080: Step One in Your Fitness Journey – Live Coaching Session

Introduction 

You're listening to Biceps after Babies radio episode number 80. Hello and welcome to Biceps after Babies radio. A podcast for ladies who know that fitness is about so much more than pounds lost or PRs. It's about feeling confident in your skin and empowered in your life. I'm your host, Amber Brueseke, a registered nurse, personal trainer, online fitness coach, wife, and mom of four. My guests and I will excite and motivate you to take action in your own personal fitness as we talk about nutrition, exercise mindset, personal development, and executing life with conscious intention. If your goal is to look, feel, and be strong and experience transformation from the inside out, you, my friend are in the right place. Thank you for tuning in, now let’s jump into today’s episode.

0:48

Hey, welcome back to another episode of Biceps After Babies Radio, I'm your host Amber Brueseke, and today we have an extra special episode. So on Fridays, I've been going live on Instagram and I'm doing what I like to call Free Coaching Fridays. And this is where I bring a follower on, who has a question about their fitness journey. And I just simply coach them through the process just like I would do if you were a client of mine. And I love doing Free Coaching Fridays, it has been so fun to be able to connect with so many of you, and even those who just come and watch and listen and don't necessarily get coached one to one, always walk away with so much value that they can take and apply to their journey. Because the way that I coach clients is not giving advice. I don't think a good coach gives advice. I think a good coach helps you to ask yourself better questions than you're currently asking yourself. And so my job as a coach is to be able to hear what you're saying, hear some of the underlying beliefs that are causing you to have this question, and to help you to ask yourself a little bit better questions so that you can tap into the answers that are already inside of you. And because that's the way that I coach, even if you are not the one being coached one to one, you can start asking yourself the question that I'm asking the person who's on the call those questions, and you can start to reflect on how you would answer them and how that impacts your journey. And so I love coaching live, I think there is so much power in being able to have that that one on one moment with somebody where you can go back and forth as a coach and client.

And so what I decided to do was to be able to share the Free Coaching Friday that we just did this last Friday because I think that there is so much value in you hearing the process that I took Sara through. Now, Sara's question was specific to what a lot of people are feeling right now or what I'm hearing from a lot of you – that you're feeling and that is you're feeling a little bit out of control, a little bit of like, I don't know how to create a plan for success during this time when everything is uncertain. And that totally makes sense, right? A lot of us were in this time none of us have experienced this before. And we can kind of feel like Well, I don't know how I don't know how to create a lifestyle. I don't know how to create a routine that's going to keep me sane, right? Because that's important that you be sane and that you're going to enjoy and at the same time that is going to get me to the results that I want. And what I find from a lot of people is they think that is an either or, that either I can have a lifestyle I enjoy and you know feel balanced,  Or I can get results because in order to get results I have to do XY and Z, right? And I have to, it has to be hard, It has to suck, it has to be miserable. And so I have to pick, do I want to be miserable and get results or do I want to like enjoy my life and stay stuck at the you know weight I am at and that is a false dichotomy. It is not an either or choice. There is absolutely a space in the middle for an and that you can have a lifestyle. You love it. And that you can create it intentionally in a way that is going to be able to drive you towards the results that you want to create. And because I feel so strongly about this, and I and I feel like one of my superpowers is being able to help you to be able to create that plan, that is the happy harmony have both. It is a harmony of being able to love the life you have, and be able to enjoy the process and a harmony of being able to get you the results and being able to unite those two in a plan that is specific and customized to you.

Because the truth is that all diets that you're following are created by other people, right? Somebody else created the Whole 30 diet and they tell you the rules and they tell you what to do. But the person who created the diet, they don't know you. They don't know your life. They don't know how much time you're willing to spend. They don't know what food you like to eat. They don't know you know what is going on in your life right now. They don't even know like what specifically your goals or your body type is. And so they set these arbitrary rules. And then we're just expected to follow them and kind of cross our fingers and hope that it works for us. And I think that is the worst way to go through trying to achieve a goal. And you can sit there and you can spin your wheels and try to hop from diet to diet trying to find, quote, unquote, the best one for you. Or you can come to a place where you can gain the knowledge yourself to be able to create a plan that takes the boxes for something you enjoy and want to follow. And at the same time drives you towards the result that you want.

