whole lot faster and it will be a whole lot easier on you (and the car) if you just pause for a second and release the parking brake”

If you stop and take my advice, you’ll realize that when you get back on the road you don’t have to work NEAR as a hard to power the car. It just goes with gentle effort.

You’re exerting yourself less but the car is responding more than when you were flooring it.

Or maybe you don’t.

If you don’t stop, if you don’t release the brake, you’re going to work really hard for little result.

You’re trying super hard but you’re frustrated, you’re damaging your engine, you’re wasting fuel and you’re not getting anywhere all that quickly.

That, guys, is the exact equivalent to what we do when we avoid the mindset side of fat loss.

The exact thing.

It is harder that it should be, it’s exhausting us more than it needs to, and we’re not seeing the progress we want because we have our parking brake on.

We’re slowing ourselves down while working harder than is required.

But, just like removing the parking brake isn’t hard once we decide to pause to do it, we can remove our mental barriers if we’re willing to take just a second to do it.

Here’s the thing: once we do, everything gets easier.

Don’t miss the full episode to hear these 6 strategies explained in detail!

Resources

Breaking Barriers

Connect with me on Facebook and Instagram

069: Positive Thinking Versus Power Thinking

094: Fear of Missing Out

Subscribe in iTunes

Subscribe in Stitcher

Fat Loss Workouts

[av_textblock]
Hey friends! I’ve put together a series of fat loss workouts you can do at home with minimal equipment. If you are new to working out, these are not for you! Remember that proper form is king – don’t take on these movements without first truly knowing proper form.

If you are struggling to make consistently improved food choices, I want to encourage you to put your energy there first. Working out can come when you feel like you’ve got your food choices more in control.

Equipment

While you don’t need at home equipment, these couple of basics will set you up to be able to do hundreds of at home workouts!

Jump rope

Kettlebell

Abmat

Full Body EMOM

10 minute EMOM:

              • Jump rope
              • 40-second plank

EMOM stands for every minute on the minute.

Start the timer on your phone. For the first minute, you’ll jump rope. Keep jumping until 60 seconds have elapsed.

For minute two, hold a plank for 40 seconds. Rest 20 seconds.

At the top of the next minute, return to the jump rope.

Alternate  between these two movements every minute on the minute for a total of 10 minutes.

Body Weight Benchmark

Complete 1 round for time:

          • 100 body weight squats
          • 100 push ups
          • 1 mile jog

Resting only when you need to, you’ll do 100 body weight squats. Don’t move on to the push ups until you’ve completed 100 squats. Complete 100 push ups on your toes or your knees. After the push ups are complete, jog 1 mile as fast as you can.

Record your time. Re-test every 4 weeks to see your improvement over time.

Fast & Furious Fat Burner

Combine the following:

        • Burpee down chain from 10-1 (by 1)
        • Kettlebell up chain from 2-20 (by 2)

Confused? Don’t be! This is what you’ll do:

        • Start your timer
        • 10 burpees
        • 2 KB swings
        • 9 burpees
        • 4 KB swings
        • 8 burpees
        • 6 KB swings
        • 7 burpees
        • 8 KB swings
        • 6 burpees
        • 10 KB swings
        • 5 burpees
        • 12 KB swings
        • 4 burpees
        • 14 KB swings
        • 3 burpees
        • 16 KB swings
        • 2 burpees
        • 18 KB swings
        • 1 burpee
        • 20 KB swings

Fast Feet EMOM

21 minute EMOM

      • Minute 1 jump rope
      • Minute 2 burpee
      • Minute 3 rest

Complete 7 rounds of max jump rope for 60 seconds, max burpees for 60 seconds and 60 second rest.

Kettlebell Crusher

Complete 5 rounds for time:

    • 20 goblet squats
    • 20 kettlebell swings

[/av_textblock]

159: Fat to Fit Part 2 – Mindset

158: Fat to Fit Part 1 – Nutrition

I’m excited! We’re kicking off a new series today! It’s called Fat to Fit and I’ll be helping you move from wherever you currently are to further along the spectrum towards your goals. This Fat to Fit series is all about sustainable progress.

In part one we’re tackling nutrition and looking at the kinds of small, achievable changes you can make to improve your nutrition in a way that leads to more fat loss.

In parts 2 & 3 we’ll tackle improvements in mindset & fitness but, for today, we’re focusing on food.

