13 Ways to Find More Time for Exercise

If you’re reading this in December when it’s first published, you likely have a million things on your plate. Between work parties, get togethers with friends, family obligations, gift shopping, and year-end reflection, there never seem to be enough hours in the day. Many people find it incredibly tough to maintain their sanity, get enough sleep, and take care of themselves during the holidays.

One of the first things we drop when times get tough is regular exercise. Unfortunately, when we stop moving every day, we usually feel worse. I know when I stop checking the training box I have less energy, struggle to focus, and I often feel overwhelmed with things I would normally be able to handle with ease.

To help you stay consistent with exercise during this stressful time, I’ve compiled my top 13 ways to find time to train even when your schedule is incredibly full and chaotic. Because not every tip here works for every person, focus on the ones that make the most sense for your lifestyle, goals, and priorities.

1. Schedule workouts like meetings.

A great way to make sure you exercise is to schedule your workouts the same way you schedule a meeting or doctor’s appointment. This is especially important if other people have access to your calendar. If you don’t protect your training time, someone else can snatch it up from under your nose.

I rely on this tip year round because managing my calendar is essential to control my time during the week. If I don’t block off my workouts, that time can quickly disappear. Scheduling my workouts reminds me to keep those times free.

2. Train in the morning before work.

I’m a huge fan of early morning workouts. Exercising first thing helps me start the day physically and mentally refreshed. People who hit the gym in the morning are often the most consistent exercisers because fewer obstacles interfere with their training. If you leave your workout for the end of the day, a million things can pop up and distract you from the gym. If you get training out of the way first thing in the morning however, you can check the box before you head off to tackle the rest of your daily obligations.

Now, if you absolutely hate mornings or have a hard time getting out of bed, this idea probably won’t help you. However, if you’re already an early riser, consider adding a workout to your morning routine.

3. Train during the work day.

If you have lots of obligations before and after work, training during the day may fit best into your schedule, especially if you belong to a gym right by your workplace. My gym, for example, is located in the heart of downtown Chicago and some of our busiest hours of the day are 11am – 2pm. Many people drop in for a quick workout over the lunch hour and then eat their afternoon meal at their desk. You may need to shorten your workouts to make this work (see tip #8 below).

4. Join a more convenient gym.

Sometimes, it’s tough to work out because we have to travel a long way just to get to the gym. Joining a gym closer to work or home can dramatically cut down on your commute, reducing the total amount of time you have to commit to every workout.

The closest gym will not always be the nicest or the cheapest. However, when time is a valuable or limited resource, changing gyms may be worth the upgrade or downgrade. If you’re incredibly busy, every little bit of saved time makes a difference.

5. Train at home.

What if you still have trouble making it to the gym? Working out at home is a great solution for many people. Home workouts can range from simple bodyweight drills and exercises performed sporadically throughout the day to longer, complete workouts. You can perform some of your workouts at home even if you still hit the gym on a regular basis. Training at home is also a great solution for anyone who needs to work out very early or very late and doesn’t have access to a 24 hour gym.

If you want a complete 4 month home training program, check out my Workout From Home Toolkit.

You don’t need any equipment to train at home. However, purchasing a few small pieces of equipment like bands, kettlebells, and powerblocks can greatly expand your repertoire of possible exercises. Those of you who have extra space or train exclusively at home may want to consider investing in a bigger gym setup (with things like a power rack, benches, full sets of weights, and cardio equipment).

6. Combine exercise with other activities.

If you’re incredibly short on time, you can do double duty with exercise and other tasks. One of the best examples of this is making your daily commute more active. If possible, walk or bike a portion of your trip to work. In Chicago where I live, it’s often faster to bike to work than to drive or wait for the bus.

Another great way to sneak in extra exercise is to move while you’re watching TV. One of my clients made a deal with himself to only watch sports games while walking or running on the treadmill. If sports aren’t your thing, do something similar with your favorite show, movies, or podcasts. If you’re really into the media you’re consuming, your workout seems to fly by.

