067: How to Believe Your Success is Inevitable

Introduction 

You're listening to Biceps After Babies Radio episode number 67. 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.

(00:49)

Hey, welcome back to another episode of Biceps After Babies. I'm your host Amber Brueseke and we are closing out 2019 today. I can't believe that we are hitting a new year, a new decade. 2020 is going to be a big year and I hope that you have big goals and big plans for it. I sure do. And I will be sharing some of that on the podcast over the next month or so.

So today we're going to talk about something that's very near and dear to my coaching heart and it is one of the core principles that I coach from.

How I Coach (05:03)

So anybody who has gone through MACROS 101 will tell you that I, I am not a, I don't know, quote unquote normal coach. I don't just sit there and cheerlead I don't just say yes, you know, you're doing great or, you know, I don't just tell you what to do and say, Hey, you should, you know, change your numbers or whatever. That's not how I coach. I coach from a very specific coaching methodology. And a lot of that coaching methodology is based in what we're going to talk about today. So I have a couple of, um, coaching, uh, beliefs that I hold on to as I coach clients. And this one is one of the most important and it's one of the ones that I find trips a lot of people up. And that is that I coach from the perspective that your success is inevitable.

Success is Inevitable (05:49)

I also live my life from the perspective of my success is inevitable. When I set a goal, I choose to believe that I will absolutely hit that goal. Like there's no way that I'm not going to hit that goal and that perspective and that belief shifts so many things for me. So why am I choosing though to focus on this? Why am I choosing to focus a whole podcast episode on believing that your success is inevitable? Why are we not talking about the logistics, right? Like how to track a recipe or how to work my fitness pal or all the like how tos. And the reason is because if you don't believe that your success is possible and inevitable and a sure thing to happen, it doesn't matter how many of the how tos I give you, it doesn't matter if I teach you how to count your macros. If you know the science behind it, that none of that stuff will matter because you won't execute on it in the way that is going to get you results. You, if you don't believe something is going to happen, you will create a self fulfilling prophecy. So what does this look like? I liken this to my kids at dinner time where if we're feeding something new to our kids and I put it in front of them and they're like, Oh, I don't, I don't like that. It looks gross. I didn't like, I'm not gonna, I'm not gonna like that. And we, in our room, in our house, we've shared before that we have a two bites, no fights rule, which our kids do know. Um, but if my kid is sitting down and looking at this plate of food and is like, ew, I'm not going to like that.

Even if I can get the kid to try it, how likely do you think they are to like it versus not like it? If they go in with the belief that they don't like it, right? They're gonna like it regardless of how delicious it is. Most of the time a kid will be like, Nope, don't like it told you I didn't like it. And what we're doing is we're creating a self fulfilling prophecy. And how would that shift if your kid had a plate of food before them? And they were like, I've never seen this before. Uh, I don't know if I'm going to like it or not, but I'm gonna you know, I think I think I'll like this, like this looks like something maybe I will like how much more likely do you think that kid will be to actually enjoy that dish or enjoy the food that he or she is eating if they go in with the belief that they will like it.

Self-fulfilling Prophecy in Fitness (08:05)

So this idea of creating a self-fulfilling prophecy happens so often in people's fitness journey. And it stems often from this part of you that doesn't believe what you want to accomplish or whatever your goal is, is possible. And so our brains, when we think something may not be possible, or we think it may put us in discomfort or we think it may put us outside of our current realm, our current comfort zone, our brain likes to come up with ways to keep us safe and to keep us from taking that risk. It views that goal as a risk because we have this part of us that believes that we might not hit it. And so that's a risk and our brain is always trying to keep us safe. And so it will encourage us in ways to create a self fulfilling prophecy. If you don't believe you're going to be able to do something, you won't.

Right? And so I see this in people's fitness journey, when you set a goal, anytime you set a goal, a part of you believes that it's possible, right? Most people are not going around setting goals that they don't like, they are 100% confident that it's not possible, right? Like I'm not going around saying, um, I want to have a 600 pound squat. Right? I don't think that's possible for me. Uh, I've never actually seen a 600 squat on a woman. So I don't really think it's possible for me and I'm, I wouldn't set that goal because Nope, like all of me believes it's not possible. When you do set a goal, when you choose to work for something or choose to set something in your, in your sites, there is a part of you that believes you can accomplish it, otherwise you would not be setting the goal.

