How Fat Loss and Your Mindset Are Related?

Our mindset is arguably the most important thing that we should be focusing on each day, and yet it’s typically the last thing that a lot of people focus on

I think that’s due to the fact that we can’t actually physically see the progress when we are working out our mind. Therefore, it becomes increasingly easy to neglect as we become more and more fixated on external rewards and less interested on internal rewards

Today, I want to talk about why it’s so important to workout the mind and HOW you can workout the mind.

So why is it so important?

Before you completely disregard the following information and say “yea yea yea, this is all common sense.” I want you to understand that just because something is common sense, doesn’t mean it is commonly practiced. So please keep that in mind.

Everything starts with our brain from a physiological standpoint. If we move our hand, there are signals sent to the brain that communicates our hand to move. Our hands don’t just move without our brains putting in the work. Most of us know and understand this. 

From a psychological standpoint, I believe this to be the case as well. If we want to exercise more, lose weight or eat better… we have to feel motivated and have some sort of intrinsic reasoning to do all of these things. Most people aren’t just going to eat healthy or exercise more for no reason. Maybe for a short period of time but not for the long term anyways… We have to place some sort of intrinsic value on these habits in order to be consistent with them.

Quite often we talk about people not being able to stick to a fitness or lifestyle program because they are on a program that’s not sustainable for them and perhaps, they need to look into some other approaches. For example, if someone is following a meal plan, perhaps that’s not a sustainable method for some people’s lifestyles and then need to try flexible dieting instead and that’s a more sustainable approach for them. 

Well that’s just one reason some people can’t stick to a program. Another reason, that isn’t talked about as often, is our mindset.

We aren’t actively trying to focus on being better internally aware. And because of that we are lacking self-awareness, confidence and an inability to sustain or external goals. If you aren’t mentally in a good headspace, all the success and external rewards in the world will never be enough. You will never lose enough weight, you will never be skinny enough, you will never be toned enough or never be strong enough.

There’s nothing wrong with setting body composition, fat loss or physique goals for yourself. But I truly believe that if you want to be successful with these external goals, you need to be mentally tough and actively working on your mindset just as often, if not more than your external goals. 

Quite often people hear that and that’s where I lose them.

But just remember this… If you are capable of being in a better place mentally, everything else feels a bit more effortless.

It becomes easier and more manageable to stick to a diet, to stick to a workout program to actually make this a lifelong lasting change. This is what most people spend a lifetime chasing, not realizing that if they just put in the work and the time to work on their mindsets first, everything else falls into place.

Focus on building your mindset and your physique goals will follow. 

So how can we workout our minds?

First and foremost, I believe we all need to identify our WHY.

Why do you need to lose weight?

Why do you need to workout more?

And when you are answering these questions for yourself, you need to answer them at a much deeper level than just needing to look good in a bikini for the summer or to fit in a dress for a wedding.

These are great short term reasons that help get you started, but what happens after the Summer? What happens after the wedding? You typically don’t have anything else to focus on so you revert back to your old habits, all just so you can put all the weight back on during the winter to be chasing the same thing year after year. 

If you spend some time and really try to focus on your long-term reasons for NEEDING to accomplish this goal, you won’t need to chase that bikini bod every single summer. After enough time and work, you’ll just have the bikini bod all year round. 

I don’t know about you, but I feel like that’s going to free about a lot of time to focus on some other things during the Summer. Perhaps learning to water ski or see how many hikes you can do. Whatever the activity is, wouldn’t it be nice to actually be in the moment during the Summer, versus always focusing on dieting and spinning your wheels each day to try to fit into a bikini?

So dig deeper when you are defining your WHY. 

Maybe it’s because you don’t want to be in pain when you get older? Maybe it’s so your grandkids struggle to keep up to you versus the other way around? Maybe it’s to be a role model to those around you?

Whatever your WHY is, we all have a reason beyond just looking good for one season out of the year. So spend some time and really try to find that reason. 

