Mindset Matters: Why It's Important for a Healthy Lifestyle
Before we begin talking about the importance of mindset, I’d like to share the definition. A person's usual attitude or mental state is his or her mindset. The noun mindset was first used in the 1930s to mean "habits of mind formed by previous experience."
Now that we know what mindset is, let’s talk about its importance when it comes to fitness and a healthy lifestyle. Being in a negative mindset when it comes to living a healthy lifestyle is always coming up with excuses, always thinking you deserve something, and throwing in the towel from one bad meal or being too stressed to workout. All these lead to having a negative relationship with fitness.
When you workout and you tell yourself that you deserve that slice of cake, all you are doing is teaching your mind to relate working out with a reward. Even though it’s not a bad thing to reward yourself, it becomes this way of thinking that you only workout to eat. If you follow an IIFYM protocol, you most definitely can fit in that slice of cake if you’d like but the problem is your not changing your behavior. You’re learning these behavior patterns that are not doing you any good. Now, if you have a craving for a piece of cake, and you decide to fit it into your macros, just because you want it, then that is fine. but don’t view it as an “I deserve it”. No you don’t deserve anything. You’re working out because you had a goal in mind.
Another one that I hear a lot is “ I can’t workout because I’m sore, or “I don’t have time to workout”, but how did you find time to do your nails? or buy yourself fast food? I am a firm believer that if there is a will there's a way. If you really want to change your life and stick to your goals, you will find the time. I don’t mean that because one day you have to stay late at work, or something came up, and you can’t workout that you're finding excuses. No, what I am talking about is everyday or every week finding an excuse as to why you can’t. Instead, change your mindset into why you SHOULD be working out: lose weight, get healthy for my kids, prevent diabetes, I want to fit into my jeans again, etc.
The last one, that is probably the most common is “I already ate bad on Friday so I might as well eat bad the rest of the weekend”. No way! Let me ask you if your partner cheats on you and you forgive him, should he just keep on cheating because he blew it once so why does it matter? No right? So why is it any different. Having one bad day will not cause as much harm as an entire weekend. There is nothing wrong with picking up where you left off, from one bad day. Having that mindset will push you back weeks or months.
On my Instagram, I shared that the brain is the biggest and most powerful organ in our body. Therefore, it sometimes has us believe things that just aren’t true. This is why people with anxiety tend to have panic attacks. The mind fixates on one negative thing and plays up an entire scenario in your head, of something that hasn’t happened and most probably won’t. Just like your excuses. You can come up with 1000 excuses and validate them in your head, but are they really helping you towards your goals?
Stress is a huge part of our society. Mostly everyone has chronic stress and some don’t even know it. Our bodies are designed to have cortisol & adrenaline levels rise during life or death situations so that we can protect ourselves. Our muscles tighten up and we get a huge spurt of energy that allows us to do things we never thought possible. However, having to pay your mortgage, dealing with work, school and your family aren’t really life or death situations. Therefore, our body never releases those high levels of cortisol and adrenaline. Instead it goes into our bloodstream causing many complications. In women, having a high level of cortisol affects the hormones which is why so many of us have anxiety and depression. In men it affects their heart. Now, I am not saying this to scare you but if you don’t start taking care of yourself, you will find yourself with diseases such as Diabetes, Rheumatoid Arthritis, Lupus, Cancer, Heart Disease, Chronic Back Pain and the list goes on.
I am a prime example of what can happen when you don’t control your stress. I was diagnosed with Bells Palsy back in March, even though they say it was viral, I know in my gut it was stress. I had to learn to take it back a notch and pay more attention to my body and the signs that it is giving me and this is what I want for all of you. If you are someone who struggles to lose weight despite eating healthy and working out and eating low calories, struggles to sleep but is tired all day, trouble concentrating, bloating, abdominal fat and feel like you need 25 hours in a day, I am here to help. Leave me a comment below or send me an email to see how I can help.
