111: How to Succeed In Fitness During The Holidays

Introduction 

You're listening to Biceps after Babies radio episode number 111.

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, wife, and mom of four.  Each week, 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.

How to feel good after the holidays  0:48

Hey, hey, hey, welcome back to another episode of biceps after babies radio. I'm your host, Amber Brueseke and we are going to dive in today talking a little bit about the holidays because it's that time of the year, we just wrapped up Halloween, and we're rolling into Thanksgiving season, and then comes Christmas and then comes the new year. And it's that time of the year that is known for indulgence. It's that time of the year that's known for a lot of women equated to the time when you gain weight, and then we hit New Years, and then the new year's resolutions come out and then the weight loss starts and you know, wash, rinse, repeat, many of us have been familiar with that, that pattern over and over and over again. And so I thought it would be a good thing to record a podcast episode and have a chat about how to succeed during this time, how to end up in January, and look back and be happy with how the last couple of months went. Because I know for a lot of women, they get to January and they're like, oh, I can't believe it like, gained 10 pounds, I can't believe here I am, again having to start over and that's not my goal. My goal is always for you to be intentional and to be able to make a goal, you know, have an idea of where you want to go, and then reverse engineer the process to get you there. Now, we'll talk more about this. But that doesn't necessarily mean that weight loss has to be your goal. Rather, I'm way more concerned about you getting to January and feeling good about the last couple of months. And that's going to like what needs to transpire between now and January is gonna look different for everybody. But I don't really care what it looks like, I just want it to be intentional. And I want you to be thinking ahead and creating the future and the reality that you want to create.

Fact: Women are aware to gain weight over the holidays  2:36

So I will say that when I was doing one to one coaching, I started out with one to one coaching and you know, just offer coaching packages to anybody who wanted it at any time of the year. I was always surprised I remember, the first time that we went into the holidays, I was like, yeah, things are probably going to die down. Right, people don't want to start a fitness program or weight loss program right before the holidays. And maybe some of you are in the fitness industry and maybe you have that experience. That was not my experience, I always saw an uptick in the number of clients who wanted to work with me starting in October, November, December. And the reason was that many of those women knew that their disposition, they knew that their pattern in the past had been to gain weight over the holidays. And so they wanted to curb that tendency or that past pattern by investing in coaching to help them lose during that time. So, you know, if they were focusing on losing, then they likely would not be gaining the 10-15 pounds that they had typically gained every single year prior to that. So I actually saw an uptick in the number of people who wanted to work with me over the holidays, which is kind of counterintuitive to what I thought I thought most people would not want to think about food over the holidays.

Struggle to find balance  3:49

But that's an area that a lot of women struggle with. And it's an area that a lot of women struggle to find that balance that in the middle of not right we think about the two extremes. One is like being really hard-nosed and you know sticking to your macros and only eating and things that are like pushing you towards the goals that you have. And then the other extreme is like you only live once right YOLO enjoy the holidays. Like it makes us happy, all the food, like eat it all and just throw your hands up in the air. Right, so those are kind of the two extremes that we could have. We could choose to have to go into the holidays, you know, typical all or nothing thinking. And I love that there is a middle ground and if you have been around the podcast for any amount of time, you probably recognize that I'm kind of a middle ground kind of girl. I'm not really big on extremes like I'm lairs moderation, there's a middle ground, and I just think living in that middle ground is such a powerful place to be. And so that's what I want to help you to find. I want to help you find what your middle ground looks like, where you get to January and you feel good about it, you're like, Yes, the last couple of months went the way that I wanted them to go, that you set an intention, and you follow through with that intention. And so that's my goal, to kind of sit here and have a chat about what the next couple of months are going to look like for you. And how you can be intentional about creating that in a way that feels really good. And it feels real, you know, balanced to you moving forward.