One additional idea is to make your home time more active. If you work from home or tend to sit on the couch for hours every evening, set an alarm to remind yourself to get up and do something physical every 30 – 60 minutes. Do a set of pushups, squats, or jumping jacks, or walk up and down a few flights of stairs. It may not seem like much, but every little bit of activity adds up when you’re pressed for time.

7. Train fewer times per week.

It’s not always possible to train as many times as you may like during the course of the week. If you are constantly missing workouts, you may want to dial back your commitment.

There is something powerful about setting ourselves up for success. If you plan to train five times per week but only make it to the gym three times, you view that as failure. But if you only plan to train three times, the same number of workouts is a success. We feel better about ourselves when we meet our expectations and we’re more likely to stick with a realistic and attainable plan.

You can get great results training two or three times per week if you are consistent and follow a well-balanced program. Save the high frequency training for a time of year when you don’t have as much on your plate.

8. Shorten your workouts.

Similarly, if you constantly struggle to make time for exercise, it may be helpful to focus on shorter workouts. Contrary to popular belief, you don’t need a full hour of uninterrupted time to have an effective workout. You can get a lot accomplished with short workouts ranging from 15 – 45 minutes.

Sometimes shorter workouts can even lead to better results. When you’re forced to maximize your gym time, you waste less time resting, on your phone, and socializing with your gym buddies. Short workouts force you to come in with a plan, work hard, and then return to your busy life.

9. Utilize circuit training.

If you’re used to long workouts, it’s tough to know what to cut from your routine. The good news is you can cover all your bases with minimal training time using circuit training. I love circuit workouts for people who have 30 minutes or less to train. They are also a great option for people who frequently travel and need some flexibility based on space and availability of equipment.

Here’s how circuit training works:

Select a handful of exercises, preferably one from each major movement group (squat, hinge, press, pull, core or loaded carry).
Set a timer for however long you have to train and complete as many rounds as possible before the timer goes up.
Take as little rest as you can while still using good form and challenging weights.

Read more: Training on the Road

10. Follow a program.

Every day you show up to the gym without a plan, you are wasting precious time. I frequently see gym goers wandering around trying to figure out what to do next. This is not only incredibly inefficient, it keeps you from getting the best possible results.

Following a set training program helps you get the most bang for your buck at the gym. Set clear goals before you start a program. If you want to run faster with less pain, you probably shouldn’t be following a bodybuilding program. If your primary goal is to look and feel better, you likely don’t need to beat up your joints with a punishing crossfit routine.

There are thousands of quality programs available on the internet; doing some research ahead of time will keep you safe and help you make the fastest progress toward your goals.

Looking for a done-for-you workout program? Check out Full45 here.

11. Sign up for an event.

Some people are motivated by external commitments like races or meets. If this sounds like you, sign up for an event to kickstart your training. Once you’ve put money and pride on the line, you may start to take your workouts more seriously.

Be sure you have enough time to adequately prepare for the event you sign up for. If you’ve never run a race before and are struggling to stay consistent, a 5 or 10k is much more realistic than a marathon. If you want to enter a powerlifting meet, pick one at least 12-16 weeks in the future.

12. Recruit a workout buddy.

It’s tough to make changes by yourself. Humans are inherently social animals and we always do better with external support. So when we recruit others to help us in our journey, we are much more likely to see things through.

There are many ways you can enlist the help of an accountability buddy. For example:

Work out with a friend or coworker.
Check in with another gym regular, even if you don’t actually work out together.
Take a group exercise class.
Join a running, cycling, or swimming group.
Join a Facebook group for people with similar goals and interests.
Join a group coaching program.

13. Hire a trainer.

One of the best things I ever did for my own training was to invest in a coach. Before I started working with my trainer Bryan, I would make all kinds of excuses later in the week for why I didn’t need to work out. Bryan called me on my BS and instructed me to complete five strength training workouts every week. I quickly stopped making excuses and found time to complete those extra workouts. While not everyone needs to train five times per week to see results, the extra accountability and expectation provided by a coach can be a game changer for consistency.

