Tag Archives: motivation

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It’s All in Your Head - Sprint versus Marathon

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It’s exciting to be coming into the first two-week checkpoint for our newest crop of bootcampers. If you haven’t yet heard the refrain, “It’s a Marathon, not a Sprint,” then now you have!

Short-term versus long-term thinking works better for different personality types. While healthy living doesn’t have a 56-day time limit on it, very few of us can labor day after day with only the promise of lower cholesterol and blood pressure that will decrease our likelihoods of stroke and heart attack one day a few decades down the line. That’s nurse thinking and even I can’t lean on that for everyday motivation.

This is why we encourage you to have goals as well as a larger overarching WHY. You can want to rock your high school reunion next month, and also be healthy to play with your still-imaginary grandchildren, but it’s getting into that smokin’ hot dress next week that is going to have the greater likelihood of influencing doughnut refusal TODAY. Remember that having very specific goals actually has the power to make our wellness journey seem easier.

Consider also that we’re human and need to experience some immediate gratification from our actions.

There are two major contributors to health - exercise and dietary intake. What are the short term benefits for you of making good choices in each?

Exercise is something we often think about as paying off later, but rarely (at least after week one!) do we leave a class worse off than we arrived. How we feel - the sense of accomplishment, the endorphins, and the burst of energy - these are all proof that movement can be its OWN reward. When you do your first full push up, or pull up, or burpee, or box jump, the act of overcoming a mental barrier and pushing our preconceived physical limits is a rush that’s almost enough to make you understand why anyone would run 26 miles. ALMOST.

As bootcampers approach their first free day off-plan, they will soon understand that clean eating is also its own reward in the here and now, but that’s something that only the ‘carb coma’ can truly teach! Enjoy yourselves, but just take careful note of your energy level at weigh-in versus how you feel after a day of eating ‘the old way’ AND remember :).

All the best,

Marcey

Coach Marcey Tidwell started as a client with NGPT in January 2011. Joining the team as an accountability coach, she wears many hats in assisting the Meltdown Nation! Nurse Marcey by day, she brings a wealth of knowledge the program! She hates burpees but loves that her triceps don’t wiggle.

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It’s All in Your Head - Habits and Motivation

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We are in week 7 of bootcamp, which can be both an exciting and really scary time for those about to graduate (although I prefer commencement :) .) You’re hopefully beginning the next step of your journey rather than picking up where you left off 6 1/2ish week ago.

You have developed new habits and the biggest challenge is how to continue those past day 56. To the timely rescue is Better Than Before: Mastering the Habits of our Everyday Lives by Gretchen Rubin. In one of the most insightful reads I’ve stumbled across in a while, she nails the four motivation personality types that determine how YOU will respond to post-bootcamp life.

According to Ms. Rubin, motivation and developing of habits is based largely on how we respond to expectations - internal (Questioners), external (Obligers), both (Upholders) or neither (Rebels.)

You know how sometimes you do stuff just because you think it’s expected? Then you are not a questioner. Questioners only form habits if they are convinced of their usefulness or benefits of the habit. You are the people who want to know ‘why’ this and ‘why not’ that. And that’s OK - as long as the person imparting the information gives a compelling reason why or why not. Otherwise you’re calling shenanigans.

Obligers will roll through boot camp because they committed to do it, often signing up with a friend or spouse. They may hate or love it, but they will get up for 6ams, dutifully submit usually perfect logs nightly, but absent some intense connection post-bootcamp, are just as likely never to step in the door again. They do things because someone else is expecting them to or counting on them, but aren’t particularly self-motivated.

Upholders (that’s me!) are influenced by both their own expectations of themselves, and by those of others. They believe in rules and processes and can be kinda fuddy duddies, but they thrive on social connections and have a dual support in developing habits, so even if the spousal unit rolls over and doesn’t want to go to class, they will.

Finally, we have rebels. Rebels probably aren’t going to send their food logs or fitness reports. They will frequently be the hardest working person in class because that’s what they CHOOSE, but if a hamburger shows up, legal cheat meal be darned. Rebels _can_ use their contrarian nature to best effect by focusing on those who think they’re going to peter out, (“I’ll show THEM!”)

I’m guessing you can tell right off the bat what your expectation style is, but just in case :).

Obligers and questioners make up by far the largest portion of the population, with upholders and rebels taking their respective places at the opposite tail ends of the bell curve. Upholders will take care of themselves, and rebels will probably just do the opposite of what you encourage them to, so the biggest benefit we can give is focusing our energies on those first two categories of obligers and questioners.

Obligers - consider a 3P group for ongoing accountability OR tag team with a buddy you’ve met for a regular weekly class meetup. A trio is even better so you’ve got a redundant system in place in case your friend is NOT an obliger :D.

Questioners - you of ALL people need to set up your two week post-bootcamp weigh-in checkpoint, like NOW. You need hard numbers to see what works and what doesn’t as you continue your transformation. Get those nagging WHY and WHY NOTS answered to your satisfaction. Then weigh in and see for yourself.

Keep rocking it and plan NOW for your “what’s next” based on your personality and what’s most likely to motivate YOU.

All the best,

Marcey

Coach Marcey Tidwell is started as a client with NGPT in January 2011. Joining the team as an accountability coach, she wears many hats in assisting the Meltdown Nation! Nurse Marcey by day, she brings a wealth of knowledge the program!