Alright, so we're gonna hop in to this coaching session that I did on Instagram with Sara, let's jump in.

Amber  7:32  

Hey.

Sara  7:35

I have three kids behind me because quarantine and no makeup on. So just forgive me.

Amber  7:44  

I just got back from working out and I'm like, you know what, it's it is what it is. We're in this together. Okay.

Sara  7:53

Yeah.

Amber  7:53 

So clarify your question a little bit, you're confused about.

Sara  7:56

I feel so confused about the whole macro counting. I feel like what, I don't know what my calories and like should be my calorie count should be. If I like the days that I work out harder than other days or not work out, that kind of thing.

Amber  8:12

Okay, cool. So let's get you some clarity on this. First things first, what is your goal?

Sara  8:17 

To lose weight?

Amber  8:19

Okay, so to lose weight and how much like how are you going to know when you're done?

Sara  8:24

I will lose like at least 20 pounds. I have three children, four and under my

Amber  8:33 

Bless you.

Sara  8:34

I know. My youngest baby is, He'll be a year next month, and I haven't been able to lose the weight. Well, one because I've been so busy and I haven't been taking care of myself, but I want to and then I look at macro counting and I get confused and I just feel a little bit overwhelmed.

Amber  8:51

Awesome. This is something that I hear all of the time. And I think one of the things that I helped clients to move through is that feeling of overwhelm, because when you are, when you sit and stay in overwhelm, you don't actually take action. And we all know that you don't get results if you don't take action. And so one of the things that I'm gonna do for you today and that I do with my clients is really getting granular on like the actual action that you can be taking. Because I want to I want to offer something to you. What Let's ask this question first. What action are you currently taking?

Sara  9:29

Well, yesterday, I ate super clean and I made a goal to either walk or jog or both three miles, which I can't jog three miles straight, but I just went outside and walked and then jog them. I mean, that was the action I took yesterday. We were trying not to become an overweight alcoholic during quarantine.

Amber  9:50  

Sure, yeah. Okay, so we know we're trying not to create

Sara  9:54  

Hmm.

Amber  9:56

So you said that you took that action yesterday. What was the action that you took the day before?

Sara  10:01

Nothing, I just wallowed in my self pity.

Amber  10:09

Okay, awesome. People can relate. Everybody is like, listening to you can relate. Like, I think one of the things that I want you guys to consider about this, like quarantine time about the time that we're all staying home and our kids are home and it's new and different. And something we've never experienced before is that, you know, when you hear this, this idea about falling off the horse, right, and when you fall off the horse, you're like, get back on the horse. And I think that's often we think that we shouldn't ever fall off the horse. We have this idea that like falling off the horse is a problem.

Sara  10:40 

Yeah.

Amber  10:40

And what I want you to consider is that falling off the horse is there's not a problem, like you're going to fall off the horse and that's okay. What you have control over is how quickly you get back on. So how long do you stay in wallow? versus how quickly you get back on and so that like just readjusting your expectations of like falling off the horse isn't a problem. It's not a problem. It's not bad. It's not anything it just is. And what is the best thing that you can do is, is see how fast you can get back on the horse. And honestly, the more often you fall off the horse, the more practice you're going to have getting back on.