Steps on how to succeed in fitness during the holidays   5:30

So I have a couple of steps that we're going to go through, it's actually four steps, I had to count them. Four steps that we're going to go through that will hopefully get you thinking, sparked some thoughts and an intention about the next couple of months so that you're really creating a plan that's going to work for you. If you know anything about me, anything about my program, anything about the way that I coach, it's all about creating a plan that works for you, customizing a plan that works for you. And when we come to the holidays, it's the same thing like this needs to work for you. And for those of you who are inside Macros 101 or have heard me talk about it, I talked about how when we build our plan, it needs to be effective and enjoyable. Those are the two overlapping circles, you think about a Venn diagram, and they're effective and enjoyable. And then there's an overlapping part where you can have a plan that's effective and enjoyable,  that's what we want to find. But then in customizing that plan to you, we need to take into consideration your body, whatever your goals are, and whatever your lifestyle is. So those are the three pieces and you think about three overlapping circles, of finding in the middle where those three circles overlap, where you're taking into consideration your unique body, you're taking into consideration your unique goals and your unique lifestyle. Now we can create a plan that fits those three areas and is really going to be the best plan for you. And so that's what I want to help you create is that plan that's going to work for you over the holidays.

Step 1: Consider maintenance over the holidays  7:03

So the first thing that I want to talk about and consider is maintenance. So for a lot of women, they go into the holidays, and the pattern in the past has been gaining. And they come on the other side of the holidays heavier than when they started. And that's a regular pattern that they have followed into. And so for many women, maintaining over the holidays is a really awesome goal. And we don't jump from like I usually gain over the holidays to I need to lose over the holidays. But just jumping into, hey, I want to maintain during this period of time. Because when your goal is maintenance, that looks very different, and you have a lot more wiggle room than when your goal is a cut or trying to lose weight.

What is maintenance?  7:53

So when I say maintenance, what do I mean? Well at maintenance, you are eating the amount of calories that you are burning. So you are eating the same amount of calories and burning the same amount of calories. And because of that your body doesn't lose or gain weight. It just maintains. And it's a beautiful place. And it's a place that we really should be spending a lot more time and then most women are spending. So if you're someone who you're going into holidays, and maintaining would be a huge win, or it's where you want to be it's what you want to do during the holidays. How do you do that? How do you figure that out?

Estimate your metabolism  8:31

Well, one way to do it is to estimate if you don't know what your metabolism is, like right now, if you have no idea what your total daily energy expenditure is, you can estimate it via a calculation. So if you have not downloaded my free guide to be able to set your macros in that guide, I talked about how to calculate your TDEE or your total daily energy expenditure. So that download is at www.bicepsafterbabies.com/setmymacros. But here's something that's important to recognize. And too few people understand this. If you take an equation, and you calculate your TDEE, it is an estimation at best. It's a number that an equation spits out so it's a good way to estimate your TDEE. That does not mean that that is your TDEE. And a lot of people get really confused about this. Your actual TDEE and what an equation says is your TDEE are not the same thing. So does it give us a place to start if you don't know what your TDEE is? Absolutely. Okay. But it is only an estimation, what is the best way to figure out your TDEE is via the data, via tracking and tracking what you're eating and tracking the results that you get and being able to look at those numbers and say Hey, I'm eating this amount of calories, I mean, these macros, and here are the results I'm getting I'm maintaining, that tells us what your actual TDEE is. So if you've gone through a reverse diet, and you've hit maintenance, that's your TDEE, I don't care what the equation says, I don't care how far off the equation is, your TDEE is the amount of calories you can eat and continue to maintain. Okay, so that's a really important thing to understand is yes, we can use equations, and they're great for a starting point. But what's really going to give you the information that you need is tracking what you're eating, and see the results that pop out on the other side. So it's a great idea to have those data points over the holidays, and continue to track not necessarily as a way to limit yourself.

