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3 Cycles to Bust Through a Weight Loss Plateau

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I am Kim Barnes Jefferson and I am your host of FabFitTv. I help women to break free of a doubt-free and rule-free life so they can live a life of infinite possibilities.

Today I want to keep on the theme of how do we diet in 2019, how do we get the results that we are looking for? So, I want to talk about the dreaded plateau. We’ve all faced it, we’ve all had it, and we’ve all just been like, “What can we do?” And what I see time and time again is that when you hit that wall where the scales are not budging, you’re not seeing any change in the scale, you’re not seeing any change in your physique, you’re like, “Time to up that cardio, strap myself to that treadmill, and I’m just going to live off of diet coke and rice cakes.” Anyone? Been there, done that, and I’ve got the multiple t-shirts for that.

I want you to think about how you feel when you increase all this exercise and you decrease all your calories. You are craving like a mofo. You might be a little bitchy, and you’re just trying to figure it out and you’re going nutso. And you’re clicking and scrolling. You’re asking everyone, and they’re all telling you to do these things. I’ll tell you that for a bit, dropping my calories and increasing my exercise is going to work. Until it doesn’t.

Your body is having a tantrum

Everyone talks about our metabolism — my metabolism is fast, my metabolism is slow, my metabolism is out to lunch, whatever is. But I want you to think about when someone pushed you to your limit and you just either lost your shit, or you dug in your heels and decided you’re not going to budge. That is what our body does when we try to force it into submission.

It’s just like, “No, I’m not going to do it. I don’t care how much you starve me, I don’t care how many hours of cardio you do, I don’t care how many hours you’re at the gym, I’m not moving.” It is like a stubborn two-year-old, it’s that kid that’s laid out on the floor and you’re just like, “I want to walk away right now and give this kid to the circus.” In order to get that kid up off the floor you’re going to do anything, right? You’re like, “What can I do?” You’re just mortified, but then you’re also like, “But this is my kid, I can’t just walk away, can I?” That’s how your body is, so let’s pick your body up off the floor.


Do the unthinkable

And now I’m going to tell you to do something that you’re going to be like record scratch, like the earth has stopped spinning on its axis kind of thing. I’m going to tell you to eat less and exercise less. Yes, you heard me right. You’re going to eat less, and you’re going to exercise less. Now, you’re already into the eat less, you’re like, “Yeah, I got that. What are you talking about? It’s all me, I can do that. But the exercise less, girl, you’re crazy.”

Now, hear me out. The strategy behind that is that our metabolism. Our body has just been beaten into submission. Do you know what it’s like when you’ve just had a week and you’re just dead on your feet and you can’t wait for the weekend and the whole weekend you’re like, “I am not leaving my couch, I am not getting out of my pajamas, I just want to chill and watch everything on Netflix until I have to call Netflix and say ‘You need more stuff because I just watched it all.'” Have you ever been in that state? That’s the state your body gets when you have just been beating it into submission, it’s just like, “Uncle, I surrender, I can’t give you anymore, I need a break.” And when you go into the eat less, exercise less, that’s exactly what you’re doing, you’re giving your body this break. You are basically putting your body on the DL, you’re letting it rehab and recover.

It’s nice to make your acquaintance.

It’s letting you repair that metabolic damage, it’s letting you start to get reacquainted with your body.

  • Reacquaint it with what hunger feels like.
  • Reacquaint it with what rest feels like.
  • Reacquaint it with how your body is supposed to function when you’re not trying to push it into a place it doesn’t want to be.

And so, when I’m able to give my body this rest my body, my hormones start to balance out, my mood starts to balance out, my sleep starts to increase. I am now a person that people want to be around. I am not feeling like I’m that girl with the rice cakes and the diet coke who’s on a diet and I can’t do a darn thing until my diet gives me the 30 pounds, or whatever you’re looking for.

Reset your expectations

I know for a lot of people this is like, “What? What are you talking about?” But trust me, one of the things I’ll tell you is that it helps to reset your expectations of what your body is capable of. It helps you to chill out, it helps you to ease into, “I am where I am, and I can’t force change.”

Think of it like this – if you’ve ever saved for something, you’ve saved for a house, you’ve saved for a vacation, whatever it is, your paycheck is only as big as your paycheck is, and you can only allocate but so many dollars towards this vacation or towards this house. And when you want to save for a house, and you can only save say $100 a week, I don’t ever hear anyone marching into your boss’s office saying, “I need more money because I need to save for a house” and your boss is like, “Sure, here you go.” That doesn’t really ever happen. 

But that’s what you do to your body when your body doesn’t give you what it wants. You literally march down the office and you’re like, “You need to give me more results, and if you don’t give me more results, I’m going to do more stuff to force you to give me more results.” It’s like picketing your body, but you’re literally exercising your body into submission, and shockingly it doesn’t want to give it to you.