Do You Believe You Can? (09:47)

Now, oftentimes, there is also a part of you that believes you cannot achieve it. And this is the part of you that we have to work on and we have to shift because that little part of you that doesn't believe it's possible will create that self fulfilling prophecy. We'll create that self sabotage that causes you to know what you're supposed to do or what action you're supposed to take, or what choice you're supposed to make and then not make it in order to create this self fulfilling prophecy. Now, here's a little bit of the irony when you don't actually believe you can do something. When you, um, think that maybe you can't have a goal, then your brain views that as a failure, as a negative outcome of something that's risky. And so your brain will cause you to not take the action you need to take to get the result that you want, which ultimately ensures that you are going to get that very negative outcome that you were so worried about.

Right? Like you were worried that you weren't going to be able to hit the goal. So then your brain causes you to take actions that makes it so you won't hit the goal, which actually ensures the outcome that you didn't want, which is so crazy to me. And I always say that the only way that you will not get the results that you want is to quit. And that's what I see so many people doing is they don't quite believe that they, it's possible. They don't quite believe that they can do it. And so they end up quitting, which is the only way you can't get what you want like to quit something is literally the only way that you can guarantee you aren't going to get the result. And so it's, it's this like this great irony that our brain does have. Like I think this is going to happen that's really scary.

Um, we're not gonna be able to get this result so I'm going to self sabotage you in a way that you, so that you won't get the result. Which is the very thing that I was afraid of. It's like the secular thinking that doesn't really logically make a whole lot of sense. But that's how our brain works cause its job is to keep us safe. So hopefully you're understanding why we're talking about this today, why this is such an important topic. And if it's something that you don't address, if you just get caught up in the learning, the how. You just get caught up in reading about the science and about the numbers and about the math and you just stay in that realm. But a part of you doesn't believe that it's possible. It doesn't matter how much knowledge you gain, you will not consistently take the action that you need to take in order to get the result that you want.

Start with Belief (12:17)

So for a lot of people, and this is why in MACOS 101 we start with this belief or believe it, um, module number one is all on unbelieving. We get to module number two where I teach you the how and we dive into the actual nitty gritty. But I start with the belief because that has to come first before you can take the knowledge and consistently apply it, which is what ends up getting you the results. So you believing your success is inevitable. You believing that the goals that you want to achieve are possible and extinguishing that part of you that doesn't believe needs to be super high on your priority list and needs to be a part of your fitness journey. And unfortunately, it's not where most people focus. It's not where most coaches focus. And it's not where most clients innately focus themselves.

Plus uncovering these beliefs can be challenging to do on your own. Because to us, the beliefs that we have and the beliefs that we hold to our truths, we have thought the thought so many times that we have now established it as a truth in our mind and often can take an outside observer to be able to help you to uncover and recognize some of the beliefs that you are holding onto that can be limiting you from the results and the goals that you're trying to achieve. So we understand, hopefully that it is so valuable to take the time to do the work, to be able to believe that what you want is inevitable and it's going to happen. So I have three steps to take you through to be able to help you get to the place where you believe that your success is inevitable.

Step #1 – What’s Your Goal? (13:54)

So the first step is for you to get crystal clear on what your goal is. And I see this so often when I ask people what their goal is, I'm always floored that either sometimes I'll get like glassy-eyed or like this, like I don't know really what I'm working towards right now or this like overarching, I'm trying to be healthier. Um, or this like really vague. Uh, I want to feel good in my body and I want you to think right now about the current fitness, health, whatever goal that you currently have right now. Okay. Are you getting clear on it? Can you recite it? Can you repeat it? If not, I need you to hit a pause and I need you to do some thinking right now. Like what do you want to achieve? What is your goal right now? Doesn't mean that it has to be losing weight. It doesn't mean it has to be doing a pull up, whatever. Like if you want to find balance in your life like great, just to get clear on what it is. Now, when you have a goal and you've decided what it is, we need to get even more specific. Because if you don't have a finish line, if you don't have a defined outline of what that success is, you will never know if you get there. So for example, if you have the goal to feel more balanced in 2020 that's your, that's your current fitness goal is just to feel more balance. How the heck are you going to know when you are quote unquote balanced? What specifically can you see that will tell you you've reached the result? What specifically will you see that will tell you that you have a better relationship with food?