Sara  11:17 

Yeah, good. No, I totally agree with that. And it's a good way to look at it not just like self sabotage for a whole week because they self sabotage for one day, you know, but I guess also, I low carb and, and whole 30. And I had all like, great results with that. But it's also before babies and I had time to, you know, food prep, I could go through the carb flu, blah, blah, blah. And I guess right now I'm just trying to figure out balance, like I have these moments where I'm like, if I drink a glass of wine or two glasses of wine, I'm never going to lose weight. If I have that piece of toast. I'm never going to lose weight if I you know, and then I just Get again. Cuz

Amber  12:02 

Yeah, so good. This is so good. Um, and this is, I don't know, if you were there at the very beginning when I was talking about the challenge, but I'm doing in two weeks. And this this is my point, especially during this time, especially in this time of life where you are, our default, our default is to, for most women is to like I need to lose weight. What diet Am I going to go on? Right? Am I gonna do whole 30? Am I gonna do keto? Am I gonna do Weight Watchers? Like, what am I going to do? And then I just follow this plan, and then I get results. And what you're feeling right now and experiencing is you're like, but I'm not at that point in my life. I have these three kids, like, I don't want to go through the carb flu like I don't want to, like it's not fitting in with your lifestyle right now. And so you're like, Oh, my gosh, what do I do? Right? Like, I don't have a plan to follow. That's gonna work for me right now. And this and this is the point that I was trying to make earlier is that I'm just trying to follow somebody else's plan. is like the worst way one to lose weight and really the worst, the worst way to lose weight and keep it off long term. And that's really what your goal is. And so what I want to help you get clarity on is what are some of the first steps that you can take to create a plan? That is a Sara?

Sara  13:11 

Yeah

Amber  13:16 

That's gonna be the right fit for Sara right now in the middle of quarantine with three kids. And whatever lifestyle you want to create right now. So the question that I want to start with, we already got clear, like what your goal is, your goal is to be able to create weight loss. And so now we have to start taking action in order to get you closer to that goal. I want to make the point that when we stay in overwhelm, we don't take action. And when we stay in overwhelm, it's for one of two reasons. When you are overwhelmed it is because you have a list of things that you think you have to do. And you have an amount of time that you believe you do not have enough time to do them in. And so when We can look at it like that. And we start to recognize that we have two ways to get over overwhelm. You can either pare down the list of things that you have to do. Or you can expand the amount of time that you feel like you have to do it in. So you said a couple of things that I want to go back to where you said in order to lose weight. I have to fill in the blank.

Sara  14:23

I have to not eat carbs. I have to, I mean, I said in order. Yeah, in order. I can't, I said I can't lose weight if I have two glasses of wine, if I have a piece of toast if I… yeah, yeah.

Amber 14:37

Yeah. So these are good. What else? You can't lose weight if you do what

Sara 14:44

I do. What if I okay, if I don't work out?

Amber  14:51 

Okay,

Sara  14:51

consistently

Amber  14:53 

Awesome.

Sara  14:53

If I'm not consistent, right. Um, if I eat, If I over-binge on snack eating and eat all my kids, snack them, okay? Not when they don't finish them. Okay? Um, I mean, there's so many.

Amber  15:14  

Okay. So one of the things that I think is really helpful is for you to get some clarity on all the things that you currently you already have beliefs, your beliefs about what it's going to take in order to get results. And first, just being able to get clear on that right like, I can't drink. I can't eat carbs. I have to work out. I have to be consistent. I can't eat my kids food, right? Like you just listen all those things like how fun does that sound?

Sara  15:37

That sounds not fun to me. It sounds not fun

Amber  15:40 

to do all of those things. Right? And and I want to offer to you have there ever been somebody who has lost weight? Who has been who hasn't been able to drink two glasses of wine while doing it?

Sara  15:53

Um, yeah, I'm yeah, I guess there has been I'm putting a filter on me because I just think Look Oh, bad, right, you're right.

Amber  16:02

Okay. Well, maybe I need a filer too. We're gonna roll with it. Um, so Has there ever been anybody who's lost weight without exercising?

Sara  16:13

Yeah, definitely.

Amber  16:14

Totally.Has there ever been anybody who has lost weight without cutting out carbs?