Tracking and weighing as pieces of data  10:54

I think a lot of times here, we're gonna go on a side tangent. Come along with me on a side tangent. I think a lot of times people equate tracking and weighing their food, with restriction. There's like a connection in your brain that thinks tracking and weighing your food is all about restricting calories. It's all about restricting food. It's all about not eating the stuff that you want to eat. And I think it's interesting how our brains jumped to that conclusion because tracking and weighing your food can be used for restriction? Absolutely. Is it often used for restriction? Absolutely. A lot of diets use it in order to restrict you. Absolutely. But that does not mean that that is inherently what it is for, or the only thing that it can be used for.  And so what I like to coach my clients through, is really starting to look at tracking and weighing as pieces of data, of understanding what you're putting into your body so that when you start to get results, and when I say results here, let's take a pause here too.  When I say results, most people automatically think of the results that they want, like positive results, like weight loss, like weight loss is a result. Gaining weight is not a result, or maintaining weight is not a result, no, no, no. Those are all results. Results are just what happened. So a result could be that you gain weight, it could be that you lost weight, it could be that you maintain it, those are all results. And when we get really clear about what we're putting in, and then the results that we're getting, we can start to figure out how we can manipulate what we put in to manipulate what comes out. Okay. So this is the idea of putting on our macro scientist hat to be able to figure out what causes what, that's essentially what you're trying to figure out.

Find clarity instead of restricting 12:42

So, back to this idea that we often equate tracking and weighing with restriction. I don't necessarily want you to restrict, I just want you to get clarity. And there's an opportunity, especially over the holidays, to just have a better understanding of how many calories are in things. How much fat is in something? And just opening your eyes to it. There's nothing wrong with you drinking two cups of eggnog. So nothing wrong with you like going to a party and indulging in your favorite holiday treats. However, how awesome is it to be able to know how many calories are in that and then you get to make the really informed decision. Is that worth it to me? Again, this is not a moral judgment. This is not like you're good if you eat it and you're not good if you don't, but you get to make a really informed decision like dang eggnog is super good. I don't know, do you like eggnog? I love eggnog. I like to cut it though I don't even know if that's a thing. I cut it with milk. Cuz it's like too thick. Like the consistency is too thick. So I actually like to take my eggnog and do like half skim milk and like half eggnog now because I want to cut down the calories but because to me it just tastes better. Like I want it thinned out a little bit. Anyway, that's a side note. But I know that for me eggnog is worth it. Like it is worth it to me. But I have that knowledge.

Data points  14:07

And so what would happen in your journey, and this applies if you're in a cut or anything if you just started to look at tracking and weighing as again as data points. And when you went over, that's also a data point. It's not bad. It's not good, just use went over your gear set macros, but that data is still valuable. See what happens is most people set their macros and then if they aren't going to hit them then they don't track, we're so funny how we try to game the system. Like if they're gonna go over or they're not going to hit their numbers, then they just stop tracking. like as if it doesn't count after that. But what you miss out on if you do that is you miss out on that data. So how much more valuable what we just at least have that data and how that even an estimation would be better than nothing because we can look at those data points and see how it's affecting the results that we're getting. Okay?

Keep track of your intakes  15:05

So we kind of got on this tangent from this idea of eating, maintenance, and figuring out what your maintenance is. So we can do that through, you know, if you've been in a cut doing a reverse diet, we can do that from, if you just know your maintenance, maybe you already know it. A good way to figure out your maintenance, if you haven't really been tracking or maybe intentionally losing weight, you just kind of have been living, a good way to figure out your maintenance is to just track your normal intake, and figure out how many calories approximately you are eating every day. And that's likely around your maintenance, if you have been, you know, maintaining your weight, you're likely eating around your maintenance. Or you can use an equation to calculate your TDEE. But I love the idea of eating around maintenance during the holidays, I think it allows again, for that flexibility, you don't have to be as strict, you have a little bit more wiggle room, you obviously can fit more treats and more holiday facilities in. And it just allows you to, again, just maintain over this time, and you know, go into the new year and be able to make whatever decisions you want to make in the new year about the next steps. Okay, so that was number one.