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It’s All in Your Head - “Maintenance isn’t Sexy”

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I was going to start this post with a pic of hubby in his snug Tshirt wielding some implement of tree or bush destruction, but after a year and a half in our house, following nearly two decades of apartment dwelling, the bloom is definitely off the rose of home maintenance. It just ISN’T sexy. But you gotta do it. Trimming, staining, bag worm masscre-ing - it’s all part of the joy of keeping the place you live in nice and worth the investment you have made in it.

When you start the Meltdown, like the Love Boat it’s all exciting and new (you’re welcome to my age cohort for that earworm.) You see dramatic changes in pretty short time periods. People notice! Your life is full of firsts - full push-ups, new pants sizes, shopping in “regular” clothing stores. And as we go along and settle into the “new normal”, there seem to be seasons for certain struggles - we expect that the holidays may be hard, and some folks throw caution to the wind as of Halloween and figure they’ll pick back up in January. But we each begin at a different time and mental place, so where we run into the Meltdown equivalent of the “sophomore slump” can vary dramatically.

This is a great article that draws from the author’s book: Foodaholic: The Seven Stages of Permanent Weight Loss . Consider checking it out to move you further along your path from “diet” thinking to “life change” thinking. Losing weight is easy, even FUN - it’s keeping it off that just kinda stinks sometimes. One of the common themes I hear that people have trouble putting into words is “resentment” at having to be constantly vigilant of creeping pounds.

Each of us is born with a certain amount of genetic baggage that will rule some percentage of our results in various arenas of life. It just is, and no amount of frustration about the person who looks like they eat all day and never gain a pound will change OUR situations. And you are not consigned to a life of plain chicken breasts and raw broccoli - there are many ways to mix up food that is good for you and actually makes you feel good. It’s absolutely a toss-up between time, money and taste. I make no secret of the fact that I prioritize time above all else - but if the enjoyment of food is important to you (and there’s nothing wrong with that) you will have to put a little bit of time into preparing it - which I see busy people doing all the time - or the money into eating out. Ultimately, we have to decide that we want to feel better AND look better, and that the fleeting sensation of something crossing our lips isn’t more important than the overarching quality of our lives.

As we cross the halfway point of bootcamp, I encourage you to resist with all your might the “eight week thinking” trap - start preparing now to make this a lifestyle change you can live with. That means not living for the cheat, and understanding that your body, like your home, requires attention that isn’t always fun, but will keep it from falling apart before its time.

All the best,

Marcey

Coach Marcey Tidwell is started as a client with NGPT in January 2011. Joining the team as an accountability coach, she wears many hats in assisting the Meltdown Nation! Nurse Marcey by day, she brings a wealth of knowledge the program!

Getting Results: Doing Something vs Getting Something DONE

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I think that the one thing that I see people worry about the most is back sliding with their results. They have invested time, money, and a lot of effort into a transformation and they don’t want to lose what they have built up! As I have said before, I believe that the mental component of the transformation process is where most people “fall off the wagon” and blow their hard earned results. It is important, however, to remember that you can’t just sit at home and “think” away the pounds. You are going to have to get your hands dirty and sweat it out a bit. There are dozens of paths you can take when it comes to exercise and nutrition. Everyone will gravitate towards different opportunities depending on what you like and what gets the best results. As you try different things out I want you to consider a very important question:

“Am I just doing something or am I actually getting something done?”

Here’s an example that we can look at. Let’s say we have two people that have each signed up for a gym membership. We will call them Sally and Sara. By signing up for a gym membership and going to the gym they are each “doing something”. Let’s say that Sally goes to the gym and does a consultation with a trainer. They do some initial measurements and set some goals for the next three months. Sally isn’t 100% perfect but she does her best to stick to her plan and when she is in the gym she hits it hard. After three months Sally has lost 25 lbs and has gone down a few sizes in her pants. She saw success by taking action, forming a plan, and working hard to stick to that plan. She was successful in achieving measurable results.

Meanwhile Sara goes and does the elliptical machine after work for 20 minutes three times a week and talks on her cell phone the entire time. After three months Sara has stopped coming in because she wasn’t seeing any results. Too many people sign up for a program or a membership and then they don’t put much effort into the actual transformation process. They don’t see much change in their health or the way they look but they tell themselves “Hey at least I’m doing something!”……and that mindset will not lead to success!

We have to remember that there are TWO different causes for a lack of results. Either the program isn’t working or the person isn’t working the program. It is very important to ask yourself some key questions to see where the problem might be if you are not seeing the results you are after.

I have actually come up with a chart that I like to use for this specific situation. I call this the “Results Per Dollar” chart or RPD for short. When you invest your hard earned cash into a fitness program you need to expect results. This chart also helps you make sure that YOU are putting in your share of the work. This will be a well timed wake up call for many people out there!

 

Time Frame Fitness Activities Paid For Approx $ spent total Approx time spent total Results Achieved Your effort/coachability 1-10

 

As you can see from the diagram, you will simply enter in a time frame, what fitness/nutrition programs you have paid money for, what results you have seen in that time frame, and rate yourself on a scale of 1-10 on how dedicated and coachable you have been. Filling out this chart should help you reflect on what you have been paying for and you should come to one of three decisions:

  1. Stay the course: Things are going well and you need to keep going.
  2. Not getting results: You are doing the wrong activities/programs and you need to change things up.
  3. Not giving it your best: You need to step up your game and give more effort to the programs you are paying for.

Always remember that your free time is one of the most valuable assets that you have. When you choose to spend your free time at the gym, in a group fit class, or any other healthy activity make sure that you are getting something done and spending that time wisely!