Most commercial gyms have trainers on staff. Often, you can get a complimentary session with a trainer before making a commitment to ensure the trainer and you are a good fit. If you don’t have access to an in-person trainer or frequently train at home or on the road, online training is a great alternative. You can learn more about my online training program here.

Want to learn more? I created my 4C System for those who want to improve their exercise consistency. If you’ve struggled to stay consistent with exercise, sign up for this totally free 5 day email course using the box below.

October 30, 2018January 21, 2020

You Should Care About Getting Strong

I’m on a mission to help everyone I work with get strong.

Getting strong is not the first goal most people mention when they come to see me. Lots of people want to lose weight and get lean. Others want to increase energy, return to training after rehabbing an injury, get through the day with less pain, or simply develop a consistent exercise routine.

Although I always prioritize the individual client’s goal, the vast majority of their plans are centered around building strength. Over the years, I’ve seen that getting strong helps people achieve just about any health and fitness goal.

If you’re weak, it’s tough to handle the intensity or volume of workouts necessary to noticeably change your body. Getting stronger helps you increase your energy levels because you won’t get so exhausted performing daily tasks. Strong bodies recover faster from injuries and are less likely to experience pain in the future. And getting stronger helps with consistency because it’s fun and empowering to see all of the amazing things your body can do when you start regularly lifting heavy stuff.

You don’t need to put multiple plates on the bar – or even lift bars at all – to experience these benefits. Strength is relative to each person. What’s heavy for my clients in their mid twenties looks very different than what’s heavy for my clients in their sixties. But no matter your age or how long you’ve been working out, everyone can get stronger in their own way.

If you’re not convinced that getting strong matters for you, please read on.

Getting stronger improves every other physical quality.

Are you interested becoming more powerful to help you dominate your rec sports or golf game? Getting stronger helps with this.

Are you a runner or triathlete trying to shave minutes off your best race time? Building physical strength is one of the best ways to do it.

Many new clients want to increase their flexibility. In many cases I find they actually lack strength and neuromuscular control, not range of motion. Once I get them on a well-rounded strength training program, their flexibility almost always increases without any extra stretching or foam rolling.

Talk to any great strength and conditioning coach for young athletes and they’ll tell you they prioritize building strength over just about anything else. This is because getting stronger elevates all other physical qualities including speed, agility, conditioning, power, and mobility and flexibility.

Trying to improve any of these skills with a weak client or athlete is a recipe for lackluster results or potential injury. Strength is the base upon which everything else is built.

strong runner race weight lifting — Getting stronger has helped my marathon runners set big PRs.

Getting stronger can help you feel better and reduce the risk of future pain and injuries.

These days, it’s rare to meet a new client who doesn’t suffer from some kind of joint or muscle pain. Knee pain, shoulder pain, and low back pain are the most common, but I’ve seen just about every imaginable combination of pain and injuries in the hundreds of clients I’ve worked with over the years.

If a client is dealing with persistent or intense pain, I always refer them out to a physical therapist or physician. But many people just need to improve their movement quality, add in more regular exercise, and build some strength.

I can’t tell you how many clients have dramatically decreased their pain levels just by consistently following a safe, smart, strength-focused training program. The quality of life increase you could experience if you start lifting weights cannot be overstated. You’re also much less likely to injure yourself in the future when you learn how to control your body and counteract hours of sitting or repetitive movements.

Getting stronger makes daily life much easier.

A couple years after I started lifting, I began to notice some surprising changes. I was able to move with ease, control, and confidence no matter what I was doing. As someone who used to always feel slow, clumsy, and weak, this was a huge change in the way I carried myself and showed up in the world. This transformation happened because I was getting stronger and building a new and powerful connection with my body.

I notice my quads and glutes engaging as I bike or climb stairs. I feel my arms, back, and core muscles turn on when I’m carrying grocery bags in from the car. I know which muscles to fire when I’m attempting to safely pick up a heavy box from the floor. After years of strength training and building these mind-muscle connections, I now feel strong doing just about everything. I use the movements I practice in the gym to aid the movements I do in my daily life.

