episode 188: my #1 tip for sticking with your workout plan
Have you ever wondered why sometimes you snack on chips and still feel hungry? Or why you struggle to exercise even though you know it’s good for you? Today I’m talking about why and how to change that with one of my all time favorite skills.
What you’ll hear in today’s episode:
My lightbulb moment during a workout that inspired this episode.
Why understanding the "jobs" of foods can change your eating habits.
The truth about why workouts don’t always have to be fun but are still essential.
How to reframe your perspective to stay consistent with your fitness routine.
Why overeating isn’t due to your lack of control or will power
Join me for some candid talk on making food and workouts finally work for you instead of against you.
-
188
[00:00:00] Hey everyone. Thanks for listening today to episode 188 of the Diet Diaries. I'm gonna keep this one short because I have to leave in like 25 minutes for an appointment to go get mammogram and breast ultrasound. I'm gonna have to grab lunch before I go. I also did really not have an idea of what I wanted to talk about today.
I have like a couple of ideas, but they were sort of like bigger things. I'm like, you know, I just don't have like, I just don't have it in me to like get into that stuff today. And then I was doing my workout and a couple times a week I post like a story on Instagram from my workout with something that I'm thinking about or whatever, um, or things that I hear come up like obstacles to working out and thinking about strength training and all this.
And I'm like, Oh my God, how have I never thought about this before? Perfect. I'm going to talk about this on the podcast. And here's what it is. [00:01:00] So, if you've been hanging around here for a while in any form, you've likely heard me talk about this idea that foods have jobs. Different foods have different jobs.
Just like, what's happening right now? Is this still recording? Okay, sorry. I thought I had a little technical pop up there and I'm like, is this recording? Um, anyway. Um, I lost my train of thought. Okay, foods have jobs. Yeah, just like you would not hire a science teacher to teach a history class because a science teacher knows science and a history teacher knows history.
That logic and framework applies to food. We wouldn't eat a chicken breast when we wanna have dessert, and we wouldn't eat dessert when we're really hungry and need to eat a chicken breast yet. This is what we do all of the time. When we're really hungry, we wanna snack and we go eat a bunch of chips, and then we're like.
Man, I'm still hungry. I just ate this whole bag of chips. I'm still hungry. And now I feel gross. And then we blame the chips. And we're like, we're not. Sorry, I said that backwards. [00:02:00] We blame ourselves for overeating the chips when really the job of the chips is not to fill hunger. The job of chips is just to taste good.
That's it. If you're hungry, you've got to eat something that's going to fill you. Something that has protein, something that has fiber, something that has nutritious fats. Not something that's just meant to taste good. And on the flip side, when you really want to have dessert and you say to yourself, oh, dessert's bad.
I'm just going to have a piece of fruit instead. A piece of fruit is not meant to do the job of cake. Yeah, fruit can taste good and be refreshing, but let's be honest, it is not the same as having a cookie or cupcake or ice cream or whatever. So when you try to deprive yourself in that way and trick yourself and saying, oh, I'll just have something naturally sweet that's healthy.
It doesn't work. It backfires. And then in both of those situations, you end up eating way more food than you needed to because you put the wrong food in the wrong job. This is literally one of my favorite skills and frameworks to talk about. And also what I love about it, it's actually really helpful for kids.
It's a really interesting and kind of fun way to think about [00:03:00] foods, so that if you are someone who wants to be really aware and mindful of not teaching your kids, like, the good, bad language around food and all or nothing and cleaning your plate to get dessert and all of that, this is such a wonderful way to do that.
Now, here's kind of the aha moment I had today. And if you're watching this on YouTube, you're going to see me, um, pulling out my phone because I want to, I took a screenshot of the story that I shared and I want to read what it said. Okay. So I did my workout very late this morning. Ben's at camp. I don't see clients on Mondays, so I have like flexibility as to when to get things done.
So I like wrote my email today, which is a fucking awesome email if you're on my email list. Um, it's kind of my update about my functional medicine stuff. Um, and so here's what I wrote on the screenshot. Did not feel like doing this workout today. Normal. You're very often not going to feel like doing the things you need to do.