Be Specific (15:40)

What specifically will you see that tells you, you feel confident in your body? Like what? What does that mean to you? And when we can get really specific and we can say, I know that I feel confident in my body when I put on the Jean skirt and I look at myself in the mirror and I like what I see when, uh, I am able to go out with my friends without thinking about my body. Like whatever it is, we just need to be very specific. And I find, I find this is where people fall short is they have goals, but they don't really know what would have to happen in order for that goal to be realized. And that is kind of like running a race without having a finish line. Like what if you just started a 5K and they're like, you're just going to run and you're just going to know it.

When you finish. Like you'll, you'll just know. I'll just know when, when I'm done with the 5K it'd be like, what the heck? No. Like we need to have a finish line. So we actually know that we've achieved the goal that we set to achieve. Um, and so I want you to ask yourself, are you currently trying to achieve a goal that doesn't have a very definitive finish line? And that doesn't mean it has to be like a number of pounds. Doesn't mean that it has to be like a size dress. But if you have a goal to be more balanced, to have more moderation, to enjoy time with your family, more like whatever your goal is, I want you to ask yourself the question, how will I know when I've got that? Okay. And in MACROS 101 I have clients get very, very clear on their definition of success and we have to have that definition.

Have a Finish Line (17:15)

Otherwise I find so many people just are like running a race without a finish line and they're like, I'm not there yet. I'm not there yet. I haven't reached the finish line. And then when we get into it, there is no finish line. They don't really have a definite finish line. Well, no wonder you feel like you're never reaching the finish line because you don't have one. So I really want you to get clear on your goal and your definition of success. If you don't know where you're going, you are probably going to end up somewhere else. Okay? So that goal and definition of is really important. Okay?

Step #2 – Rate Your Confidence (17:51)

Number two, when you look at that goal or you think about that goal, I want you to rate on a scale of zero to 10 how confident you feel that you can achieve that goal.

Now, I said at the beginning, most of us do not start goals that we absolutely don't believe we can achieve, right? Most people aren't going around setting goals being like, I think there's 0% likelihood that I'll achieve this, but I'm going to set the goal anyway, right? So on that scale of zero to 10 I really hope that you're not a zero you put it, it's probably not a goal that you should be having. If you are zero confident that you are going to be able to hit that goal. So I want you to think though that goal that you've thought about, that goal that you are trying to reach in 2020 how confident are you that you will achieve that goal? Give it a number, zero to 10. Now, if that number is less than seven, we have a problem, okay? We have a belief problem and I guarantee if you don't focus on that belief first before you get into the how to, if you don't focus on that belief before you learn how to count macros or start going to the gym or whatever, you will self sabotage you will, you will create the self fulfilling prophecy.

Past Experience of Failing (19:12)

And a lot of you have experience in your past of doing that, which only gives you more evidence that you can't accomplish what you want to accomplish. For those of you who have spent years dieting or have yo-yo dieted had been successful and then regained the weight back, you have a lot of evidence to support this idea that it's not possible for you. Okay? And we have to focus there before we get to the how. Okay. I hope that, I hope that you're picking up what I'm putting down now. If you are less than a seven, I do a lot of work in my coaching in helping you to raise that number, helping you to get higher than a seven. But I will give you one tip today on the podcast. Um, uh, again, I go way deeper into this and I, when I coach in MACROS 101 but one thing that you can do if you are thinking, okay, I have this goal and then maybe you're about a five with whether or not you can accomplish it, we can either make a smaller goal or you can lengthen the timeline.

