One of the biggest things I struggle with with my fitness and that I hear over and over again from clients is problems staying motivated to stay on track with diet and exercise. Of course it’s easy when you put on that dres you haven’t worn for 10 years but what about the weeks when the scal doesn’t budge adn you’re craving a Monte Christo? As far as motivation goes one thing I do for myself and have my Beachbody coaching clients do is sit down and make 2 lists: 1 list is of all the tangible things they’ll have/feel/not have to worry about when they lose weight (notice I said “when” not “if” they lose). The other list is of all the tangible things they’ll have ro not have/feel/have to worry about if they do not get serious about weight loss. Basically, I have them answer the question “What happens if I keep going along the way I am now?”. The answers to these questions don’t have to me lofty things about only health- they can be things about where can you shop for clothes, whether you can fit into a movie theater seat, wanting your knees to stop hurting, or not feeling attractive. For me this was really a compelling thing to do since I’m really wanting to avoid the health consequences of obesity and have a daughter for whom I don’t want to set a bad example of yo-yo dieting. Once you’ve done this, make some index cards or sticky notes of some of your favorite reasons why you’re doing this for yourself and put them in your car, on your fridge on your bathroom mirror, etc to remind you. As far as staying motivated and accountable, think about using a coach. Yes they can be spendy, but if you’re interested in buying a home fitness video form Beachbody, you get a free coach when you do that- it’s pretty cool and has been a huge help to me and now I really enjoy coaching others. Give this a try and see if it helps you remember why you’re doing this for yourself- remember, all you have to do is get through cravings or points of weakening resolve (research shows cravings last only about 20 minutes). I swear, this works!! To learn more about diet and fitness for busy people, check out http://fitnessthatfitsyou.com.

Many of us have either stopped a diet or fitness program or never started one for reasons like:

        "I'm so busy doing other things for other people at home and work that I just don't have time to do this too." 

Or maybe its:

      "If I take the time to prioritize my fitness I won't be able to do all the other things I'm doing." 

One way or the other, there seem to be a bunch of reasons why fitness and diet fall by the wayside.  We decide that work, or hobbies, or groups we belong to, or family are so demanding and take up so much of our time that we have to drop our plans to eat well and/or exercise in favor of all the other stuff we have to do. 

Unfortunately, when we do that, we often enter a negative spiral of some combination of:

1.  Feeling resentful that we "don't have any time for me"
2.  Feeling stressed out and having no way to diffuse that
3.  Lacking energy and focus
4.  Feeling physically out of shape or weaker that we'd like
5.  Gaining weight and feeling awful about it
6.  Increasing risk for health problems associated with weight, being sedentary, or poor eating habits

Once these things start to creep in we tend to spiral further into them, feeling worse and feeling worse about ourselves.  This then translates into the very people we are "serving" or working with at work or home noticing that our demeanor is not so pleasant, that we "look tired", or, my personal favorite, "look like Hell" (yes my previous boss said this to me).  It can also affect how well we do our tasks or jobs-  we may become less effective or more error-prone.  In any event, the end result of all our sacrificing our own care to care for others has the unintended consequence of impairing our ability to meet the demands before us.  It sucks, and it does not have to be this way.

I can say this because I know this all too well-  it's one of the reasons I'm where I am today.    Before I took a job at my university as an Associate Dean 3 years ago in a tumultuous college with a rotating door for Deans and huge budget challenges, I had been battling my weight for years and years.  I was not in great shape but I was in control and reasonably active.  Then, as the demands of the job increased and increased and my demands at home did the same thing as my husband struggled with his career and felt the impact of the failing economy, I totally gave up my fitness program and any semblance of healthy eating.  I wasn't getting ice cream or cheeseburgers every day, but I was overeating and drinking more than usual to compensate for the stress.  My sleep became disrupted and I pretty much never worked out.  By the end of the job (I finally resigned at the end of 2009), I'd gained more than 20 pounds and felt weak, flabby, and demoralized.  The real bummer was that all those bad feelings bled over to my family, whom I'd been trying to support through all my "sacrifices".  Talk about adding insult to injury.