Step 2: Identify your non-negotiables  16:14

Number two is to list your personal non-negotiables. And when I say non-negotiables, I mean, what is important to you? What is the priority for you? We get in trouble when we have competing priorities when we have two things that feel really important to us. And yet they feel like sometimes they're at odds with each other. For example, sometimes we can feel like it's at odds, I want to lose weight, I want to hit my macros. But the other part of me really wants to not miss out on the holiday goodies. And so it can feel like I have two priorities, hitting my macros, and enjoying the holidays. And sometimes it can feel like those are in competition with each other. So whenever I feel like things need to be either A or B. I reject that. And I asked myself, what would need to happen for me to either have A and B or to have C? Like what's another option with giving me I don't like those two options. Give me option number three. And so we can start to ask ourselves the question, How can I do both? How can I hit my macros and be able to enjoy holiday goodies? What would need to happen for this to be both ends rather than an either-or? That's a really good question to start to ask yourself, if you ever start to feel like, Well, part of me wants this. But then part of me wants this and they're in competition with each other. You can ask yourself the question like, like, how could I do both? What would have to happen for me to be able to do both? What would it have to look like? What could it look like for me to be able to do both?

Just pick one  18:09

And then if you still feel like those things are at odds, and you can't figure out a way to do both. You can't figure out a way for them to coexist or for them both to work, then here's the second powerful question to ask yourself, is, if I force you to pick one, and you can only have one, which would you pick? So let's take the example that I gave. I can either hit my macros, or I can enjoy the holidays. Okay, so those are the two choices and you feel like I can't make these both work together. And I ask you the question, well, you can if you could have one, you could hit your macros, or you could enjoy the holidays. And you can only pick one, what would you pick? And that question gives you a lot of clarity in what is actually a bigger priority to you. And I think one of the biggest, like, I don't know, roadblocks, things that we run through life, just kind of on autopilot is not recognizing what our values are, and not prioritizing the things that are actually a priority to us. And so when you can take two things that are two parts of you that feel like they're competing, and you can ask yourself a really good question to figure out which is actually a bigger priority to you. That gives a lot of clarity moving forward. So if I said would you rather lose weight over the holidays or enjoy the holidays and you have to pick one, what comes up for you? Now, I'm not saying you can't do both. I'm just saying if you really feel like there is no way for these two things to coexist, and they're competing against each other. If you don't pick which is the priority, you're gonna stay in that limbo. You're gonna stay feeling like you have an angel on one side and a devil on the other. And that my friends are what feels stuck, feels like, feeling like, I just have to stay in this limbo because I can't have both, and I haven't prioritized one or the other. And so picking what is a priority to you is such a valuable exercise.

Our priorities vary from 20:16

Now, what's a priority to me, is going to be completely different than what's a priority to you which is why it's so valuable to ask yourself that question and to recognize, again, we're building a customized plan for you. And that means you need to figure out what your non-negotiables are. Is it a non-negotiable to eat a certain pie at Thanksgiving? Is it a non-negotiable for you to not track your food on Christmas Day? Is it a non-negotiable for you to be able to like you look forward every year to having eggnog? Like, what is a non-negotiable for you? And then conversely, what is not that important to you? That's also a really good question. Because I think sometimes we do things because they're there but they're not really that great. Like, for example, I'll give you an example. Christmas sugar cookies. In my opinion, they're not worth it now. Okay, this is my opinion. But for me, like Christmas sugar cookies, I don't even really like them. They're, there's like a solid fine at best. And so if I hadn't had that clarity, and like understanding that, like, it's really not that big of a deal to me to eat a Christmas sugar cookie, you know, what happens? Like, sometimes they're just there, and you just eat them because just because like, somebody dropped them off, right? Somebody gave you a Christmas sugar cookie, and you just eat it.  And then you're like, why did I eat that it wasn't even really that good. And so I recognize for me, eggnog is worth it. Sugar Cookie, not worth it. Maybe like a, you know, a specific if there was like a specific sugar cookie I like then I would eat that sugar cookie.