Give it a rest

So, with this eat less, exercise less, it’s giving your body a much-needed break. How does this work? So, when you were growing up and you probably had three square meals a day: you had breakfast, you had lunch and you had dinner. And you had big spaces of time between each meal, and the big spaces of time between each meal give your digestive tract time to rest. It’s not always digesting – you eat, it digests, it has some rest, you eat, it digests, you have some rest time.

And so, I want you to pick a time that you’re going to stop eating in the evening. Now this isn’t about, “If I eat calories after 6:00 it’s going to go right to my butt.” Malarkey. I’m saying if I have dinner every night at 8:00, I try my best to get dinner on the table before 8:00, it just doesn’t happen. So, I eat at 8:00 and I don’t eat again until anywhere between 12:00 and 1:00 in the afternoon. So, I give myself a good 12 hours of my digestive tract just chilling out, but eight hours of those I’m sleeping, so it’s really only four hours that I’m not eating. And it’s literally just taking my digestive system and just giving it a big old rest. And I was that person, I ate five to six meals a day and I never really gave my metabolism or my digestive system a chance to rest and recover, only when I was sleeping. So, this is another way to kind of help reboot my system.

Then with the workouts. I know for a lot of people who like to work out this is going to be like, “Whoa.” And it was totally whoa for me. The workouts are going to be two to three times a week, that’s it. The rest of the time you’re going to just focus on movement. In last week’s episode I talked all about what movement is, in a nutshell if you’ve got a Fitbit trying to hit those 10,000 steps a day and just moving, active daily living. I go into greater detail, and I’ll put the link in the show notes so you guys can reference it. But it’s movement.

Rest and Restore

Then the other part is just really focusing on rest and restoration, and that is besides the leisure walk, getting your 10,000 steps walking at a leisurely pace, it’s doing infrared saunas, it’s doing cryotherapy. I know it’s winter and the thought of you going from a freezing cold outside to a freezing cold inside you’re like, “Why would I sign up for that?” Trust me, I’ve done it. Believe it or not, three minutes goes by pretty fast. And I’d say I’m cold, like my knees and my ankles get cold by like two minutes in and then I have like a minute, you can do anything for a minute, so I just power through.

The sauna on the other hand, I feel like I’m drunk when I get out of that. I’m just so chill 5,000 when I come out of the sauna. It’s a great experience, just 100% stress reduction. Rest and restoration is taking naps, being more mindful, loving your pets, loving your partner yup read between the lines (s-e-x), watching TV —  whatever you do to relax. Whatever it is, it’s all about how do I just rest and recover your body? That’s the main focus during this period where you’re eating less and you’re exercising less. 

And this period will last for four weeks, so for four solid weeks you’re getting in two to three workouts a week and you are eating three meals a day. And these workouts, they’re not like, “I only have three workouts, I need to hit it hard.” Yes, I want you to lift. I want there to be a little metabolic work in there, but it’s not like I’m going to the gym for two hours and I’m killing it. That’s not what it is about.

You are working out so that you maintain your muscle mass, so that you’re not just sitting around like veal. Read the Year of Yes, Shonda Rimes has a great story about that in her book. You are still lifting heavy weights to maintain that muscle mass so that when we get to the next phase (eat more, exercise more) you haven’t taken a few steps back. You’ve maintained the strength that you’ve had and now in this eat more/exercise more phase we’re able to start focusing on the muscle build. 

During the eat less/exercise less phase, the focus is on tapping into your body’s stored fat. By spacing out meals leptin levels reset,  hormone that tells your body that you’re full, reset ghrelin levels, the hormone that tells your  body is hungry, and lastly works to reset insulin receptors. When you have too much insulin hanging around all the time your body becomes less sensitive to it.  

The Next Phase

Now, in this eat more/exercise more phase, my focus is now let’s again keep the body guessing. This phase you are back to working out a little bit more. You’ll put a little bit more food into your system four meals equally spaced.

For your food think soups, scrambles, stir fries, and shakes. Your meals start with protein and vegetables as the first two components of your meal.

Then add fat, good fats. People are like, “Oh, I cook in my fat.” For this time, I don’t want you to cook in fat for your stir fries. Use chicken broth for your stir fries, and then afterwards, after you’ve cooked the vegetables then you can throw in some of your good fat in once the vegetables have cooked or once the meat has cooked. Focus on protein and vegetables, fibrous vegetables. Fibrous vegetables are like broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, those that kind of have that hearty-sticking-with-you type vegetable. There’s no vegetable that’s off-limits to you. 

