One day, we made a rule as a coaching team not to give out any more recipes to our clients.
Crazy right? Well yes and no. Yes its crazy because honestly you could compile a bunch of recipes you googled and pay $20 to have them bound or sell them e-book style and make a mint! Food CONFUSES people. BIg time. So its a need that needs to be met. We need to un-confuse our clients.
But no, because our philosophy is that the first move in the game of fitness is your mental game, then nutrition, and we realized a weird inconspicuous truth. When your mental game is on, several things occur. One, you put the tools given you to use instead of ignoring them and asking the same question hoping for a different answer. And you ask radically different questions.
For example take fictitious client "Jane" - her game is SO ON. As soon as she signs up she completes her application and its totally complete. When she recieves her manual she pours over it and in a week she brings in her journal completely filled in with questions like:
"How is my food log looking?"
"DO I have those macros right?"
"What do you think of fake sugars in some of these recipes I found?"
"See how I missed 2 workouts, should I do a make up or just stick with the program?"
"I did the cardio option 3 in the manual, after my kids went to sleep, is that ok or do I need to do it in the morning? should I change it up?"
"What are the best places to find recipes that fit my nutrition plan?"
Now when this happens, I just step back and let this person go. And they are 100% of the time a before and after picture.
Then consider Jane's twin sister "June" - she has the same life and job as well as the same goal and has been given the same tools. Here are the things I hear from June.
"What else besides chicken can I eat?"
"Can you send me some recipes?"
"I couldn't do any cardio this week because I needed to go to my sister's best friends kids ball practices, can I sill lose weight?"
"Is it always going to be this hard?"
"I can workout at night because I have a family, and Im exhausted. What can I do?"
"I can't do any cardio so is this even worth it?"
So what seems like an innocent question can be a huge clue to a missing mindset puzzle piece. I find that those who read the 10 pages of nutrition guidance we give them and take responsibility an try ask a totally different set of questions. Both of them have obstacles and its imperfect and miss themark, but the mindset is totally different in one than the other.
In our gym, if you blindfolded me and put 2 people in front of me and one was an athlete and one was totally new to fitness and challenged them to do a new, difficult, never done before workout move and neither one of them got it, I could tell you who the fit person was by the words they spoke at that failure.
Person 1: That was humiliating, I shouldnt have even tried. Why did you ask me to do that?
Person 2: I didn't get it but I will. Anything I can do to get better at in the meantime until I try again?
People don't ask the right questions because they are fit and healthy and never fail. They are fit and healthy because they fail all the time and have learned to ask the right questions. The mindset came first.
So if this is something you'd like to try, take your next problem and focus on the questions you ask...
What can I do today to turn this around?
What is the solution?
What is the first step to the solution?
How can I get 1 step closer to my goal than I was yesterday?
What can I do to solve the problem?
What can I control and how can I focus on my actions today?
Its a big realization when you realize that life is not a lottery. You are not destined to be good or bad, you CHOOSE to. It all depends on your perspective and the questions you ask.
Its all in your head.
Committed to your health and fitness!
Anna
PS~And just to be ironic, I love this recipe so Im sharing it and it fits the macros we recommend to be lean, fast and strong:)
Pumpkin Yogurt
Mix 1/4 cup of pumpkin puree, 1/2 cup of nonfat plain Greek Yogurt, protein powder to bring up the protein to your carbs, 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract and stevia to taste. It's delicious, just 100 calories and full of fiber.
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