Sara  16:20 

Yes, yes. Okay, this goes back to like, I know it's, I know my mindset from previous times of when I lost weight. I did all the things that we named off. And then so now I'm like trying to figure out okay, well, when can I have a carb? You know? Or when can I have that glass of wine? Or if I work out this much am I eating? am I eating less? like am I not eating enough? You know what a

Amber  16:45

cool. Yes. I guess all of that confusion. am I eating too little am I eating enough in my work doing the right workouts like all of that confusion of like, I want to create a plan but I don't know how to create this plan that's actually going to move me forward. Right. Is that what I'm hearing?

Sara  16:59 

Yeah.

Amber  17:00 

Perfect. First of all, I mean, if you don't go and sign up for the challenge, like, I don't know if I can help you very much, this is what I'm going to walk you through, like the five days is exactly what you're saying is giving you clarity on like, yeah, I want to help you create a plan. And right now you're like, have all these questions about how do I create a plan that actually works. That's what we're gonna do in the five day challenge is we're going to walk through creating that plan for you, so that it will work for you. And not only will it work for your lifestyle, but it actually gets you results because that's where I feel like, there might be some resistance coming up as you're like, yeah, I can create some sort of plan, but I have no idea if that's actually gonna create weight loss, right? If I say, like, how much can I eat in order to still lose weight? And so there's those questions that come up of like, Oh, yeah, I'm cool with like, creating my own plan. But I also really wanted to cause weight loss, right?

Sara  17:49

Yeah, yes.

Amber  17:50  

Okay. Awesome. So www.bicepsafterbabies.com/fatloss is gonna be your next step after we get off this office chat, but for right now what I would love for you to do is to just start acknowledging where you are at right now. And once we acknowledge where we're at right now, then we can start to change it. And so the way that I'm going to offer up for you as a way to acknowledge where you are at right now is to simply start tracking what you're already eating. And the really, really important thing so do you have My Fitness Pal or a way to track your food?

Sara  18:26  

I do.

Amber  18:27 

Okay, cool. So I want you to pull up My Fitness Pal and I want you to track your food today. Now, this is super important for you and for anybody else listening. We have to be able to pull off the judgment glasses.

Sara  18:41  

Mm hmm.

Amber  18:42 

Okay, because as soon as people start tracking, they start judging. Right?

Sara  18:49

Yeah.

Amber  18:49 

Right. Like, oh my gosh, I shouldn't have eaten that cookie. Oh my gosh, I can't believe that. I eat a whole like I keep all my kids goldfish. Oh my gosh. Like I over ate. Five, you know five doughnuts today, right? And we start judging it as good and bad. Yeah, right. What are we gonna offer to you is that it is not good or bad. It's just what you currently are doing. And when you can start to acknowledge what you are currently doing, then you as Sara step into the power to change it. But what most of us try to do is we want to go through life with our hands over our eyes and not acknowledge what we're already doing. And then we think that we, by doing that are somehow going to be able to just like randomly magically transform and change our actions. By just ignoring them and pretending like they're not existing, right. You are currently eating food and you're currently exercising or not exercising, you're currently taking actions. And when you can start to step into that power of acknowledging where you currently are at. Now I as a coach can help you to create a step by step plan to be able to start to implement things One at a time to be able to move you towards your goal. And so the challenge that I'm going to give to you is for the next week, that's so we're starting here Friday, until the next Friday, you are going to track every single thing that you eat, and you are going to reserve judgment on it. So you eat seven cookies. You track seven cookies, because it is not bad. It just is what is it's what happened. And coming into that place of acknowledging it and owning your choice, right? You made the choice. Eat your goldfish. Awesome, right? Like you made that choice. That's cool, cuz you're a big girl. You're an adult and you can choose to eat your kids goldfish.

Sara  20:38

I don't like to be referred to as a big girl.