Then I’m going to move to my good fats, focus on oils versus the nuts and the nut butters. Use olive oil sparingly; olive oil is great but has a lot of omega-6, and in our diet we already get a lot of omega 6s. If you go to any grocery store, you’ll see a plethora of oils. Pick any oil with the exception of corn, vegetable, soy, and peanut.

Next, you can start bringing in some of your starchy vegetables. These would be beets, butternut squash, acorn squash, spaghetti squash, those kinds of things. I want you to focus on the protein and the vegetables first. Then pay attention to your hunger and your energy. They will tell you what to do with fat and what to do with starch.

And then the same premise holds true for the eat less/ exercise less, but with the eat more/exercise more I want you to make sure that because we’re exercising, you’re really paying attention to when you have that starchy vegetable. It should be in the morning and around your workout time.

I know for years you’ve been told to ‘avoid carbs’ it’s the “carbs” that helps start the chemical process get the energy in your body, and the protein helps after exercise when your muscle bellies are open for about 20 to 30 minutes post exercise for it to absorb the proteins that help you build and repair. 

You also want to pay attention to your hunger, your energy, and craving because that’s what’s going to dictate whether you add a little bit more food or you pull back a little on the exercise, because if you try to push your exercise and not do anything with your food, you’re going to be back in that craving cyclone, and that that craving cyclone sucks.

Increase how you workout

In the eat more/exercise more you’re going to go to four workouts. These are metabolic workouts; they’re strength workouts. But you’re also building in a little bit of plyometric work so that you’re lifting heavy weights. During your workout you should be breathing heavy and sweating. It’s not about I need to PR this workout, no, it’s just like I want to leave and just say, “I had a great workout” and leave the room.

While I’m increasing my exercise and I’m still keeping up with my movement. I still want to make sure I’m getting in those 10,000 steps every day. I still want to make sure that I’m managing my stress. I still want to make sure that I’m managing my sleep. Because I’ll tell you, regardless of what protocol you follow, if you’re not getting great sleep and you’re a stress ball, everything goes out the window. Your body does not do well with prolonged stress and prolonged lack of sleep. Your body is just like, “I don’t like it.” Sleep and stress are always going to be a focus because regardless of what else you do, if that’s not right, you’re not going to get the results.


It’s a process

And so, remember, as you go through these processes, the first phase: exercise less/eat less, is four solid weeks. And then you’re going to do two weeks of eat more/exercise more. Then you’re going to go to two weeks eat less/exercise less until you’ve reached your desired physique goals. And you’re just literally going back and forth, and the goal here is to keep your body going, “What is she doing? What’s happening here? I don’t know.”

Your body is very adaptive, and as soon as it figures out that we’re dieting it’s going to be like, “Oh girl, we’ve been here, I’m not giving you what you want. I’m just going to sit here on the side of the road and I’m going to smoke my cigarette and have a scotch and watch you run around the gym like a crazy person, and I’m not going to do a darn thing because you’ve put me through hell and I’m done being in hell.” That’s how your body talks to you. Your body is like an 80-year-old woman drinking Dubonnet and smoking like Pall Malls! So, you have to keep your body guessing.

I’m not that person who ever believes that a food group is off limits. I’m more about at certain times, based on your goal, your choices change. But all food groups always will have a place in your diet.

Find your buffer

For me, I need to have fruit. It’s like a buffer food for me. Fruit keeps me from eating just junk and candy. So, if I have some blueberries in my house, if I have a banana in my house, I can eat that, and it takes the edge off of me seeking out know Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups or M&Ms or jelly beans. If I have a handful of blueberries or I have a banana with some nut butter on it, I’m good. It takes away the craving monkey and I’m able to move forward.

But again, during this period is when you really start to become the investigator. I want you to think about CSI. They look at the chalk outline and they’re like, “The guy must have broken in through the window, and then he did this, then he did that.” That’s what I want you to think about when you’re going through the process. Remember that we’re focusing on repairing or rebuilding our metabolism so that our metabolism has that flexibility and we don’t ever hit these plateaus anymore. Or when we see ourselves getting into that plateau, we’re like, “I see the plateau ahead and I know how to make this left turn in order to avoid that plateau. I see another plateau, I know how to make a right turn.” And so, that’s where I want you to start thinking about. The more I can get in-tuned with my body, the more I can avoid plateaus in the first place.

When I work with my clients through this cycle, it’s not about the number on the scale. I want you to think about what does your physique look like?

Are you looking to reduce the size of your thighs?

Are you looking to reduce some belly fat?

Are you looking to get some more shape in your body?

And by shape, that’s where you build muscle.

Fat makes you fluffy, where muscle kind of like shrinks you in.