So after I got my sea legs back from that job I had an epiphany.  I'm a life coach in addition to being a professor, and I'm always telling clients to define and set priorities and put in the time and energy necessary to make them happen-  why on earth had dI not done this with my fitness????  DOH.

So I've done this, and it's not all that bad.  I still work a stressful job at the University, but it's not as bad as it was, and I'm plenty busy in my coaching businesses and with my awesome family, but I've prioritized two simple things for myself that are non-negotiable:

1.  1 hour per day of exercise (Beachbody videos, walking, elliptical, stationary bike, yoga)
2.  Mindful eating (skipping sugar, lots of fruits and veggies, no fried stuff, less wine, less cheese, watching portion sizes) with one "cheat meal" per week if I want it (which I often don't now).

Really, this is 1-2 hours a day of effort at the outside-  this is no more time than I was spending watching TV, goofing around on the internet, tweeting, and facebooking.  I still have time to do all that, but  just not as much.  The best part?  Not only have I already lost 15+ pounds and 2 pant sizes, but my family is glad to have my (generally) cheery demeanor back and I feel strong and healthy again.  I still have more weight to loose to get to my goal, but it will happen this time.  I am a priority at last, and that means that I can take better care of others in my life as well.

The things that have made this possible are not only my decision to invest some time every day in taking care of my physical and mental health, but finding fitness support and solutions that make sense for my life.  Beachbody home fitness videos have made the difference for me, as has the support of the BB community and my coach.  I can help you make these same changes for free in a way that fits with your life.  Click  for Free Fitness Coaching  and select "free membership" to start your diet and fitness coaching with me, DrMary.  You can also email me at DenverLifeCoach@gmail.com to get started.  If I can do this, anyone can, and I can help you make it happen too.

One of the most challenging parts of developing a career is climbing to the top of whatever heap you’re in, having proven yourself, taken your knocks, gone the extra mile, and impressed the right people and groups sufficiently to be vested with significant leadership and responsibility. It feels good, doesn’t it? Well, it should, but it interesting, that once that pinnacle is achieved, there’s always more to do, isn’t there? There’s that saying, “Want something done? Ask a busy person.”, and nowhere is that more true than in our jobs, especially if you’ve managed to absorb responsibilities as they’ve been handed to you, perform at a high level, and not totally lose your composure in public.

So this poses a problem, of course, when even you, with seemingly endless capacity, begin to get that “Wow- I’m overcommitted” feeling. It may have taken a long time, but once it happens, it’s a little scary, as it can feel a bit out of control. When we get overcommitted at work or at home, something has to give. The worst-case scenario is when you slog along, continuing to shoulder the burdens that keep getting placed on you and smiling, taking on more and more without unloading anything, and then you drop a ball. The ball drop frequently occurs in a “perfect storm” situation, which can include any combination of variables such as increased work pressure/crisis, spousal/family illness, financial stress, personal health challenges for you or co-workers, unexpected problems that impede work progress, and problems with kids at school. Regardless of the factors contributing to the storm, however, the ball drop occurs for the same reason: there is not enough of you to go around, and the resulting lack of capacity to absorb the unexpected. Hopefully the ball you drop is a little one, but if it’s a big one, the outcome can be a mess and can not only affect you, your family, or the organization you work for, but will certainly take your self-confidence down a few notches.

The best-case scenario, however, is that you decide to deal with the overcommitted feeling before the ball drop occurs. This is a hard habit to develop, especially when you’ve “made it” by being all things to all people all the time, but it’s a critical leadership passage, and one that will prolong your career as well as your mental and physical health. There are 2 basic parts in approaching this, and basically they add up to making strategic decisions about what to give away when things get to be too much.