There are so many daily tasks that get easier when you’re strong. Here are just a few common examples:

Lifting a heavy suitcase into an overhead bin on a plane.
Carrying all your groceries in one trip. Bonus points if you have to walk up multiple flights of stairs like I do.
Carrying kids or pets. They can both be quite heavy!
Moving heavy boxes or furniture
Climbing flights of stairs

strong strength muscle women lifting training — Being strong feels awesome.

What to do next

You can’t know all of the positive benefits getting strong will have on your life until you try. Here are a few resources I’ve put together to help you get started on your strength training quest:

I’m New to the Weight Room. Where Should I Start?

Just Getting Back in the Gym? Start Here.

Design a More Efficient Workout

5 Ways to Lift More Weight

Strength Training for Special Populations:

Why Musicians Need Strength Training

What Runners Must Know About Strength Training

Squats and deadlifts are two of the best exercises for building strength. If you want to get better at these great lifts, you need to download your free copy of my ebook Squat and Deadlift school.

I share my favorite form tips, troubleshoot common problems, and provide progressions to help you work toward (or supplement) barbell training.

I’m confident both novice and experienced lifters can use the book and accompanying videos to take their training to the next level.

October 9, 2018April 23, 2019

Why Motivation Doesn’t Work (and What to Do Instead)

What is motivation exactly?

At some point, we’ve all been fired up to work out:

Perhaps you watched an inspiring video and you’re excited to hit the gym.
If you just signed up for a race or purchased a new training program, you may feel eager to start your new workouts.
Maybe you’re one of the millions of people who, upon reflecting about the last year, feel a strong push to make changes on January 2.
Motivation can also come from a negative experience, like not being able to button your favorite pair of jeans.

Many of us prefer to be in the right mood before we work out. If we “don’t feel like it,” we may not go to the gym today. Sometimes, when we don’t want to work out but know we should, we search for a bit of inspiration. If we can just find the right video, story, or transformation photo, then we will find the energy to drag our butts to the gym.

The problem with relying on motivation is that motivation is fleeting. It’s a feeling, and feelings come and go. Allowing our actions to be dictated by our feelings gets us into all kinds of trouble because we can’t truly control our feelings, only our responses to those feelings.

We need some way to ensure action even when we are dealing with a negative emotion or lack a positive one.

If you constantly seek motivation, the things that once inspired you will eventually lose their effectiveness. Those videos of impressive physical feats, tear-jerker personal posts, or jaw-dropping before and after photos? Eh, not doing it for you anymore. Now you have to keep chasing some new and novel source of motivation. Eventually you become numb to all of this stuff and still don’t feel like going to the gym.

Motivation feels good in the moment, but it can be counterproductive to long term success. We start to crave this good feeling and associate it with working out. On days we don’t feel motivated, inspired, or energized, it is even harder to drag ourselves to the gym.

motivation doesn't work exercise momentum — You shouldn’t always expect to feel like this.

The solution? Use momentum

Think back to your high school physics class when you learned about inertia. Inertia is a property of matter that states that a body in motion tends to stay in motion, while a body at rest tends to stay at rest. This has many implications beyond its literal scientific application.

Getting started is always the hardest part of making a change. Once you’ve gotten the ball rolling, you’ll have a much easier time sticking with your new routine.

We are all creatures of habit, and habit can work for or against us. The choice is up to you. Make a realistic plan and don’t allow yourself to give up as you wade through the challenging first steps. Put your gym time on your calendar as an important meeting that cannot be skipped. After a couple weeks of practicing and keeping your commitments, your new habits and routines will start to become more automatic.

Momentum helps keep us going so we don’t skip the gym just because we aren’t feeling it. We may not feel inspired to work out, but we go anyway because we’ve been doing so well and don’t want to stop. This is the power of building momentum – the positive effects of your own actions take the place of fickle and fleeting feelings of motivation.

