Life can be very hard. Many of deal with far too many negative emotions. We get frustrated, we feel lonely, overwhelmed, angry, sad. We focus on fear of the future and shame around the past.
Instead of helping you improve your responses to negative emotions, today’s episode will help you overcome negative emotion. Yup, put it behind you. Let it go.
Because honestly, the ROI (return on investment) of letting go of this negativity is far greater than the ROI of practicing a better reaction to it.
If you found this episode helpful, I think you’ll really enjoy my self-guided e-course, Breaking Barriers, which is all about overcoming emotional eating, negativity & self-limiting beliefs.
If you find the Primal Potential podcast help, it would mean the world to me if you’d take a minute to leave a rating & review! That helps show platforms display my podcast to new listeners! Thank you so much for your support! I can’t tell you how valuable it is!
Let’s get back to the basics of metabolism to help you figure out why you aren’t losing weight and what you can do about it!
I recently shared with you guys that episode 240 was one of my favorites – we were talking about how your body allows or disallows fat burning and what you can do to control this cellular & hormonal signaling.
Understanding these concepts is really the key to figuring out why you aren’t losing weight or why you’re always hungry or why you can’t get your cravings under control. After that episode, some of you shared that it went a little over your head.
Since this is your show, that’s not okay with me! I want every episode to be FOR YOU so we’re breaking it down today to ensure that everyone understands these important basics of why you gain weight, why you aren’t losing weight and what you can do about it.
If you want the detailed science & technical explanations, I’ve linked to a bunch of those episodes below in the Resources section. Or, you can check out my comprehensive course on Carbohydrate Strategies for Sustainable Fat Loss.
But for today’s episode, I want to simplify, perhaps even over-simplify, the process that takes place when we eat and how it addresses why you aren’t losing weight.
Just because you don’t get immediate feedback when you eat, that doesn’t mean the food you eat has no impact.
Just because your jeans aren’t tighter immediately after eating cookies or looser immediately after eating a salad doesn’t mean the choice had no impact on your rate of fat storage or fat burning.
In fact, I would argue that both choices impact fat burning & fat storage, you just don’t immediately see or feel the impact.
Every time you eat, a conversation begins inside your body.
The fuel you consume each time you eat triggers hormones & enzymes to spring into action and consider what should be done with the fuel, if it should be burned, if it should be stored and where it should be stored.
The answers depend on what you ate, how much you ate, if you needed to eat and what you’ve eaten in the recent past.
In order to respond to & process the fuel you’ve consumed, your body begins by breaking it down into it’s simplest parts. Without first breaking it down, it would be too large to travel through the body.
Only in it’s smallest parts can it get into and out of cells to be stored or used as fuel.
In the case of carbohydrates (whether they are from bread, pasta, oats, cookies, crackers, potatoes or fruit), the simplest parts are small, singular sugars.
The conversation in the body changes when the simple sugars hit the blood stream.
Your body must respond immediately because sugar hanging out in the blood stream for too long can be toxic.
Your body sends out signals “blood sugar has risen beyond a stable level! All available personnel come help clear it out”
Metabolizing sugar takes priority because it is toxic.
The primary responder to this blood sugar situation is the hormone insulin.
You see, sugar isn’t allowed to roam freely through the body. It requires a chaperone.
The chaperone charged with ushering sugar out of the blood to be burned or stored is insulin.
Insulin is a storage hormone. Insulin begins a conversation with the body which goes like this:
“Please stop all fuel breakdown activities, including fat burning. We have a fuel excess situation and while I’m dealing with the excess, do not break down any more fuel. We are now in storage mode.”
This signaling from insulin stops fat burning and initiates storage mode.
But that’s not the only signal from insulin.
As I explained in more technical terms in episode 240, when insulin is chronically elevated and running the show due to overeating or consuming too many sugars & starches, it siphons off too much fuel and shuttles it to the fat tissue.
Insulin is preferential to fat storage versus muscle storage
Insulin diverts fuel to the fat tissue and decreases delivery to the muscle tissue
Insulin slows fat burning
Insulin triggers the creation of new fat cells so there are ample storage sites available
In today’s episode I talk about simple changes we can make to help control insulin and spend more time in fat burning mode and less time in fat storing mode. Make sure to listen to the full episode!
If you find the Primal Potential podcast help, it would mean the world to me if you’d take a minute to leave a rating & review! That helps show platforms display my podcast to new listeners! Thank you so much for your support! I can’t tell you how valuable it is!
If you find the Primal Potential podcast help, it would mean the world to me if you’d take a minute to leave a rating & review! That helps show platforms display my podcast to new listeners! Thank you so much for your support! I can’t tell you how valuable it is!
I got a fantastic email the other day from one of my Fall Fat Loss Fast Track members. After setting a goal and having a couple good days, she struggled. She didn’t do the work. She had a “bad day”.
On this bad day, she emailed me.
I know one of my biggest issues is eating (and eating too much) when I’m not hungry. I’ve been working on tackling this for years without much success.
I’ve decided my 30-day goal should be around this issue. I want to eat when I’m hungry and stop when I’m satisfied.
Yesterday was great. Today, not so much. I ate well beyond satiety at dinner.
Did I choose the wrong goal? As you say, was my motivation exceeding my skill set? Am I trying to hit this goal every single day or is 80% consistency good enough?