Being intentional on what you will include  21:55

But this is why walking through hey, these are the things that are important to me. And these are the things that are really not important. It is really not important to me, so I don't know, fill in the blank, whatever, eat candy, but the day after Halloween, but it's really important for me to eat candy on Halloween. Doesn't matter what it is, you just need to get clear on what your non-negotiables are. And when you get clear on that, then you can be very intentional moving forward about what you include. So when you go to Thanksgiving, and your aunt brings your very favorite rolls that you've been looking forward to all year. And you've already decided one of my non-negotiables is I'm going to have four rolls at Thanksgiving and you've decided that ahead of time, then you go into that and you eat the rolls. And it's like that was your decision, it was a conscious choice. You enjoy them and you keep going forward. And you skip all that emotional crap, skip all the guilt and the shame, it was intentional, and you made a decision. And so getting clear on what your non-negotiables are, and then creating your plan around those is incredibly valuable.

Step 3: Build a plan for success 23:00

Okay, number three, is we're actually going to build a plan for success. And this is one of the like, things that are kind of like, Well, duh. But I can't even tell you how often I hear women going into situations without a plan. or, even worse, their plan is, I'm just gonna try harder. Just gonna have more willpower, just gonna do it. I'm just gonna go to this holiday party, and I'm just not going to eat. And that is not a strategy. Just trying harder is not an effective strategy. Just like being like, I'm gonna wing it, I'm just gonna see what happens is not an effective strategy. And so what would happen if you actually, like had a plan, and were able to execute on that plan? How much more powerful would you feel? How much more in control would you feel? How much more intentional would you feel? And then more importantly, how would you feel after it was over? And so building a plan seems real duh. But it's one of the most valuable things that you can do. And so let's talk about some of the most effective ways to build your plan. Because your plan again is going to look different than someone else's.

1. Start with the end in mind 24:22

The first thing when you're building your plan is to start with the end in mind. Okay. And one of the things that I hear when I ask people, What's your goal like you're going to this party, What's your goal? If they state a goal that is not binary, is not actually like a finish line. Meaning they don't really know what success is or what success isn't. They're like, you know, I want to come home from the party and feel good, okay. But that's such an ethereal way to describe it like how will you know if you feel good? Oh, I'll just know when I'm there. No, no, no, you won't know you won't. So instead, how can we make this really concrete so that we can create a plan that's going to achieve that goal?

Identify metrics to define your success  25:14

So here's a question that I like to ask clients to bring things from the ethereal to the concrete. And that is the question: How will you know? So if your goal is to, I want to come home and feel like I enjoyed the party? Awesome. How will you know that you enjoyed the party? Like, what are we using? What are the metrics that we're using to define success? And when you can actually create metrics to define your success, you're going to be so much better suited to be able to create a plan that will get you there. It's like, if you are, imagine you had a dartboard in front of you, and you had a dart in your hand and somebody like, blindfolded you, and was like, just, you know, shoot towards shoot forward. Just shoot forward as well as you can. And so you throw the dart, and you like, don't even know where it goes, you just because you have nothing that you're aiming for. Whereas if you take the blindfold off, and you like to see, okay, this is where I want to go. When you throw the dart, it doesn't mean you're necessarily always going to go exactly that way. But aren't you going to get a whole lot closer when you actually have like a laser focus of here's what success is? And now I can point my eyes, I can point my gaze, I can do things to set myself up for success for hitting that goal. But if your goal is not defined, it's going to be really challenging, and you are probably never going to cross the finish line. And that gets really discouraging for a lot of people. So ask yourself the question, how will I know when I'm there? So what does success look like for you? How will you know if you're there?

Recap on the 1st way of building a plan  26:57

So we start with the end in mind, just like Stephen Covey said, figuring out how you want to feel, or what success would be, at the end of the year, at the end of a party, at the end of your day today, at the end of the week, like wherever you're setting your intentions or your sights on what would be a success, and how will you know you're there. So if we're thinking in January, January 1, take yourself out to January 1, what would be a success for you? How will you know that the last three months were successful? What will tell you, you were successful? So that's a really good question to ask.