Paying bills. Doing laundry. Going to work. Working out is the same. It doesn't have to suck, but also doesn't have to be your favorite thing. You do it for other reasons. The job of the workout isn't to entertain you or be the most fun part [00:04:00] of your day. Its job is to improve your physical and mental well being.
And And I kind of just like wrote that sometimes like I, I get clarity around things as a lot of times when I'm working out when I'm moving, it's crazy. And then as I'm writing them, and I'm like, this is the same thing as the jobs of foods, right? It's like, we kind of have this thing where like, And I used to talk about this all the time.
I really swung in the opposite direction where it's like make all of your workouts enjoyable and that's what will help get you to do them. I mean, sometimes that can help, but if it's super enjoyable and you're like loving every second of it, it's probably not doing the job that it needs to do. It's probably going to be too easy or it's not going to challenge you in the way that your body needs to be challenged to get the results of the workout that you're trying to get.
And so if we just acknowledge that. And we just call like a spade a spade and say, okay, the workout doesn't have to be the most fun part of my day. I don't have to love every second of it. It doesn't have to be super enjoyable. On the flip [00:05:00] side, I don't have to hate it. It doesn't have to totally and completely suck.
But if I can identify that the job of this workout is not to like necessarily bring me joy and pleasure in the moment. It, it kind of helps in terms of the way we think about it. And we stop trying to make it something that it's not, and we can accept that it's something we have to do. It is a responsibility that has to happen, right?
It's not, not everything in life is going to be fun and enjoyable. There are certain things that we have to do to take care of ourselves. And, and live in a, in a, in a functioning, you know, society. We have to pay bills. We have to do laundry. We have to brush our teeth. We have to go to sleep, which for some people I think becomes questionable, right?
We have to go to the grocery store. We have to feed ourselves in some way. That's actually a whole other interesting topic I've been thinking about, is how much labor, how labor intensive it is to feed yourself, something I want to talk more about separately. Um, and working out and exercising has become this extra superfluous thing for the vast majority of people.[00:06:00]
And there are a lot of reasons for that. There are reasons we all do not have the same 24 hours in the day. We don't have access to the same resources. There's a lot to it, and I'm not going to oversimplify it. But what I will say, because I'm talking to the population of people that are listening to this podcast and who follow me, and for most of you, That's not the situation, right?
There is some time. There are some resources in different forms to exercise, to move your body in some way. And if you are waiting for that exercise to be super fun, or to be something that you look forward to, or to feel as good as like watching a show on Netflix, or reading your favorite book, or getting dessert, it's never going to fucking happen, right?
Yes, I go to dance classes sometimes and I love them and they are so much fun. That is not the only thing I need to be doing for my body. The things you need to be doing, the heavy strength training, the one to two times a week HIIT workouts, and some zone two walking, which means walking at like not a super like [00:07:00] benign easy pace where your heart rate is elevated a little bit, very, very doable.
Those things take effort. They take work. They are not always going to be pleasurable and enjoyable, and we have to stop trying to make them. As such, that's not their job. It is not the workout's job to be the most fun and the best, most enjoyable part of your day. Just not. It's job is to improve your physical and mental health.
And that's fucking important. And so I think if we just start to identify that we don't have to love every second of the workout, that's not it's job. Then it's like, okay, this is challenging, this is hard, but you know what? That's the job of this workout. That's what I need to be doing right now to get this outcome.
Right? If you want to just get stronger, because improved strength often decreases pain for people. It, it's a, um, improves risk factors for osteoporosis. Um, it [00:08:00] decreases, uh, or increases insulin sensitivity. It can decrease inflammation. It's going to improve your self efficacy and your body image. There's so many benefits, right?
I totally just lost my train of thought. Um, I had a point with this. If you get clear on why you are trying to do that, then There are so many upsides that it helps to make it a little bit easier to acknowledge it doesn't have to be fun. It's got to be challenging in order to do, that was my point, in order to get those outcomes that I listed.
It has to be challenging. It has to be hard. Otherwise, you're not going to get, you might get some of those benefits, but not all. And so, you know, uh, We talk about like, I feel like, I don't know how many years ago this became a thing, like, like hashtag adulting, right? This like made up word, but it's so true, such like a lovely and I think accurate commentary on like modern life.