For a lot of my people, when they get to the exercise more/eat more, I want them really focusing on quality workout, so that the last few reps of the exercise they’re doing feels challenging with great form, so that as we go through these cycles, you’re starting to see maybe that hourglass is starting to uncover. Maybe you’re starting to see a little bit of a shoulder cap. Maybe you’re starting to see a little tighter tush. Sometimes, you’re able to see the results of your effort versus looking down at the scale and then being like, “It’s not adding up.” Or you’re losing a pound here and a pound there; take that away.

Judge it by measurements.

Judge it by how your clothes feel.

Judge it by how your hunger is, by your energy, and by your sleep. Those are the markers that are going to really give you the biggest bang for your buck.

That’s all I got for you today! So, it’s really how do you go about busting that plateau. It’s really turning what you think upside down, inside out, and left and right.

Definitely if you have any questions or comments about this, I’d love to talk it through with you to see how this could possibly benefit you.

Last Week’s Show: The New Rules of Weight Loss

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FabFitSquad/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kimjeffersoncoach/

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The 10 Minute Self Care Routine For Busy Women

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In today’s hectic world it’s so easy to let yourself get lost in the process and forget to take care of yourself. Maybe you’ve been so busy worrying about other people you don’t even know what taking care of yourself looks like.

If that sounds like you, I’d like to share with you some ways to reduce stress and get back some “me” time.

But before I do anything else, let’s first define what self-care really is: “
Any intentional activity that you do that in some way contributes to your emotional, physical, mental health and well-being.”

So simplistically, it is any activity that soothes and satisfies your soul.  

Let me repeat, it’s not getting spa treatments, it’s anything that makes you feel good and feel like a human again.

If you aren’t the touchy feely type, let me break it down in machine terms. Every piece of machinery needs some periodic scheduled maintenance to keep it working correctly – think oil change! If not, over time that piece of machinery will fail to perform its function. Your car will leave you on the side of the road!

You need that same type of scheduled maintenance too (or you will eventually fail) it’s called SELF CARE!

I hear you with all the other priorities you have in your life right now scheduling in time for self-care can feel like an obligation. Flip the script and think of self-care as one of your non-negotiables and for the love of God make it something that you enjoy!

Different things work for different people. You have to find what works for you. 

I work from home running an online business and I know how hard it is to break free from the hustle. I love what I do and want to keeping working. It can be tough to find that balance.

I know that when I don’t have the balance I’m junk, I can’t keep “hustling”.

If you are already maxed out on time, you may have to give up something to have time to add in self-care. Do you really need to spend a half-hour a day on social media to see what others are doing? Instead, take that half-hour for yourself occasionally and spend it on self-care. Maybe it’s taking an extra 5 minutes in the shower and applying a bath oil with essential oils. Maybe it’s waking up 10 minutes earlier and enjoying your cup of coffee or tea vs taking it to go.

Setting Boundaries at Work If Necessary

If you are coming home from work drained every night, or bringing work home with you, maybe it is time to set some boundaries. This one was huge for me when I worked in corporate. I found a kickboxing class that I LOVED, and it forced me to stop working exactly at 5pm so that I could make the class on time.

Sit down and look at what you must do and things you could give up, trust me you have something that you can give up. Maybe you have some responsibilities that can be shifted to a co-worker that isn’t as overloaded as you. The important thing here is if you do not initiate a change, everything will stay the same … and you will still come home drained every night. Grab the bull by the horns and make change happen.

Feeling Happier with Your Life

Good mental health – one of the keys to happiness – starts in part with good physical health. By taking care of your body, you will get in better shape, which in turn will improve your self-confidence and how you view yourself. Feeling good about yourself will always improve your mental mood!

Exercise

You don’t have to run a marathon to reap the benefits from exercising. Lord knows I only run when chased! Even something as simple as a 20-minute walk during your lunch hour will not only help you manage you weight, but will improve your mood by the release of endorphins in your brain

Eating right

Focus on eating healthy nutritional food in the right portions … like a colorful small plate of fresh fruits and vegetables. Add in some whole grain and lean protein, while avoiding sweets and processed foods, and you will be well on your way to looking good, feeling good and bursting with energy.

Sleep

Set a bedtime so that you can do your best to get 7+ hours of sleep. Maybe you spend 5 minutes writing down 3 things you are grateful for. This one of my favorite ways to do that, the 5 Minute Journal. Maybe you diffuse some lavender to help you sleep a little better.

None of the above lights your heart. Here are a few other ideas.

Warm bubble bath

Massage – Groupon is my jam for these

Reading for pleasure

Walking in nature

Playing with animals

Playing with children

Spa Treatments

Dance it out

Knit

Journaling

Meditation

Deep breaths

Don’t Forget to Schedule Self-Care

So many want to focus on diet and exercise as the only way to get healthy and fit. Yes, that’s important, BUT if you aren’t taking care of your mental health, you won’t be able to get the most out of your balanced work and personal life.