2. Reverse engineer the plan 27:34

So then, once we've created, we figure out what the end is, we figure out what success is, then we can start to reverse engineer the plan that's going to get you there. And this is where you get to figure out okay, I want to feel successful. I want to feel like I enjoyed the holiday party. Okay, well, what will that take? What will the party look like for you? How will you know if you enjoyed the party? Well, I will have eaten, you know, one plate of food, but I won't have gone back for seconds. Awesome. Okay. It's very like concrete. I will know when I hit that. And I will know if I don't hit it. It's very binary. And so we can reverse engineer the process. Okay, so what needs to happen, what needs to be my plan? What tactics and strategies am I going to use going into the party to be able to accomplish that? And you can see how that becomes so much clear of like, yeah, I could totally implement some strategies to be able to make that happen.

3. Debrief the plan 28:27

And then here's the last piece that so many people miss, is you must debrief the plan. So what does that look like? It looks like creating a plan, and executing on the plan, and then debriefing and walking through what happened. This is the piece that most people miss. Because just because you go into, I'm sure I'm not the first person to tell you to go into a party with a plan. I can't be the first person that has thought of that. That doesn't mean you always follow the plan, though, right? Am I right? Sometimes you have a really great plan going in and then you go in and like then the plan goes to pot and then you don't actually follow the plan. Here's the piece that most people miss after that. Debriefing it which means walking through the experience walking through and pulling out the lessons that you learned during that experience. Because if you don't learn the lessons, you're going to continue to repeat them. The people who are successful people who are willing to sit there and learn the lessons, and that happens through a debrief process with yourself and I walk clients through what that debrief process looks like inside of Macros 101, but you can do it with yourself just walking through your experience. What happened? What were you telling yourself? What helped you? What didn't help you asking yourself these questions about figuring out why the plan didn't work? And what parts could you change? What parts can you improve? How could you do it differently next time to be able to get to a place where you are successful. So number three is building a plan for success and that includes starting with the end in mind, creating that plan, and then debriefing the plan one of the most important parts.

Step 4:Holiday is just actually a day 30:06

And then number four, my fourth tip is to remember that the holiday is actually just a day. So it's called a holiday, not a six week or eight weeks or 12 week period of time. And so, one day is never ever going to ruin your progress. Just like one perfect day is not going to make you ripped. We all know one day at the gym is not gonna like make you all the sudden up biceps, one day hitting your macros is not going to all of a sudden make you fit into the size jeans that you want to fit into, one day of not hitting your macros or one day not tracking or one day indulging is not going to mess you up. And so remembering that the holiday is a day, and I'm all about being intentional, you do what you want with your holiday. But I'm all about being intentional and enjoying that holiday for whatever that looks like for you and recognizing that holiday is just that day. And that's very different than that spreading out over like, yeah, December 19. That's also kind of like in the holiday season and also December 20, and also December 5 and like that whole time frame using that as you know, an excuse, or using that as like, well. It's the holidays, it's the whole time, it's very different than saying no, like, this is Christmas Day, it is one day of the year, and I'm gonna enjoy it and I'm going to spend time with my family and I'm going to eat the food that I want to eat. And that's like I'm going in with that intention.

Being intentional  31:36

Again, the last thing that I want to leave with this podcast is this idea of being intentional. I think so many of our problems would be solved. Our emotional problems with food or emotional like, problems with our bodies would be served and fixed if we were just intentional. I don't care what you eat on Christmas Day, I don't really care what you eat any day of the year, honestly, what I care about is that you made a decision to eat it and that you decided to do it. And life didn't just happen to you, it didn't just accidentally fall in your mouth, but you actually made a conscious decision. That's what I coach. So much of my coaching and my client work is around helping women to step into that place of power and feel that ownership and that responsibility and feel that empowerment comes from not judging, not labeling things good or bad. But simply making a choice, simply making a decision, and being able to step into that power to make that choice at any point.