Working out is adulting, right? Like, we have [00:09:00] responsibilities to do certain things, we don't always want to do them, but they have to get done in order for us to live productive, um, lives. There's other adjectives that I can't come up with right now. And working out is not about being productive. It's about taking care of your body and your wellbeing and your, and your health, health in all different forms, spiritual, emotional, physical, mental, um, relational, right?
Health is not just like what your cholesterol is or like what your blood pressure is. That's one element of health. Working out impacts all of it. It's got to, do the job it needs to do. Otherwise, you're not going to get the outcome you want to get. Like, it's a simple concept. Simple, not always easy to implement.
But I wanted to share this with you because it was kind of like a little bit of an aha moment for me. And if you are someone who has, wants to work out, understands the importance and the significance, but can't make [00:10:00] it happen, right? That gap. That's the gap. That's like what coaching is about. That's like the greatest struggle in life.
I know what I need to do. I just can't fucking do it. Right? How do we move those two things closer together? How do we close that gap? This is an interesting skill to start thinking about and using it as a way, as always, layering this on top of another skill to respond to your thoughts, right? When you start getting that internal pushback, I don't feel like it, I'm tired, I've got other stuff, I'm busy, I don't have time, I only have time for 15 minutes, I don't have time for 45, I have to get up early, I gotta pick up my kids, I gotta respond to this email, all the shit that comes up.
You pause. And you say, it is not the job of this workout to be the most fun or the most pleasurable part of my day. It is the job of the workout to improve my health and you can get really specific about what that is for you, what your goals are and to be challenging. That is the job. A dance class, [00:11:00] um, going to play tennis if you like to play sports, um, going for like an evening stroll with your friend or your partner that is not like exercise, it's movement, right?
All those things are wonderful. Again, all movement is good movement, but not all movement gets you the same outcomes. And that's just science. And we have to get honest about that. So I think that's really mostly what I wanted to say. Again, the job of a workout is not to always be fun or to be the most pleasurable or enjoyable part of your day.
Doesn't mean it has to totally suck. I feel the need to repeat myself on this and it shouldn't totally suck because then you really won't do it. You got to find that sweet spot of being challenging and doable, both. Not challenging but doable, challenging and doable. And then remembering when your brain pushes back and tells you.[00:12:00]
Not to do it for the million reasons that are going to come up. You got to remind yourself that this is a priority. This is part of what means to adult and take care of yourself. Just like you have to have groceries in the fridge. Just like you got to pay your bills. Just like you got to check the mail.
Just like you got to like get your oil changed. You got to do laundry. Um, all these things, they have to happen. It's like homework for kids. It kind of sucks. Usually there's a benefit, not always mixed feelings about that. Whatever. I don't need to digress into that, but there's a benefit to it. And we have to get comfortable with being uncomfortable about it and stop expecting it to always be fun and enjoyable and stop expecting that, like, and then making it optional.
Because it's not fun and enjoyable. Because we don't always look forward to it. Because it's not like the best part of our day. You know what? [00:13:00] That's okay. It doesn't have to be the best part of your day. There need to be other things that can be, right? Something else that you look forward to. Whose job it is purely to be joyful and pleasurable, right?
Watching a show, reading a book, spending time with your kid, um, having a dessert, going out to a fun dinner, like so many other things that are just meant to be fun. That's not what working out is. For some people it can be really fun. For most people and most of you listening, it's not. And I get it. It's not always fun for me.
I don't find HIIT workouts to be fun at all. I'm glad when they're done. I'm proud of myself. I feel good. But in the moment, I'm not enjoying it. I'm not like, oh yay, I'd much rather be doing something else. But I know the benefit of it. I know the job that this thing is doing for me. And that To take care of myself in the way that I want to I have to put the right Action into the right job and that takes work and it takes effort [00:14:00] and it takes discomfort Okay, this needs to be short.
I gotta go I gotta go eat lunch because I don't want to be starving and then eat 10, 000 snacks. So I'm prioritizing that Thanks for listening I'll see you next week