Our core identities start to change as we build momentum. When we consistently keep our commitments, we begin to look at ourselves in a different light. Instead of being a person who always skips the gym, we gradually become a person who never misses a workout. You can accelerate this process by deciding to live as if you’re already the person you want to become. Ask yourself, “what would a fit person do in this situation?” “If I never struggled to stick to an exercise routine, what decisions would I make today?” Then act accordingly.

What to do when motivation doesn’t strike

Here’s my quick and easy advice for what to do when you don’t feel motivated to go the gym: do it anyway.

Each time you show up you build positive momentum, making it less and less likely you’ll skip workouts in the future. The majority of your workouts will feel pretty mediocre, and that’s perfectly ok. Just show up and do the best you can.

There are, of course, legitimate reasons to skip a workout. If you’re sick, it’s in everyone’s best interest for you to stay home. Emergencies, last-minute meetings, and unavoidable changes of plans happen. However, when you find yourself about to skip the gym, honestly consider whether you have a real reason not to train or if you’re just feeling uninspired. Consistency trumps everything else in the long run. It may seem harmless to skip a workout when you’re feeling lazy, but over time skipping chips away at your results.

If you find you are consistently unmotivated, you may need to reassess your training. Many people feel pressured to chase goals which don’t resonate with them or align with their values. Sit down and think about what is truly important to you. If your current workouts aren’t getting you where you want to go, it may be time to change course. Make sure your workout program is realistic and appropriate for your schedule and your fitness level.

If you’re still struggling to stick to a training routine, find some extra accountability. It’s much harder to bail on the gym when a trainer or workout buddy is there waiting for you.

Lastly, make sure you’re spending plenty of time doing things you like. Training should ultimately be fun and enjoyable on some level. If you don’t enjoy your workouts, you won’t stick with them for long.

If you want more tools, tips, and strategies to help you dominate your health and fitness goals, sign up for my email list here. I’ll send you my 4C System, a free 5-day email course teaching you to become a more consistent exerciser (without overly relying on motivation).

September 25, 2018October 14, 2019

Plan Ahead to Exercise and Eat Right Over the Holidays (Or Any Stressful Period)

The last few months of the year are anything but relaxing for many people. Despite the bombardment of seasonal advertisements promising joy, togetherness, and peace, this is the time of year when many of us feel the most unhappy, overwhelmed, and stressed.

As the days get shorter and the temperatures drop, many people start to feel down in the dumps. Motivation to exercise and eat healthy wanes accordingly.

Additionally, holiday events and family time can create tons of extra stress. Even if you adore the holidays, you may still worry about purchasing gifts for your list, managing seasonal obligations, and making healthier choices amidst a never ending supply of drinks, sweets, and fried foods.

Regular exercise and healthy eating are often the first things to go when you’re stressed and short on time. The good news is, since you’re already aware of this risk, you can take steps ahead of time to make your life easier as you move into the fourth quarter.

Here are three steps I recommend you take now, before things get crazy:

Adjust priorities. For most people, the last quarter is a bad time to chase a fat loss goal. You will drive yourself crazy trying to avoid every tasty treat that crosses your path between October and December. Rather than setting yourself up to fail with too much restriction, change course and try to maintain your physique or use extra holiday calories to build strength or muscle.

Read more: Seasons of Lifting

Ask, “What does success look like for me?” We all have different struggles. For me, success during the holidays means avoiding binging. For you, it may mean staying consistent with your exercise regimen, even when you’re traveling. Yet another person’s vision of holiday success includes keeping their drinking under control. Determine what is most important to you so you can prioritize the behaviors and strategies that get you where you want to go.
Manage your minimums. I learned this phrase from Precision Nutrition and I think it’s especially relevant in this context. What are the bare essentials you must do to keep yourself on track? Once you’ve figured these out, direct most of your effort into knocking them out consistently. Everything else you do is just an added bonus.

Below, I share specific strategies for managing training and healthy eating during the fourth quarter (or any other period when you’re under a lot of stress). Just remember to focus on the things that matter most to you. You don’t need to do everything I’m suggesting here to stay on track this holiday season.

stressed out holidays — Don’t let this be you come October, November, and December!

How to exercise over the holidays

Do less, but do it consistently.