Recap: Consider maintenance  32:45

Okay, so just to kind of recap the four tips that I gave you for navigating the holidays, and being able to build, again, a plan that's going to work for you. The first tip was considering maintenance doesn't mean that you have to do maintenance, I'm never going to tell you what you have to do. But consider it, it's a good idea just to even consider it. Consider maintenance, if you feel like that would be maybe a place that you would have a little bit more wiggle room if that would help you to get through the holidays. If your problem has been gaining weight on the holidays, throughout the holidays in the past, I would really strongly encourage you to consider maintenance. Jumping from like most months, most years you gain weight to trying to lose weight over the holidays, that's just setting you up for a recipe for disaster. But moving from Hey, I usually gained 15 pounds over the holidays to this month this year. My goal is to maintain my weight, that's a really good jump, a really good goal moving forward without jumping all the way to the other extreme of like, No, I want to actually lose 15 pounds this year, not gain it.

Recap: Listing non-negotiables  33:47

Number two is listing out your non-negotiables and just getting clear on what's important to you. What are your priorities and how can you make your choices align with your priorities and your values and nobody gets to pick that but you as your choice. Nobody gets to tell you what your values are. Nobody gets to tell you what you should care about and what you shouldn't care about. That is your choice girlfriend, you get to pick that and you're gonna make your decisions based on that. But when you feel like you have conflicting values, got it, you got to figure that out. If you let those conflicting values sit there, you will stay stuck until you figure it out. So we either need to figure out how to make those values work together, how to make those goals work together in sync with each other, how we can do both ends or you need to figure out which one's more important so that you can prioritize it.

Recap: Build a plan for success  34:39

Number three was to build a plan for success. We do that by starting with the end in mind defining what success is reverse engineering that plan that's gonna get you to that success, and then debriefing that plan afterward and pulling out the lessons that you learn.

Recap: Holiday is a day and not a season  34:54

And then number four, remembering that the holiday is a day and not a season. And just keeping that in mind as you create your plan and recognize that the holiday can look very different from the day before or the day after the holiday and one day is never ever going to ruin your progress ever. Just like one perfect day is not going to be the thing that saves you the thing that makes all the difference. And so we change transformation really in increments, it is a consistent long term process. One day, either way isn't going to make or break you. So enjoy the holidays. Make it intentional, make it what you want to make it.

Recap: Be intentional on what you choose  35:36

I remember when I was coaching clients one on one, and you know, I would talk to them about the holidays and what they were going to do for the holidays. My goal with them was always just to be intentional. Like I don't care if you want to go into Thanksgiving, and you want to literally like eat everything that you want, you just want to go into Thanksgiving, I want to eat every single thing that I want. Awesome, good for you go for it. Because that's being intentional, you're making a decision beforehand, you're being proactive, and you're being conscious about it, rather than having it happen to you. And being like oh, I lost all control. And like I eat all the things like the outcome can be the same. You can wake up the day after Thanksgiving and have eaten all the things. But the difference is, you know, one client chose, like chose that ahead of time and was intentional about that and one client hadn't happened to her. I just want you to be intentional about what you choose. And whether that means not tracking, whether that means eating all the things, whether that means stuffing yourself with seven pieces of pie, I don't really care doesn't even matter. What matters is that you made a choice that you chose to do that and you thought about it ahead of time. And you were intentional about what you wanted to create. That is always my goal. And especially when it comes to the holidays, being intentional with what you want to create.

Plans do not always gonna work, learn from it  37:05

And guess what, it's not always going to work. You're always going to do it, you're always going to follow through and that's okay. Because that's where the growth and the lessons come. That's where we dive into coaching. That's where I can help you through self-sabotage. That's how I can help shift those thoughts and beliefs and feelings in you when those things start to show up, they start to creep in. It's okay, doesn't mean anything just means you're human, and that we have some coaching that we can help to shift that. So don't get discouraged. Don't get discouraged if you create a plan and you don't follow through, learn the lessons there. And if you want help learning lessons, that's when coaching really comes in and can be really powerful in your journey. 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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