Self-care keeps you sane. Keeps you from running around like a wild woman!

As the saying goes, you need to put on your oxygen mask first before you check on the other person.

Of the list above what looks like something that can start doing today?

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The New Rules of Weight Loss in 2019

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It’s 2019 and everyone wakes up on January 1st and they’re like, “This is the year I’m going to be the best person I can be. This is the year I lose 400 pounds.” “This is the year I become a millionaire.” “This is the year I divorce my husband.” “This is the year I get a husband.” 🤷🏽‍♀️

Watch show

A New Approach to Weight Loss

We all have our own approaches to what the new year is going to bring us. So, what I wanted to talk about is what if we turn dieting on its head? You’ve seen all the commercials just as much as I have, you’ve heard all the commercials, and it’s all about “give up”, “drop this”, “do that.” What if we stop focusing first on dramatically dropping our calories and dramatically upping our workouts?

For some people dropping calories and upping workouts, keeps people in that perpetual cycle of chasing skinny. You give up all the “bad” food you rely on willpower and then your willpower gives up, your motivation runs away and you find yourself on the couch with a pint of Ben and Jerry’s Dublin Mudslide with a side of Cinnamon Toast Crunch.

Once you get out of your sugar coma you promise yourself that you will get back on to the “wagon” again. You’re going to go to the gym every day and hit up every class that so-and-so told you, will give you a tight butt. “The class that will give you six-pack abs.”  You are going hard, but you can’t sustain it because that’s not who you are, it’s too hard and you go back into that cycle. I’ve been in the fitness industry for over 15 years and I see it time and time again.  

The first Monday in January everyone comes in, ready to rock! I’ll tell you that by March 31st 20% of the those with fitness goals stick. The other  80%, I’m going to see them again NEXT January.

I don’t want that to be you.

No cold turkey

What if we took the two things that everyone says they need to start with – diet and exercise – and we put them on the back burner and “Instead of chasing skinny I want to chase lasting results.” And I know for many people lasting results come from having great habits, because if you’re not in the habit of working out, if you’re not in the habit of eating right that’s like trying to force someone who is a smoker to stop smoking cold turkey. Why would they have the patch and these other things if quitting smoking was just like, “Hey, I’m not going to smoke anymore” and they’re done? That’s what you’re trying to do when it comes to diet and exercise.  You’re like, “I was having Big Macs and margaritas yesterday, and now I’m not going to salads and water.” 

Reboot your mind

What I want to say is if you’re tired of that reboot button, what if we started to focus on your mindset first? Now, it isn’t sexy, not by any stroke of the imagination. But what I know is that when I

✅ clear out the cobwebs up in my head,

✅ clear out all of the negative self-talk,

✅ clear out all of the judgments that I have on myself,

✅ clear out all of the comparisons,

that’s when I’m going to start making some serious changes because I can’t outrun my mind.

But I know I can outrun the next person on the treadmill 😉, I can probably out-diet somebody, but I can’t outrun the coo-coo that lives in my head. And we all have that coo-coo that lives in our head it only seems to comes out when you’re trying to do something different. It’s that voice that say you shouldn’t even try. You suck, you’ve been done this road before and failed why try!

I always challenge my clients, and I tell them if I focus on my mindset the body is going to follow.

What happens is when you start with diet and exercise and you’re like, “This is great! This is awesome! I’m doing amazing!” But there is always going to be a roadblock, there is going to be a challenge that comes up and your mind is going to tell you, “You know girl, how many times are you going to go down this road? How many times are you going to try? How many times are you going to fail? How many times are you going to make this perfect when it’s not perfect? How many times are you going to be let down and disappointed?” That inner voice starts talking louder and louder. And even though you feel great you’re making progress, your mind can find a way to knock you down just like that.

The challenge: Start where you are

I want you to get away from the focus of how fast things are coming, because that’s one of the first things that always knocks people off track.

When it comes to starting down the path of mindset, please know that mindset isn’t one of these things like, “Oh, in 30 days I’m going to have a brand-new mindset.” that’s not how it works. Working with my clients I use the Arthur Ashe quote as my framework “Start where you are.”

Arthur Ashe Questions

I want you to sit down and just say, where am I? When you start down the diet road, what are the obstacles that jump out at you first? What are the excuses that you say about yourself? How far down the path do you get before you get squirrely? And by ‘squirrly’ I mean are you four weeks in before you start questioning, “Is this working? Am I getting results?” When do you start to press the freak out button and start feeling like, “I’m not getting the results from my efforts”? At what point have you experienced that in the past?