Part 1: Say No

If your plate is full, admit it. You wouldn’t sit at the dinner table with a plate full of food and when someone passes you the next dish, create a mountain of a meal rather than saying “no, thank you, I have enough”, would you? Hopefully not . Think of saying no to new things in the same way. The next time someone asks to serve on a Board of Directors, politely decline. The next PhD student who approaches you to be their dissertation advisor, let them know you have too many commitments already to do the job they deserve. Admittedly, sometimes you’ll be asked to do something you really want to do, and saying no is not what you want to do. In that case, something else must go to make room for the new task. Remember the plate? Either eat the roll or take it off your plate before taking another helping of something yummy…

Part 2: Give it away

So if you say no to a request or opportunity or want to say yes to something new but have a full plate, step 2 is to create opportunity for someone else. This can be called delegating, but that word suggests passing responsibility down; often, you may have the chance to pass responsibility and opportunity to your peers. When someone asks you to do something and you say no, it’s best if you can offer an alternative to that person, ideally having checked with the individual you’re recommending first. If you need to unload a task or responsibility to allow yourself to take on something new, do that as well, but discuss the possibility with potential recipients of the added task before doing so. The goal here is to spread work around by giving people with capacity additional tasks, not to overload them instead of you.

Clearly, the cynics in the audience (myself included) will say “Oh, yeah- well, we all know that s*** travels downhill, right?” The key here is to pass on opportunities and tasks with integrity and from your ethical core. Listen to your gut here. Although it would be great to unload the huge, complex, painful project you’re struggling with in favor of a new, shiny, simpler one, your gut will tell you that such a move is wrong. Listen to that, and do not pass the buck when it should stop with you. If you are working on the painful project and really want to try to take on the shiny one, let your manager or colleague know that you are interested, but cannot work on the new project until you have completed the current one. Also, when passing incoming tasks or opportunities to others when you cannot take them on, think about the people you work with and who could derive benefit from taking on the task and showing they can do a good job. This can be a developmental tool for you to use, and the projects or opportunities you offer to others can be presented in the frame of “Here is something that came to me that I think would be a great opportunity for you, and I know you’ll do a great job, so I wanted to offer it to you first.” Using respectful delegation and task sharing in this way can be a wonderful leadership tool, but be careful not to overload your reports or your colleagues!

By being strategic about taking on more, creating options for getting the work done when you say no, and using delegation as a leadership tool, you can protect your time and make sure you stay out of the “overwhelm zone.” Remember, it is better to do some things very well than a number of things poorly.

Even coaches have goals, you know .  One of mine has long been to stop the dieting/regain weight roller coaster and develop some livable, sustainable habits that free me from having to count calories, drink weird shakes, never eat certain things, and feel trapped by rules that don’t make sense to me.  It’s not that I’ve been “unsuccessful” dieting-  as a physician acquaintance of mine once said when asked if he’d lost weight “You bet-  I’ve lost about 200 pounds, over and over and over…). 

I have no problem setting and meeting and sustaining other goals for myself, but getting to and living at a healthy weight for me for a long time has been the really tough one.  Does this sound familiar to you? 

I’m a big believer in science and medicine as well as in the power of the mind to support the boy and vice versa;  as such, I have been waiting for some time for the publication of the REAL Mayo Clinic Diet .  Although it sounds like “just another diet” and certainly can be if you approach it that way, it has the potential to be a real, manageable, set of fairly modest changes that can make it different this time.

So far, it works for me and for my family, and I’ve found the motivation to do this and follow-through.  The book provides a balanced approach to mind, body, nutrition, and movement, and a realistic and non-invasive way of simply paying more attention to your eating.  I’m impressed.

They also point out the importance of having a group support system to help you along, especially in the early part of the program.  As such, I am starting a new coaching group that meets once a week to support Mayo program followers in navigating the program, being accountable for their changes and goals, and supporting each other.  It includes an initial one-on-one coaching session to get you started or, if you’re already on the program, to check in and tune up your approach.  As motivation for signing up, I’ll be holding a drawing for the Mayo Clinic Diet book and journal, and will give away 2 sets of these prior to the start of the first group.  The group starts on April 1, and will meet on the phone every Thursday from 6-7pm MT.  Hope to see you there!