How The All Or Nothing Mindset Effects Progress
“I’m doing the keto diet for 6 weeks and not going to have a single cheat meal!”
“I’m going to workout 7 days a week for a whole month!”
Sound familiar? I’ve been there too. Man, the amount of times I convinced myself “this weekend will be the last weekend of indulgence!”
Progress doesn’t come from perfection. It comes from consistency. It’s what you do MOST of the time that matters! Having your favorite foods in moderation can keep you sane while continually seeing progress.
The stress of trying to be perfect is unrealistic. So what happens when you don’t meet your own expectations you set for yourself? You say “forget this!” and end up “falling off the bandwagon.” Why? Because it’s too hard! You can’t seem to follow this crazy lifestyle that YOU set for yourself. I promise you it does not have to be that difficult! Fitness and health is simple. (Not easy! But WAY more simple than diet culture has made it out to be.)
If instead, you set REALISTIC goals for yourself, you’d be more likely to see progress overtime. Remember, slow sustainable progress is still amazing progress! What do realistic goals look like?
“I’m going to add a vegetable and protein source to each meal.” When someone has the desire to be perfect on their diet they’re typically coming from a place of not tracking their intake. Having no idea how much protein they’re consuming or fiber, veggies etc. So taking a couple steps to add nutrient dense foods to your overall nutrition will leave you with higher success compared to going from one extreme to another. Extremes lead to that horrendous diet cycle we’ve all experienced at some point!🙄 It didn’t work before so why try that none sense again?
Or “I’m going to exercise 3-4 times a week.” Look we all have different work and home situations. Trying to exercise 7 days a week is impractical! Especially if you’ve been sedentary prior. Why does that even sound like a good idea? Any movement will be effective for progression especially if it’s not going to discourage you after you realize it’s unsustainable. Not to mention, rest days are very important for recovery and growth so nobody should be killing themselves in the gym 7 days a week.
Moral of the story: take small steps in the right direction. You are not meant to be frustrated along your journey. Just take each day as it comes and when things don’t go as planned, you get right back up and proceed forward. Perfection is overrated and frankly not possible!
Stay sustained out there! 💪🏼