These are the obstacles I want you to focus on.  “Here are my known obstacles, here are my known excuses” so that when they pop up you can start to build the toolkit to bust through all of the lies, all that malarkey and just be able to say, “You know what, it’s my mind trying to stop me from taking things to the next level. It’s my mind trying to keep me safe.” 

As humans we like certainty. We want to know that when I close my eyes at night the sun is going to rise. You want to know that there are 24 hours in a day.  As you go through each step of getting healthy and fit you want to know. “How am I going to react on each step?” This is where the work comes. And that’s why most people don’t want to do it; IT’S WORK. It’s not this “take this pill wake up in three days and you’re going to be down 40 pounds.”

Do the work

Trust me, my life would be so much easier if I said, “Take two of these and call me on Friday.” I wish, but that’s just not how it’s going to be. Here is where that inner work comes, and that’s where most of us slip up. It’s our society, we want to snap our fingers versus have to ride through the uncomfortable parts, the feeling of the unknown. But if you’re able to do that, trust me, on the other side is going to be the results that you want. It’s going to be what you want. It is going to be that blue sky. But you’ve got to go through the dark forest first in order to get to that blue sky.

Define your sustainable success

I want you to think about how you define success, I want you to break free of your past self. I don’t want you to be like, “Back in high school I weighed 138 pounds” and you’re now 40. It might happen, but let’s just break up with old high school you. Instead let’s say, “In the last five years I’ve weighed this.” Or, heck, throw the scale out and just say, “In the last five years I’ve been a size blah, and I want to go back to being that size.” Then, I want you to take it to the next level – in order to be that size, what are you willing to do long-term?

If you want to get down to a size 10, size 8, what am I willing to do? Am I willing to do it for the next five years in order to get there? Because a lot of times people get to that size and then they’re like, “I can do whatever I want now.” And then gradually they creep back up. I want you to think about whatever you chose it has to be sustainable, and that sustainability starts in your mind.

We are always going to be working on our mindset. As you knock down one barrier, another barrier is going to pop itself up. It’s just a constant building of that toolbox in order to get that bulletproof mindset that instead of wallowing for a couple of days you might wallow for a couple of hours or what used to take you out for days isn’t even a blimp on the radar anymore. I don’t want you to think that all of a sudden, you’re this bullet proof Wonder Woman, deflecting all of your obstacles and challenges. 

You’ve got to move

The second piece is MOVEMENT. Now, I’m not talking balls to the wall kind of workouts. I’m just talking moving your body. And if we think about it, in our society we don’t move as much as we used to move. 20 years ago – which was a short period of time – we walked a lot more. There weren’t remote controls, you cranked your window by hand – it was a luxury, an option that sometimes you decide you didn’t want to pay for to have power windows, so you cranked your windows.

And when you hear people say these little things like – “get more movement in your day, take the stairs. If you work in a corporate environment go to the bathroom the furthest from your desk.” All those little things add up, those are active daily living. Why do you think the Fitbits and the activity trackers are so popular? It’s not because the Fitbit https://amzn.to/2AJxRqh is pretty; it’s because we don’t move.

I do a lot of work in corporate environments. I go in and teach group fitness classes in companies, and a lot of the companies over the last few years have adopted more standing desks because fidgeting, that’s movement, or pacing, that’s movement. While you are the standing desk, you’ll do more fidgeting than you would sitting in a chair.   Fidgeting burns 29% and 38% more calories than just sitting in a chair. Those little acts of daily living add up.

If you have a dog, you’re definitely going to be out at least two times a day with the dog. If it’s a puppy you’re out way more if you’re trying to potty train it. Little things that add up and you will get a lot of bang for your buck. 

Are you getting 10,000 steps? And if you aren’t, what can you do to get those 10,000 steps? I’m at 12,000 steps today, and some days I can hit 30,000 steps and some days I can hit 5,000 steps. It’s very telling about what kind of day I had with those two types of steps.

Enjoyment and satisfaction

After you get mindset and movement down THEN we can focus on food, and I know you want me or any fitness professional to hand you over a magic fat-burning, calorie-torching food list. Here’s the thing – when you work with me, I’m not that type of coach that says, “Okay Susie, here is the ‘don’t eat this’ list and here is your meal plan for this week, and here are the foods you can have.” I don’t do that because this is what I know – you are a grown ass woman and you know what to eat. You know that super sizing it out at McDonald’s isn’t exactly the best thing for you. You all know that. It’s just a matter of helping you to figure out what’s the best thing for you.

