As busy moms, it’s easy to fall into a pattern of prioritizing everyone else over ourselves so when something has to give, it’s usually our needs that don’t get met.
Then we get frustrated that we’re not making any progress, feel even less motivated to try to make it all work, throw in the towel, and around we go.
Today’s guest on the Live Diet-Free podcast is no stranger to the demands of being a working mom but still manages to be an (incredibly) fit person: Miranda Alcaraz, mom of 3, wife, owner of Street Parking, and former CrossFit Games athlete.
You can listen to the episode here…
Or keep reading the post below:
Getting Uncomfortable & Fitness Freedom
There’s a saying that floats around the fitness community a lot that goes something like this – you get to choose your hard.
Essentially, a lot of things in life are hard – fitness included – but fitness can also alleviate some of those other hards as long as you maintain consistency for the long-term.
If given the choice between an all-out 15-minute sprint type workout or a more leisurely hour long gym session, being able to appropriately choose between the two is important for building consistency.
Will the 15 minute all in workout make you uncomfortable? Absolutely.
Will the hour long gym session eat into more of your day, possibly leaving you to skip it altogether if you can’t find the time? You bet.
Both workouts have their place in a well-rounded fitness plan, but in order to make them work, you’ll have to learn how to be ok getting uncomfortable in those sprint workouts.
Integrating fitness freedom into your life and embracing a something is better than nothing mindset is one way that you can make quick strides towards building consistency.
The Skill of Consistency
There’s a misconception that consistency is just something you have or don’t have when the reality is that consistency is a skill. Just like any other skill, consistency is something you can work on and improve with practice.
It’s very unlikely that you’ll find yourself jumping from a sedentary life to working out seven days a week for an hour at a time. When you set that goal for yourself, you’re really just setting yourself up for failure or a quick burnout.
Building consistency is a process that needs to start at the most basic level.
If you’ve never worked out before, don’t jump to working out everyday. Make it a goal to do something on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday (or whatever days work for you). During that time, the goal is just to show up with no time goal. Just get dressed and show up for yourself.
Then once you’re consistently showing up for yourself those three days, start tying a time commitment to it until you’re consistently following through on that.
Then you can increase the number of days or integrate different types of workouts.
It will likely take longer than you’d like, but what it will do is build a consistent routine that is much easier to maintain and easier to adjust when life throws a curveball.
What can you control?
So what happens when life starts doing what life does and things start feeling out of control again?
You focus on the things you can control.
You don’t have to invalidate the struggles – your reasons are real – but you do have to take an investigative approach to solving the problems.
In the moment it will likely seem like everything is out of your control and you’re held hostage by the external circumstances.
When that happens, sit down and create a list of things you can control.
Maybe your gym closed so you feel like you can’t work out like you used to, but what if you grabbed a pair of dumbbells and started doing something at home until you find a new gym.
We’ve all experienced the grocery stores not having the things we wanted to prep, but that doesn’t mean you toss out the whole plan and grab fast food every day. You can simply tweak your choices from the store.
As Miranda tells us, “Even if you just choose one thing on that list and start there and start small, I think that can be really helpful to help you build that confidence that you do you do have control over a lot more than you think that you do.”
If you find yourself struggling to build the consistency necessary to reach your goals, our team of coaches at EA Coaching is here to help you. We have years of experience helping clients get off the weight loss rollercoaster and we’d love to help you do the same. Check out estheravant.com/coaching for more info.