I’ve written about this over and over and over, but it bears repeating here: you do not need to spend hours and hours each week exercising. This is especially true if you’re just trying to maintain your current level of fitness during a period of stress. You’ll see better results by being consistent through the end of the year than you will by occasionally following the “perfect” workout plan and giving up by December.

You also don’t need a full hour for a great workout. If you only have 30, 20 or even 15 minutes to exercise, you can still do something worthwhile. When you release yourself from the need to train for long periods of time, you may actually find more time during the week for exercise.

Plan ahead.

Sit down with your calendar for the remainder of the year and determine how many workouts you can realistically commit to every single week. For most of you this will be just two or three workouts.

You should also consider the length of time that works best with your schedule. For example, if you have to train over your lunch break but can’t be away for more than an hour, you’ll do better with 20-30 minute workouts than 45 minute workouts.

Whenever possible, schedule your workouts into your calendar the same way you do with any other obligation. This helps protect your time and demonstrates to yourself you’re committed to training.

Get creative when you’re away from the gym.

Many people struggle to come up with workout ideas and inspiration when they’re away from their regular gyms. I wrote an entire article about training on the road. Check it out for lots of ideas about modifying your workouts when you’re traveling this holiday season.

How to eat healthy over the holidays

Plan ahead.

When you’re overwhelmed and stressed out, the last thing you want to do is spend precious time cooking food every single day. If you’re not already batch-cooking some of your weekly meals, now is a good time to start. Here are two approaches you can use:

Set aside a few hours on the weekend to prepare as many full meals as possible.
Prepare some items to use in multiple dishes. Make a batch of shredded chicken in the slow cooker, roast a pan of veggies, hard boil a dozen eggs, prepare a bunch of quinoa in the instant pot, etc. You could also chop up raw veggies to throw into soups, eggs, salads, and stir frys throughout the week.

Use a delivery service.

Not everyone has the time or desire to grocery shop or cook all of their meals. If this sounds like you and you have the means to hire a delivery service, you’ll save a ton of time and hassle. You can find services that send you raw ingredients, fully cooked meals, and everything in between. Do some research to decide which option makes the most sense for you.

healthy eating thanksgiving holidays christmas

Make healthier choices when eating out.

It’s unrealistic to expect to eat only healthy home-cooked meals this time of year. If you’re eating out at a restaurant, attending an event, or simply navigating the buffet at family Thanksgiving, try following these tips:

Prioritize protein and veggies and be sure to eat some with every meal.
Take just one plate of food, and try to use smaller dishes when possible.
Eat slowly and stop when you’re 80% full (not stuffed).
If you’re going to eat junkier foods (sweets, fried foods, etc.), make sure it’s something you really enjoy. Don’t eat the store-bought cookies just because they’re there.

Be mindful of alcohol.

It’s common to reach for a drink when you’re feeling stressed. However, some people lean more heavily on alcohol during the holidays than the rest of the year. Alcohol flows freely at holiday parties and family gatherings, and it’s tough to say no.

If you know you have a tendency to drink more than you’d like, try following one of these strategies:

Decide ahead of time how many drinks you’re going to have and stop once you hit this number. Recruit an accountability buddy at the same event to help keep you honest.
Drink a virgin drink (like soda water with lemon or coke zero) to make it seem as if you’re drinking. Some of my clients feel peer pressure to drink at work gatherings, and this strategy makes it easier to fit in with the crowd.
If you’re drinking as a response to stress, try to find alternative releases. Go for a walk, take some deep breaths, converse with a friend or loved one, read a book, exercise, meditate, take a bath, journal…the list goes on and on. Experiment to find what works for you.

With everything else, do your best.

You can’t do everything all at once. When dealing with lots of stress, your exercise and eating routines can easily fall by the wayside. It’s important to focus on the most important things and forget about anything not essential to your success.

Adjust your priorities and figure out what success looks like for you. Determine the one or two things which will make the biggest difference. Nail these as consistently as you can and do what you can to manage stress in the rest of your life, then try to relax and enjoy the season. If you prepare ahead of time, it’s much easier to thrive through a stressful period.