I call 3 Meal Planning — satiation, satisfaction, satiety

The first thing I always say to people is we have to focus on the type of meal that you’re eating. And so, what that means is, do you have satiation with that meal? A big word to say do you feel full? Do you feel like you’ve had enough? Do you feel like you don’t need anymore?

Was your meal satisfying? Did you enjoy it? Enjoyment piece is not a physical thing,  my brain will tell me if what I just ate was satisfying.  My stomach can be stuffed, but my brain can say, “You know what, there are some cupcakes over there and I want one of those. I’m having one of those. It’s going down.” 

Eyes vs. Belly

And trust me, you’ve all been there. Think about it – you’re out to dinner and you’re like, “I’m so full, it was a great meal.” And then the waiter comes by, and restaurants knows that you eat with your eyes, they have a dessert tray that physically shows you a sample of dessert is versus handing you a piece of paper. Restaurants are smart.  I worked at a restaurant and we used to hand out a piece of paper. Then, we used to have one piece of the desserts on the cart, as soon as we started doing that I sold way more desserts than before. We get satisfied with our eyes even though our belly is like, “Oh girl, I can’t have no more”.

What I want you to focus on, as you’re putting together meals, I want your meals to feel satisfying and I want them to physically look satisfying. Why do you think restaurants spend so much time on the presentation of the meal? Because if it looks pleasing to my eyes it’s going to feel pleasing to my belly. So, I want you to think about, “I want something that gives me that quick hit of fullness, then I want that fullness to last and not just a few moments.  I want that fullness to last a couple hours so that I don’t feel like I’m always eating or always seeking food.

Maximize your nutrition

After that then I’m going to focus on caloric intake because I want to have maximum food from minimum calories, if that makes sense, I focusing on food QUALITY and not just  “This has X number of calories.” Then I’m going to say, “Does it satisfy me?” Because I know when you focus on X number of calories or X number of macros and you eat it and it’s not as satisfying, it doesn’t leave you full, guess what? You’re off looking for the next thing, and that sucks.

Beware of trigger foods. They are foods that trigger you to eat keep eating it’s food that you just can’t get enough of, it just hits all the taste buds in the right spot and lights up your brain like Christmas day. Pay attention those foods and do your best to not have them in your house.

When you’re building your menu focus on the foods that you’re going to eat. I want you to sit down and really think about what foods you find satisfying but are also filling. It’s like broccoli – minimum calories, but if you can eat more than a cup of broccoli…(I’m going to look at you funny because clearly there is something is wrong with you.)

Their is so much fiber in broccoli that most people can’t eat more than a cup of broccoli in a sitting. You might be able to eat several cups over the course of the day, but in NOT one sitting“. It’s satisfying, minimum calories, and with all that fiber in it, it’s going to stick with you for a while. So, I want to think about things in terms of that.

Create a meal daisy chain

As you go through your day those are the types of meals you want. But I also want you to think about meals being daisy-chained together. The first meal of the day can affect the rest of your day. Let me just backup and explain what that means. My first meal, if it doesn’t hit on all those buttons, (satiation, satisfaction, satiety)

If you don’t feel full, satisfied or if your hunger comes quickly back.  That’s going to set you down this avalanche of seeking and nibbling.

I know for me, it’s eggs – sometimes if I’m traveling and I’m not in my normal environment sometimes the only choice I have is eggs. And eggs for me, they are not very satiating. I can eat three to four eggs and probably within an hour or two I’m like, “What’s next?” I’ve done it all, I’ve put in vegetables, I put toast, I do all the things to make that meal way more filling and way more satisfying, and it doesn’t do it for me. So, when I have eggs first thing in the morning it sets me down the snowball of, I can’t eat enough of other foods. And so, you might have foods like that, or now I’ve raised your awareness may start thinking about, “Do I have foods that do that for me?”

That first meal of the day doesn’t have to be breakfast. I know that some people are into the intermittent fasting and all that other stuff, that’s fine. But whatever that first meal of the new day is, I want you to make sure it hits on all three Ss

  • Does it make you feel full?
  • Does it stick with you?
  • Is it satisfying to the brain?

Let’s make sure we are not maxing out on our calories. If you think about it, it’s like Denny’s or Applebees, they’re all over the internet like, “If you eat this breakfast, you’ve eaten breakfast for five people.” I don’t want those kinds of breakfast if you feel me. 😉

Plan your success

That’s where the meals come in. It flips meal planning on its head a little bit so that your focus more is making sure you are full versus, “I need this many calories or this many macros of carbs and this many macros of protein.” It’s focusing on making sure by the end of that meal you are not hungry, you are not craving, and your energy isn’t in the toilet. Makes sense?