Amber  20:43

You are a grown woman who can choose to eat her kids go fish if she wants to. And when you can acknowledge that and not judge it. It's not good or bad. It really isn't. I know it just is when you can acknowledge that and track it and own it. Now, Sarah, I can help you to start to create little step by step goals to move towards what you want to create. And so is that something you are willing to commit to doing over the next week?

Sara  21:14 

Yeah, yeah, I think that oh, I mean, I feel like I'm in a really good place. As of yesterday, I made the whole day eating, what was clean. And then I actually did snack on some of my kids food. And I said, Well, okay, well, that's just what it is. I didn't tell you what's good or bad. So I'm in that headspace. And I'm trying to I think the biggest part of this whole thing is that I'm trying to not let food have power over me. You know, we have power over my food choices.

Amber  21:46

Yeah.

Sara  21:47 

But yes, I think I can do all of that.

Amber  21:49

Awesome. I want to touch on a little bit of language that I heard you use. You said that you accidentally ate something. Okay. You didn't you didn't accidentally eat anything. You made a choice to eat something else, and that that's a choice that you made. And so what I really want you to like, consider over this next little while because I think it's great that you're trying to eat clean. I don't think there's anything wrong with clean eating. But I do find that when we start to label food like clean, unclean, healthy, unhealthy, high carb, low carb, like we start to label food like that, it makes that acknowledgement very challenging because we start to judge, right, so we say, if I'm not eating clean, then I'm judging it as bad. And that's what I'm trying to help you to step away from. So what I would like you to consider is that it's awesome to like, include clean foods into your diet, but I would really challenge you to maybe step away from feeling like everything that you eat has to be clean, and instead saying I'm trying to include more clean foods into my diet, but it's not like I can only eat clean foods or they can eat anything else because then we step into a place of judgment. And for most people that ends up spiraling out because we can eat clean foods for Three days and we're so good and we're so strong, and then we mess up, we mess up, we accidentally eat something. And now because we've labeled that as bad, we've labeled that as something we shouldn't be doing. We spiral and we just end up eating all of the bad things and having to restart on Monday.

Sara  23:16

Yeah, yep. I have that. That's me!

Amber  23:20

Resonating a little bit?

Sara  23:21

Yeah.

Amber  23:22 

Okay. So let's just recap. Over the next week. What are you committing to doing?

Sara  23:31  

I'm committing to tracking my food.

Amber  23:35

Okay.

Sara  23:36

Not labeling food as good or bad.

Amber  23:38

Awesome.

Sara  23:39 

Yes, it is what it is.

Amber  23:40

Yep.

Sara  23:41

And what else did we say? Oh, I'm going to go to www.bicepsafterbabies.com/fatloss.

Amber  23:50

Yeah. Cool. Yeah, I think that is so awesome. And now what I'm going to tell you is at the end of this next week, Sara,

Sara  23:59 

yep

Amber  23:59

You are gonna have all of this data, all of this information of where you currently are at. And once we know where we're currently at and where you want to go, it's really easy to create a plan to close that gap. But what most people are doing is they have an idea of where they want to go, right, I want to lose weight, I want to gain muscle, I want to look a certain way, like they have an idea of where they want to go. But until you get an idea of where you're currently at, you don't know what actions you need to take in order to take that gap between those two places and close that down.

Sara  23:59

Yeah.

Amber  24:01  

Okay. So I, I want to acknowledge you because you were really honest and open and vulnerable about where you currently are at and when we can do that, I as a coach can then help step in and help you take the actions you need to take to get to that that end point you want. Okay.

Sara  24:47

Makes sense.

Amber  24:47  

Okay, so here's my last my last ask of you my last request of you.

Sara  24:52

Okay.

Amber  24:52

Next Friday, I expect in my DMS a DM from you giving me a Report of the last week.

Sara  25:01  

What is today, Friday?

Amber  25:03

Today's Friday. I know. It's like what the heck? What day is? So, uh, next Friday, I expect the DM and I just want you to fill me in on the last week. I don't need to know like, you don't just tell me every day what you ate. But I want you to fill me in on what you've learned over that period of time of tracking, starting today, all the way till next Friday and tracking everything that you eat, not just the things that you think that you should eat.