If you’re worried about staying in shape through the end of the year, I’ve got your back. Fill out an application for my online training program and we’ll work together to create a plan to keep you on track without losing your mind.

August 7, 2018October 14, 2019

Do Less to Do More

As someone who’s made a living helping people, I’ve spent a lot of time pondering why some people are able to change and others are not. My most successful clients have a few things in common:

They take ownership of their situation and truly believe in their ability to change it.
They work hard and are consistent with their training and healthy eating.
They all make small changes and transform themselves gradually.

I haven’t had a single client who attempted to make multiple major changes at once and was successful long term. Yet much of the general public still assumes this is the best and only way to lose weight, build muscle, get stronger, and improve their health.

If I’ve learned anything about the psychology of change during my five years in the fitness industry, it’s that slow and steady really does win the race. Doing less initially can actually help you do much more overall.

Why We Aren’t Good at Dramatic Changes

Many of us think we can successfully quit something cold turkey or overhaul our entire lifestyle in a matter of weeks. Unfortunately, we are almost always setting ourselves up for failure with this approach.

We can only manage a finite amount of stress at any given time. Stress comes from many different sources including your job, relationships, travel, physical activity, and health issues. Unless your work and personal lives are totally chill (and whose are), you only have a limited amount of brain power left to devote to making lifestyle changes. If you overload yourself with difficult changes, it’s only a matter of time before you burn out and quit. All of the willpower in the world will not help you if you take on more than you can handle.

I’ve also found that every restrictive diet or grueling exercise plan is accompanied by an equal reaction in the opposite direction. A couple years ago, I went on a fairly strict diet for three months. I wanted to see fast, dramatic results, and I got them. However, after I decided to relax a bit, I went through several months of near-uncontrollable binge eating. I couldn’t sustain my strict eating plan and demanding training regimen when the rest of my life became busier, and I rebounded from months of restriction and built-up stress with months of overindulgence. I ended up gaining much of my lost weight back, which was a frustrating and embarrassing experience.

One Thing at a Time

There’s a better way to move forward and improve your life, no matter what goals you’re chasing. Instead of trying to do everything all at once, focus on making just one small change at a time.

If you have a list of many changes you want to make, start by picking the one you know you can manage right now. The best changes require you to take action in some small way every single day.

You’re also better off picking pro-habits instead of anti-habits, at least at first. This means instead of saying “I won’t eat sweets after dinner,” say “I’ll eat a piece of fruit after dinner to quell my sweet tooth.” Pro-habits are more empowering than anti-habits because they give you practical tools to make better decisions.

Before you decide on a change, ask yourself how confident you are you can make this change on a scale of 1-10 (1 = no way I can do this, 10 = I can do this in my sleep). If your answer is 7 or lower, consider breaking the change down into smaller, more manageable pieces. Pick something you can actually do and don’t stretch beyond your current capabilities.

I recommend focusing on just one habit for two weeks. For fourteen days in a row, devote all your focus and energy to making this one change. Only consider adding a new habit after the two weeks are up. If after two weeks you’re still struggling with the initial habit, you have two options: keep working at it until you can nail the habit at least five days per week, or scale back the habit to something you can manage. When done correctly, over the course of many months you will successfully make multiple positive changes to your lifestyle.

1% Better

In the beginning, it may seem like making one small change at a time does very little to get you where you want to go. And it’s true that you probably won’t see tremendous progress over the course of two to four weeks. You may not even see a dramatic transformation after three months. Over the long term, however, you are much more likely to see lasting and profound changes.

If you focus on getting just 1% better every day, by the end of the year you will be 365% ahead of where you’re at right now. Think of how much better your life could be if you followed this approach consistently and trusted the process Instead of riding the neverending roller coaster of crash dieting and re-gaining weight, you’d make changes that stick. Rather than dragging yourself kicking and screaming into a new restrictive routine, you’d find ways to gradually make positive changes work with your existing lifestyle and values.

