Keeping things rolling and prioritizing taking my weekly thoughts, getting them on a screen, and sharing them with all of you, this week I want to talk about excuses.
Ah that lovely word that we all love to hate, but also love to use incredibly often. Oh yes! That’s right! You may even be using one right now! Just kidding. Maybe.
But anyways, let’s really chat about excuses, because it is something that I have tried to make myself more and more aware of in my life in the last 3 years, and let me tell you, just being aware of them is so freaking powerful.
So what are excuses? Well they are reasons, thoughts, negotiations with ourselves to avoid doing what we know to be correct but maybe not ideal, and be ok with it. It is the mind’s mind speaking and turning up its volume. However, the key part of that is that we know what is correct, and what we should be doing. We always know! But sometimes we just don’t want to admit it, and convince ourselves otherwise.
The mind’s mind, huh? Yes, it is a thing! See as human beings we seek comfort and safety naturally. It is programmed in our brains to avoid change and difficulty, which is exactly the process we need to lean into to become a better version of ourselves. So when we elect to make a change, whether that is waking up early to get to the gym, eating better on the weekends, putting ourselves first, whatever it may be, when it gets hard our brain is naturally going to start negotiating giving you all the reasons not to do it, and in your mind justifying it to make sense.
But again! We know what is right, so if we become aware of the excuses that we make we can navigate the challenge much better and ultimately get to where we want to be!
Unfortunately, we are up against it in a world where everything is easy, and easy doesn’t lead us anywhere near where we want to be. I am here to tell you also that anything is possible. You can still build muscle as you get older. You can still change your life and lose weight if that’s your goal no matter where you are in life. You can learn a new skill. You can get better at something. You can become a healthier and happier version of you. You can make time for yourself. You can eat better.
All of this stuff is possible, you just need to be aware of the stories you tell yourself as to why they are not. Now don’t take it out of context, the stuff mentioned above is HARD. Everything worth doing in life is hard. Just accept it. Hard is the way forward.
So for the next 2 weeks, I want you to become incredibly aware of excuses and try to pick them out when they come up, and instead of leaning into them, just take a breath. After that breath, think to yourself what is the best step forward for me in this very moment? What is the best step forward for future me in this very moment? Then whatever the answer is, take that step.
As always if you need any help or assistance getting things together and in line. Just reach out. I am here to create life-long health and fitness for all of you.