You likely fall into one of these categories:

  1. You know what to do but you aren’t doing it
  2. You’re confused about food & fat loss and aren’t sure what changes to make or how
  3. You feel like you’re doing what you need to do but you aren’t seeing results.

Today’s episode will provide strategies and suggestions for all three.

Before we dive into today’s episode, I want to acknowledge that improving your food choices for fat loss can be really tough if you don’t know what to eat or you’re bored with food. I know I used to spend hours on Google looking for fat loss meal ideas only to find that they were either too expensive, used obscure ingredients I didn’t have or took WAY too long to make. I’m saving you time & energy! I have curated a list of 100 fat loss meal ideas and dozens of recipes and I’ll share them with you for free! Just click the green banner below and they’re yours!

Listen Now

Download Episode

Fat to Fit Part 1: Nutrition

Let me first address fear. It’s a very real challenge holding many people back. I can’t tell you how many emails I get from people who don’t make initial nutrition changes because they are afraid of failure, afraid of the unknown, or afraid of potential future outcomes that may or may not come into fruition.

In today’s episode I share an email I got from a client where she expressed that she is ‘scared to death’ of what might happen if she stops numbing her emotions with food.

I addressed people who fear that they’ll have loose skin.

I shared my thoughts that I feel that is akin to a new business owner stressing over how they’ll find an affordable warehouse space before they’ve even created a product or sold their first unit.

You are clipping your wings! You are quenching your power for progress by limiting yourself with your thoughts.

DON’T CLIP YOUR WINGS.

This is fatal.

You aren’t there yet. You’re here. It’s now. Stop clipping your wings with the fatal blow from your imagination.

When you focus on the negative, you prevent progress. You confine yourself to the prison of your mind.

If you’re struggling with fear I want you to start questioning those fears:

  • Does this have anything to do with what I am able to do right now in this moment?
  • Is this distracting me from what I can and should do right now in this moment?
  • What am I choosing not to acknowledge or recognize when I focus on this fear? What are all the potential scenarios?
  • What can I do right now?

So what about the nutrition stuff? Once we have set our imagined fears aside, what about the food stuff?

Dive into the full episode to hear me explain how you can adjust your food choices to accelerate your fat loss. I explain what your body needs in order to allow fat burning and outline specific adjustments you can make to your food choices starting today.

The very first thing I want you to do is keep a 14-day food journal.

From there, I want you to identify ONE improvement to practice.

If you aren’t sure what improvement you can make, you need to listen to the episode in full so you can hear me teach & explain what dietary improvements will be the most effective based on where you’re currently at.

And don’t forget! Grab your free 100 fat loss meal ideas!

Resources

094: Fear of Missing Out

How to Track (without counting calories)

Subscribe in iTunes

Subscribe in Stitcher

How To Reduce Stress In 2 Minutes or Less

Raise your hand if you’ve ever turned to food in response to stress? (Both hands in the air over here!) I want to show you how to reduce stress in less than 2 minutes.

Learning to manage stress is a critical skill when your goal is fat loss or improved health for both physiological & emotional reasons.

Most obviously, we’re far more prone to justifying less-than-stellar food choices when we’re stressed. Think about it: making a food choice when you’re in an awesome mood & feeling calm and capable produces a much different result than making a food choice when you’re overwhelmed and stressed.

The more we can naturally reduce our stress, the better our food choices will be.

The second part is based on physiology: mental & emotional stress trigger a surge of stress hormones, especially cortisol. Chronically elevated cortisol impairs fat burning. The more we can naturally manage stress, the more we improve our fat burning potential. 

Now, I know you can’t sell your kids (or can you?), quit your job and move to an island. Certain stressors can’t be removed but we can absolutely improve our response to them and, in doing so, lower cortisol.

Here’s the best part: not all stress reduction techniques require lots of time, money or mental muscle. In fact, there’s a super simple technique that works incredibly fast. It’s called Box Breathing & I’ve shared it with my Fat Loss Fast Track clients and they found it super effective.

I first heard about Box Breathing when I read The Way of the Seal by former Navy Seal Mark Divine.

It’s really simple and you can do it for 2 minutes or 20 minutes. The longer you do it, the greater the benefit. I started one of my Fat Loss Fast Track webinars with box breathing for just 60 seconds and people were commenting, “Oh my goodness I feel so much better!”

First let me tell you what it is & then I’ll share why it’s so effective.