What to do if Your Belief is Below a 7 (20:13)

Okay. So those two things, if if you said, okay, I want to lose 40 pounds by the end of 2020. Okay. And maybe that feels like a five to you, you're like, I don't know. Like I hope that I can do it, but I'm not, I don't, not like 100% confident that I can lose 40 pounds in 2020. All right. So we can do two things. We can either make the goal smaller or we can increase the timeline. So could we, instead of saying I want to lose 40 pounds in 2020, could you make it 10, does that feel more believable to you? Or instead of saying, I want to lose 40 pounds in 2020 what if you say, I want to lose 40 pounds by the end of 2021 right? Like, so we increase the time. Does that, does that make you believe more that you, if you had two years to do it, you could do it.

Okay. So you can mess around with those two little things to hopefully get to a place where you have a goal where you are at least a seven, preferably like an eight or a nine or a 10 on. How hard do you believe that you can achieve that goal? Okay. Um, our goal with this exercise is to get really clear on what, what part of you, how much of you doesn't believe it's possible and start to extinguish that start to increase the part of you that believes it's possible and extinguished the part of you that doesn't believe it's possible until you truly, truly, truly can look someone in the eye and say, I know I'm going to get the, I'm going to hit my goal. Like it's not even a stress anymore. Like, I just, I know what's going to happen and I don't necessarily maybe know the timeline or I don't necessarily know exactly how it's going to look and I don't know what's going to happen in between point a and point Z.

But I know I'm going to get to point Z and that my friends is a beautiful place to be in your journey. And that is when you are coachable and you look for evidence to support the fact that it's working and that you are making the changes that need to be made in order to get you to the result that you want to get. Okay. So first we had to get really clear on your goal and your definition for success. Then I had you rate your belief and I'm hoping that we've been able to at least come up with a goal that has a belief on the seven to 10 of the how hard do you believe at scale.

Step #3 – Find Evidence to Support Your Belief (22:26)

Um, and so then once we have that, we can go to step number three. And this is where you find evidence to support your belief. Ok, I get this a lot. Where people are like, okay, I have all of this evidence in my past, right? I tried this diet, it didn't work. I tried this, it didn't work. I, you know, was able to lose 20 pounds doing this, but then I regained it back. Right. A lot of you have a lot of evidence to support the fact that it's not possible for you or that it's hard or that it's going to take a long time. Right. You have a lot of evidence and so when I get a lot of people doing is saying, I want to believe it, like I want to believe that I can lose 20 pounds, but I have all of this evidence in my past that shows I can't. So I will believe it when I see it. I will believe that I can lose 20 pounds when I actually do it and my friends, that is backwards.

Okay. That is like sane. I will get a paintbrush after my bedroom wall painted. Right, like that doesn't make any sense. You have to have the paint brush first. You gotta have the paint brush in order to paint the wall. Same thing complies to your journey. You cannot be waiting for the evidence. In order to create a belief, the belief has to come first because the belief drives your actions, which drives the outcome. So we need to scrap that. I'll believe it when I see it and we need to turn it around and say, I will see it when I believe it. Okay. And so as you're going through your journey, as you're going through this process of reaching for this goal, I want you looking and searching for evidence to support your belief, to support this belief that it's working, to support the belief that you're going to get to the goal that you want to support the belief that you are being successful right now.

Create Results in Your Head First (24:24)

Um, it's been said that you create things twice first in your head and then in the external world. And I couldn't agree with them more. We first create our results in our head and then we create them in the external world. Okay? Think about how powerful that is. So if you want to create, you want to change what's in your external world, you want to change your external results, you got to create it in your mind first. So within, as within, so without, okay, what's going on in the inside is projected out into the external world. Okay. So what does this mean? How do you find evidence to support? I want you to look for reasons that you know that it's working and use thoughts such as it's working, right? Like you step on the scale and the scale goes up a pound and you choose the thought it's working or you lose five pounds, but it feels like it's really, really slow.