Am I overthinking it because I’ve already stumbled?
I TOTALLY relate to this line of thinking. You get motivated, set a goal, crush the day and then pretty soon…not so much.
How you respond at this point is EVERYTHING. You can tell yourself it’s too much, it’s too hard and you can’t do it. Or, you can change your perspective.
The choices you make on & following your bad days will determine your success & your ability to reach your goals.
Let’s say you decided you wanted to be a great basketball player and you were going to start by improving your free throws. Every day you’re going to practice.
The first day goes your way. You’re sinking all your shots and it feels amazing. You’re encouraged. You feel hopeful.
The next day, you’re off. You’re missing more shots than you’re making. You get frustrated.
Welcome to PRACTICE, the path to improvement. This is what it looks like, folks. This is when it matters most that you keep going.
Here’s the thing: when you have that off day on the court, you learn from it. Is my head in the game? Am I distracted? Is my form off? Are my muscles tired? Am I using different equipment I need to adjust to?
Struggle is where we learn. It’s where our practice improves, it’s how we get better.
The mere decision to create a goal isn’t enough. You can’t expect flawless execution just because you’ve decided on it.
Progress requires practice.
Practice in and of itself is imperfect.
You grow when you evaluate your imperfect practice and learn from it:
What am I doing right?
What am I doing that could be improved?
What’s different from yesterday when things were going so much better?
What can I do differently?
And then, most importantly: KEEP TRYING.
Now, the need for practice isn’t license to not try your best. In fact, the value of your practice depends entirely on your effort.
Every day do your best. Accept that “your best” will often look different from day to day.
Don’t ignore the opportunity in your struggles. There are nuggets of gold in those challenges that, when you learn from them, dramatically accelerate your rate of progress.
So you had a day that wasn’t what you had hoped. Was it better than you’ve done in the past? If so, that’s progress! Congrats! Keep at it!
And even if it’s not, are you practicing? Are you learning? Are you bringing awareness to how it makes you feel so maybe next time overeating doesn’t sound like such a great idea?
So to my sweet Fat Loss Fast Track friend – no, you didn’t set the wrong goal. Welcome to practice, the path to your goals. This is what it looks like. Learn to love it.
Do you find yourself making promises to eat healthy or workout, only to talk yourself out of it hours or days later? I used to do that all the time & it left me feeling frustrated and prevented me from making the progress I wanted desperately!
In today’s episode I want to help you stop breaking promises you’ve made to yourself!
You cannot reach your goals if you are constantly talking yourself out of taking the steps to achieve them. Every choice you make leads you somewhere, either closer to or further from your goals.
To get the details on the challenge I’ve given myself to take 45 yoga classes in 45 days and all I’ve learned from it, click here to listen to episodes 235 and 239.
How to Stop Breaking Promises You Make To Yourself
I’m not super hero. Though I have committed to 45 yoga classes in 45 days, I certainly don’t want to go everyday. Heck, I don’t want to go most days. But, how to battle those feelings? How do you shut down your attempts to make excuses and not do the work you said you would?
Your goals don’t make you a hero. Your intentions don’t create results.
It’s not what you intend that matters – it’s what you do.
It’s not what you do when you’re motivated that counts, it’s what you do when you aren’t motivated that makes all the difference.
Doing the work is the ONLY thing that gets you to your goals.
So, how do you respond when you start talking yourself out of the work?
Don’t use logic to sabotage yourself
The most dangerous thing we can do is to use logic to talk ourselves out of our goals. Sometimes this logic is valid, and sometimes the logic is faulty or a flat out lie.
Either way, you’re talking yourself out of moving towards something you want.
No bueno. That won’t get you there.
So how do we stop breaking our promises? So how do we stop making excuses?
Get brutally honest with yourself and stop justifying quitting.
Don’t let your beautiful brain hold you back
If you allow your mind to consider all the reasons you shouldn’t do the work, you’ll always find plenty of them.
Don’t do that.
Instead, challenge yourself to identify what work you CAN do.
Your brain is there to help you, to become an ally to your goals. Use your brain to talk yourself into your goals and consistency. Use your brain to talk yourself into what you CAN DO.
Do not let the present moment be the only moment you consider
Ask yourself, at the end of the day, what decision will make me the most happy? Don’t make your decisions based on what will make you happy in the present moment, rather, bring your attention to how you’ll feel later.
Step back and ask yourself why you made the promise in the first place. Remember the reasoning behind the decision and understand that your choices now do matter, even the little choices.
Keep your decisions aligned with the logic behind the promises you made to yourself.
Create your foundation first
Your first step needs to be creating a solid foundation. Often times we only focus on the outcome, but without the foundation our efforts can be in vain and we will only increase frustration.
When you skip steps, you find yourself working hard without getting the results you want.
Your foundation needs to be unshakeable before you rush around doing everything.
What CAN You do?
The most important thing is to not quit on yourself.
Find your reasoning for making the promise in the first place. Don’t let excuses, even valid ones, steer you away from your ultimate goals. Use your beautiful brain to keep your body and actions in check!
If you find the Primal Potential podcast help, it would mean the world to me if you’d take a minute to leave a rating & review! That helps show platforms display my podcast to new listeners! Thank you so much for your support! I can’t tell you how valuable it is!