Box Breathing

  1. Sit in a comfortable, upright position without slouching.
  2. Take a deep breath in through your nose, counting to 4 as you inhale (the “through your nose” part is really important!)
  3. After you’ve inhaled, hold the breath in for a 4 count.
  4. Exhale, slow & controlled, for a 4 count
  5. Hold it for a 4 count before inhaling again through your nose

Many times when we’re stressed and feeling overwhelmed, our breathing becomes rushed & shallow. When we slow down long enough to focus on deep, controlled breaths, we naturally bring our attention to our breathing and that decreases the attention directed towards the things that have us feeling stressed out.

As I tell my clients all the time, stress & anxiety are caused by a case of “too much future & not enough present”. Our attention is directed towards something (or somethings) beyond what is happening right now.

When we can quiet our minds and bring our attention to right now (and to the breath), we feel much more calm and in control. Being calm & in control leads to far better food choices than when we are stressed and out of control.

Plus, controlled breathing exercises have been shown to decrease cortisol (one of our primary stress hormones).

Some of you might be wondering why it  matters that you breathe in through your nose as opposed to your mouth. When you breathe in through your nose, you take in more oxygen than when you breathe in through your mouth.

Plus, your body manufactures more nitric oxide, a vasodilator, when you breathe in through your nose. This improves blood flow which supports energy, metabolism and fuel delivery throughout the body.

Breathing through your nose lowers your heart rate more than breathing through your mouth, which is a great way to help lower your stress levels & calm yourself down.

Breathing through your nose pushes more oxygen into the lower lobes of your lungs (mouth breathing fills primarily the upper lobes). Within the lower lobes are receptors for your parasympathetic nervous system. When we stimulate these receptors, via breathing through the nose, the body produces more of these calming & relaxing chemicals.

How To Reduce Stress

To start out, I want you to put your phone in airplane mode to prevent distractions, set the timer for 2 minutes & practice box breathing through your nose for two minutes.

Over time, I’d love for you to work up to 6-10 minutes or more. Keep in mind that in moments of feeling overwhelmed, you can do box breathing for whatever time you have, even if it’s 30 seconds. You can practice box breathing while you drive, while you sit in a stressful meeting or when trying to fall asleep at night.

It’s really simple. You’re going to sit in a comfortable position and breathe in deeply through your nose for a count of 4. You’ll hold that breath (before exhaling) to a count of 4. You’ll slowly exhale to a four count and then you’ll hold your breath for a 4 count before beginning again.

Give it a try for a minimum of 2 minutes & let me know what you think!

159: Fat to Fit Part 2 – Mindset

157: My Own Personal Weight Loss Success Strategies

Today I am going to share with you some of my own personal weight loss success strategies.

Lately, I’ve been hearing a lot of comments and getting emails about how people wish they were as motivated as I am or had as much willpower as I do. It is not about motivation or willpower. 

There is nothing I have that you don’t have, except practice. I have practiced more and I have simplified more.

I’m going to take you inside my personal thought processes and into my daily life to show you these simple things I practice in order to create my own weight loss success strategies (without super human anything).

Listen Now

Download Episode

My Personal Weight Loss Success Strategies

Let me first share a few high level personal philosophies that set me up for success and then I’ll get tactical. Here are my non-negotiable philosophies:

  • I refuse to lie to myself
  • I ask myself a lot of questions
  • I won’t make things more complicated than they need to be – I eat whole foods that I enjoy eating & I pay close attention to my body & the signals it sends me
  • I spend more time DOING than PLANNING

So what does that look like on a day-to-day basis? How to I keep myself on track during the day through the normal ups and downs of life?

  • I don’t keep convenience foods around. If I want to eat, I have to prepare something. This forces “the pause” and eliminates mindless eating. Nothing is mindless when you have to stop what you’re doing & cook instead of grabbing an easy handful.
  • I create energy through movement (instead of always eating in response to low energy)
  • I do one good thing first. I make sure I approach decisions from a positive, not negative, frame of mind
  • I wear tight things. Around the house. All the time. This helps me keep a close eye on what is happening with my body.

Resources

094: Fear of Missing Out

How to Track (without counting calories)

Subscribe in iTunes

Subscribe in Stitcher

Download a free chapter from Chasing Cupcakes.

Enter your first name and email below and I'll send over chapter nine from my best-selling book. 

Thanks! Check your inbox.