And like your friend is doing it faster. You think it's working. I'm doing it like I'm being successful. Um, and so I really want you to consider that when you start to have those, I'm frustrated, I'm not doing well. I'm not doing it fast enough. It's not happening fast enough. Um, instead of dwelling on those thoughts, I want you to look for evidence of it working and sometimes, and inside MACROS 101, we talk a lot about celebrating wins and I'm huge on you finding the wins. Okay? The wins don't come out and like bite you in the butt. Okay? You have to go find the wins. You have to actively be looking for those wins because they don't always come in the way that you think that they should come. They don't always come as numbers on the scale. They don't always come as measurement changes, but you are having wins and if you aren't actively seeking them out, you aren't reinforcing that belief that this is working, that it is possible that your success is inevitable.

It’s Working! (26:21)

Now I want to be really clear. This does not mean that we don't put on our scientists hat and experiment and use the data and analyze the data and adjust according to the results that our body is giving us. No, like I go through that in module four of MACROS 101, we dive deep into that. So I'm not saying that we don't, we put on our Rose colored glasses and we don't do anything different. No, we need to adjust. But in the process of going through the data and the process of experimenting in the process of going through your weight loss journey, you must be looking for evidence that it's working okay. And when you start to do that, you will start to see that belief number rise because you have a lot of evidence maybe that it won't work. You've got to start finding evidence that it will.

What Will Your Goal Give You? (27:15)

Okay. So hopefully that gave you something to chew on and it gave you something to really maybe start to think about and, and work on for the goals that you have for 2020 have you gotten crystal clear on what your goal is and your very specific definition of success? And I, I would encourage you, if you have a number goal, like you want to lose 40 pounds, right? If you have a number goal instead of that being your clear definition of success, I would love it if you would take it one step further. You want to lose 40 pounds so that what? Like what is that going to give you? What will 40 pounds lost give you? Is it going to increase your confidence? Is it going to make you feel better naked? Is it going to have you have a healthy relationship with food?

Be a better example to your kids. Like what is it going to give you and then figure out what success in that area looks like. For example, I want to lose 40 pounds so that I will be more confident in my clothes. Now we asked the question, how will you know when you are more confident in your clothes? Okay, now we can get really specific. How will you know when you're more confident in your clothes? How will you know when you have a better relationship with your husband? How will you know when your kids have a better relationship with food? What specifically will tell you that you have reached that finish line? Okay, so get crystal clear on your goal and definition for success. Number two, rate your belief and this, and this is really just a feeling like when you ask yourself the question, how hard, like how hard do I believe this?

Where’s Your Rating? (28:49)

Do how on a scale of zero to 10, what percent of me believes that this is absolutely going to happen? We really want to get that at least over a seven and be actively working towards it being a 10. Um, so, and if you don't believe it's possible, if you're like less than a seven, we talked about two ways that you can increase that belief is to create a smaller goal or to lengthen the timeline of the goal. And then number three is to start to find evidence and actively seek it out to support the belief that it's going to work to tell yourself that it's working to find evidence that you're making progress, to look for things, look for wins that tell you that. Yeah, I'm doing it, I believe, isn't it? My success is inevitable. I absolutely believe that I'm going to be able to get the result that I want.

And I want you to know that as you do this, it will change things for you. It will change how you view your fitness journey. It will change the choices that you make. It will change the actions that you take and that will drive the results that you want. So many people are are doing it backwards. They think if they can just learn more, then there'll be able to to lose the weight. If they can just learn how to count macros, then that's going to change the game. If they can just learn how to cook healthy, then then everything's going to be okay and what I'm telling you is that while knowledge is an important piece, the other important piece that so many people are missing is the belief that it's possible and if you cannot support the knowledge and the execution with the belief that it's going to work, you will create a self fulfilling prophecy and you will self sabotage.

Conclusion (30:30)

We talk a lot about self sabotage inside MACROS 101 because that's something that I see very, very frequent in clients is this self-sabotaging behavior and maybe that maybe that speaks to you. Maybe you've experienced that in the past. So that wraps up this episode of Biceps After Babies Radio.  Thanks for listening. I'm Amber. Now go out and be strong because remember my friend, you can do anything.

Outro

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