Sara  25:27

I can do that.

Amber  25:29  

Okay, awesome. Okay. I love it. Anything. Any other questions?

Sara  25:35 

Nope.

Amber  25:36

Okay. Thanks for coming on today, Sara.

Sara  25:38 

Yeah, thank you.

Amber  25:40

Alright, so hopefully that was helpful to you guys. I mean, I didn't plan that but I couldn't have planned a better chat about why it's so important to be able to know how to create a plan for you that's going to fit both with your lifestyle and like I talked to Sara about is actually going to get you results. Right. We we do want the results and so, so many things. People are like, but I don't know. I don't know which exercise I should be doing. I don't know how much carbs I should be eating. I don't know how many calories am I eating too much? You mean too little? How much exercise do I do with it? Like, do I track macros? Do I have to count calories? Like all the questions, right? And so that is what I as a coach can help you to get clarity in. And if you're kind of in the same spot as Sara and you're feeling like you're spiraling out of control, or you feel like now that you're home, you're eating all the things, I'm going to challenge you to do the same exact thing that I challenge Sara to do, and that is for the next week is to just start tracking and acknowledging and owning your choices. Because y'all, when we own our choices, you are now empowered to create new ones. And if we sit here we sit in victim mentality, which is that life happens to me and I don't have any control. And you know, I like accidentally ate things. That is the stepping into the victim mentality and as a victim. You are not able to enact change in your life. And so what I love to help clients do is to step into the creator role. And when we step into that place where we own and we acknowledge and we don't label or judge, then we are at a place where we are so empowered to be able to create new things in our lives. And that's what I want to be able to help you do, especially during this time when everything is so uncertain and the world is feeling so out of control. And there are things out of your control, like you cannot control COVID 19, you cannot control the economy, those things are without outside of your control. And at the same time, there are so many things that you can control. And when we step into that place of empowerment to control the things that we are able to control, you are able to have the sense of peace and a sense of ownership and a sense of being able to take care of the things that you can take care of. And that's just such a powerful place to be able to work from especially as we are all going through the crazy uncertainty that is the world today. So I hope that I see a lot of you guys in our challenge. It starts April 6, it will be five days. And I'll do exactly what I talked about with Sara, where are we going to take you step by step through creating the plan that actually gets you the results that you want. So if you go to www.bicepsafterbabies.com/fatloss you can sign up for that free five day challenge. And we'll be starting in about 10 days. So April 6. Thank you guys for being here. If you are here live, I love it. We continue doing these free coaching Fridays, every Friday for the next little while until you guys don't want to do them anymore. But 9am on Friday, I will catch you guys here next week. See ya.

Conclusion 28:36  

I hope that that was so helpful to listen to that coaching episode with Sara and if you are in any situation that is similar to her, I'm an extend you the same challenge that I extended her and those who are listening on Instagram and that is to take this next week to be accountable and to own the choices that you're making. And to do it without judgment that and I think for a lot of women, that's the hardest part, the hardest part is to start to remove that judgment. We always want to label things good or bad, we ate good today we ate bad today. You know, I kind of chided her a little bit about using the word accidentally. But recognizing that once you step into that power of acknowledging and owning the choices that you're making, then I can start to coach you on how we can create a new result up different than the one that you're currently creating. And again, that's what I'm going to cover in the free five day challenge next week that starts April 6, Monday, April 6, I will walk you through that process of getting a lot of clarity on what your own unique, customized fat loss plan can look like in order to have a lifestyle you love, and the results that you want to be able to get so if that's interesting to you definitely go to www.bicepsafterbabies.com/fatloss to be able to get registered for that free five day challenge and I hopefully will see you there starting next Monday. That wraps up this episode of Biceps After Babies Radio, I'm Amber. Now go out and be strong because remember my friend, you can do anything.

Outro

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