Once you know your WHY. You have to hold onto that and remind yourself of it every single day.

Make a cool wallpaper of your why and put in on your phone so each time you look at your phone, you are being reminded. Write it on a sticky note and put it on your mirror in the bathroom, the dashboard of your car and/or in your wallet.

Once your WHY is ingrained in your head, it will pop up in moments when you need it the most. And those moments are moments of doubt and denial. We all have them here and there throughout our journey. It can be very easy to quit in those moments when we don’t have our WHY’s reminding us why we need to persevere despite those doubting moments we have of ourselves. Over enough time as you build up enough confidence, you will start to find that you have those moments less and less.

Knowing the why for your goals allows you to bear the how’s.

If you have a deep connection to WHY you need to do something, you will figure out HOW to make that happen, regardless of the obstacles you may be facing right now.

Don't lose sight of what's important to you because of all the adversity you may be facing right now. Instead, spend some time and really understand WHY you need to do something. Once you understand your WHY, remind yourself of it constantly. Each day, multiple times a day, you should be reminding yourself of your WHY

Once you know your WHY, you can start to trust in your abilities to figure out the HOWS

The next thing I recommend doing is Journaling

Like we’ve talked about before, journaling is the most underrated coping strategy if you really want to get a handle on your emotions and take control of your life. This allows us to create a level of self-awareness in us that we are all lacking. We’re so consumed with social media and media in general right now that we aren’t taking the time to ask ourselves what person we want to be, how do we want our grandkids to remember us, where do we want to be after all of this and what do we want our legacies to be?

 All of these questions can be answered and of course of evolve if we take some time to journal. It’s one of the strongest tools for self -reflection and personal development

 Remember, you don’t get clarity… you seek it.

The next thing you can do to be working out your mind is…

Reading! And I don’t mean articles on Facebook.

I mean actual books.

If you don’t like reading or struggle with it, then listen to audio books. Or the bar minimum, listen to podcasts at least. 

I can’t tell you how much reading has changed my outlook and perspective on life. And I am referring to personal development books, of course. Most of the authors are experts and have studied how to find your purpose, be happy, leave a legacy and live a fulfilling life. They challenge your beliefs and get you to think a bit more deeply about things and see NEW and different perspectives. 

If you are reading this and thinking…

“I just wanted to lose some weight and be a bit healthier”

It’s all connected!

It’s never been about just losing weight and finding an optimal program. It’s about being a better person, mentally, physically and spiritually. If you are able to be more happy, self-aware, positive, patient and driven… losing weight (or whatever your fitness goals are) becomes a lot easier. Almost effortless.

And the last thing you need to do…

Is be consistent.

You can’t just do all these things for a week and think it’s all good and you are better now. This is something you need to be constantly doing every single day. It’s no different than flossing your teeth. You don’t just floss them once and you are good to go forever… You have to keep flossing them every single day IF you don’t want a Root Canal. And I have been there, trust me, you don’t want the root canal. Just floss your teeth.

The same hold true with your mental health. So many have created this negative stigma that mental health means that there’s something wrong with you. And it’s time to break this stigma. 

We all have shit going on. We all have negative thoughts and emotions. That doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with us.

It’s normal.

But we have the power to change those thoughts and emotions. You don’t need to wait until you are at your breaking point to take you mental health more seriously. You don’t need to wait until your breaking point if you need to go talk to something. In fact, I encourage it.  

So put in those reps. Put in those sets and work on building up your mindset every single day. It’s not going to be easy. You will uncover some darkness. But that’s how you find the light.

And once you find that light and start building up your mindset, it truly does feel like you can do anything. So focus less on fat loss and focus more on your mindset. You might surprise yourself of how much easier achieving your fat loss goals will indirectly become.

And because we are all impatient and want to see these positive benefits right away, I will leave you with this:

You do not jump for the summit. You take hundreds of small imperceptible steps.

Xoxo

Coach Krysten