Work it out

The last piece is the workout. So many people want to solve the eating problem with the workout. It makes me crazy when I hear people say, “Last night was a bad night. I’m just going to sweat it out on the Stair Master. Or I’m going to not eat today” 🤦🏽‍♀️It makes me crazy when I hear that. You can’t outrun a bad diet. If you ate it, you own it, the end. You ate. You own it. Move on. I hope you enjoyed it, next.

Working out is not about, “I need to kill myself. I need to work so hard that I feel like my heart is going to pop out of chest. I need to work so hard that the next day getting off the toilet is hard for me.” No. I want you to focus on quality. I want you to say, “If I could get in three to four awesome workouts I’m winning.” Now, when I say awesome, it’s awesome for that day, because some days you feel like you could lift a Buick, other days scanning your card at the front desk is all that you can do. Each day you work out check in with your body and go with how your body feels on that given day.

And that’s how we’re going to flip dieting upside down. That’s how you’re going to break free of chasing skinny. That’s how you’re going to say, “I can live a happy life with an occasional cocktail and have cream in my coffee.” 🥰 It starts with having good habits, creating these small little habitual wins that are going to help you create routines. Having a great routine gives you the courage to keep going so that eventually you’re able to get this consistency.  And it’s the consistency that’s going to get you the results. It’s not these hit or miss endeavors that you do here and there and every once and a while it’s like, “What can I do on a day-in and day-out basis for the next five years for the rest of my life?”

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Do You Want To Find More Free Time?

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Not all of these will be applicable to your life — choose the ones you can apply and give them a try:

Take a time out. You physically block time out on your calendar. Block off at least an hour. Several hours or half a day is better. A whole day would be awesome. A weekend would be even more ideal. This year I’m challenging myself to block off one weekend per month to just do whatever the heck I want!  

How would you get to where you’ve always wanted to be? What do you enjoy doing, but don’t have enough time to do? What things actually fill up your day? Are there things you could drop or minimize to make more time? We’ll look at some of these things in the following items, but it starts with taking a time out to think and plan.

What are your non-negotiables? What is it that you love to do? Make a short list of 4-5 things. These are the things you want to make room for.

I make my non-negotiables so simple that I can EASILY do them without much effort.

How are you wasting time? I’m so guilty of this and this one of my biggest goals for this year. I’m working on, not letting the day to get away from me. How much time will your non-negotiables? Take a close look at these things and really think about whether they’re necessary, or if there are ways to reduce, minimize or eliminate these things. Sometimes you do things because you assume they’re necessary, but if you give it some thought you can find ways to drop them from your life. What are straight up timewasters? — maybe too much social media, Netflix, too many coffee dates, scrolling through email. You’re going to want to minimize these time-wasters to make room for the more important stuff, the stuff that makes you happy and that you love to do.

Schedule the time. As you sit down and think about your life and what you want to do, versus what you actually do. The goal is to find ways to free up time. Each week sit down with a blank weekly schedule (you can just write it out on a piece of paper or use your calendar) and assign blocks for the things you love — the stuff on your essentials list. If you want to exercise, for example, when will you do it? Put the blocks of time on your schedule and make these blocks the most important appointments of your week. Schedule the rest of your life around these blocks. I do this weekly and it’s been the best thing ever. This way I don’t skip a workout.

Consolidate. We live in a busy world. There are many things you do.  Consolidate your time. Instead of running one or two a day, do them all in one day to save time and gas. Email can be HUGE time suck! Pick 1-2 times/during the day and batch process your email instead of checking and reading and responding throughout the day.

Cut out meetings. 67% of all executives consider meeting to be a waste of time.  Meetings take up a lot of time to get across a little information, or to make easy decisions that could be made via email or phone. This may be asking the meeting organizer if you can get the info in other ways. If so, you’ve saved yourself an hour or so per meeting (sometimes more).


Declutter your schedule. I use to jam pack my day and it left very little for fun or spontaneity! You are going to have to  weed out your schedule so that it’s not so jam-packed. Find the stuff that’s not so essential and cancel them. Leave big blank spaces in your schedule.


Re-think your routine. Often we get stuck in a routine that’s anything but what we really want our days to be like. Is there a better way of doing things? You’re the creator of your life — make a new routine that’s more pleasant, more optimal, more filled with things you love.


Learn to say no. No is a complete sentence. You can easily say no without coming up with an excuse. How many times have you said yes and really regretted it. This is where I challenge to go with your gut and break free of the people pleasing so that you have a little more time freedom for yourself.


Keep your list to 3. This was a game changer for me!! If you were like me you’d have a to do list as long as your arm! Then feel disappointed when you didn’t get it all done!!  Over the past few years I started to make my to do list only have three Most Important Tasks that I want to accomplish that day. By keeping my task list small, I’m getting the most important stuff done but not overloading myself.


Do your Biggest Frog first?