Racking up small wins is a powerful motivator for continued progress. Nailing your one habit day after day builds confidence in your ability to change. Trying to change everything about your life all at once has the opposite effect; when you inevitably get overwhelmed and have to stop your mad dash for results, you feel discouraged and start to mistakenly believe nothing you do will ever work. In reality, you need to do less in order to do more. Making fewer changes at once ultimately lets you experience more success.

If you want additional help tackling your goals, sign up for my email list using the box below. When you sign up I’ll send you my 4C System, a free 5-day email course teaching you to become a more consistent exerciser. I also send out regular tools, tips, articles, and recipes to my email list that I don’t share anywhere else.

July 2, 2018

So You Want to Build Muscle? Here’s What to Eat.

Many people start exercising because they want to change the way they look. And to build the bodies they want, most of these people will eventually need to build some muscle.

In part 1, I explained the essential components to include in your workouts if you want to build muscle. In part 2, I explain how you should eat. I also include a few additional important considerations at the end.

You need to eat a lot.

Hard training is required to stimulate muscle growth, but it’s not going to happen without providing your body with the necessary raw materials. I’ve worked with many naturally skinny people who simply don’t eat as much as they need to if they really want to gain weight.

If you struggle to eat enough, set timers on your phone to remind you when it’s time for meals. If you either don’t get hungry or tend to ignore your hunger, an external stimulus can prompt you to eat. Eating several smaller meals throughout the day can help you get around feeling overly full.

Consider experimenting with liquid meals like shakes and smoothies. It’s much easier to drink your calories than eat them, so these meals won’t leave you feeling quite as full. Start with a shake before and/or after your workouts and add more during the day as needed.

Regular training can also help boost your appetite if you have trouble eating enough food. Many of my clients and friends tell me they were amazed how much hungrier they felt when they committed to a consistent strength training regimen. Focus on hitting the weights hard.

What should I eat?

Calories are king when it comes to building muscle. However, it’s also important to pay attention to what kinds of foods you’re eating. This will help you feel better, train harder, and stay healthy on your quest to build a more muscular body.

Contrary to what you may read on the internet, you will have much more success building muscle if you eat lots of carbs. Carbs are the body’s preferred source of fuel. They help you recover faster and power through the grueling workouts necessary to pack on muscle. Don’t be afraid to eat plenty of carbs every single day, especially around your workout.

Protein is also critical to hypertrophy. Aim to keep protein consumption around 1g/1lb bodyweight. You can get your protein from a wide variety of places; it’s not necessary to eat grilled chicken breast all day every day. White fish, salmon, eggs and egg whites, cottage cheese, greek yogurt, lean steak, ground turkey and chicken, and pork chops are all great protein sources. There are also plenty of vegetarian protein options, such as beans and legumes. Experiment to find which foods agree with you and are most enjoyable.

The rest of your diet should come from healthy fats. I don’t recommend cutting fat consumption to less than 20% of your total calories for health reasons. Some people need to eat more fat to feel and perform their best.

Your diet should center around whole, nutrient-dense foods, but you definitely have room to add in calorically-dense treats, especially if you’re having trouble consuming enough calories. However, chasing hypertrophy isn’t an excuse to just eat junk food all the time. Aim to eat nutritious foods ~80% of the time and save the other ~20% for treats. Tweak this percentage depending on your preferences and results.

Other considerations

Sleep is absolutely crucial. Your body needs sleep both to recover from hard training and to build muscle. You will have much better results if you can commit to sleeping at least 7.5 hours every single night. Sleep time can also be broken up throughout the day. Never underestimate the power of a good nap.

If you’re not already lean, consider losing some fat before you start trying to put on size. A lean body is more likely to store excess calories as muscle than an overweight body. Going on a short diet before you start a gaining phase can ensure you put on weight in the right places and don’t end up with excess unwanted body fat.

Don’t worry about getting “too big.” Building muscle takes a lot of time and effort (and food). It doesn’t happen by accident and you can always switch gears once you’re happy with your results.

Finally, remember that building muscle isn’t just for bodybuilders and fitness models. Anyone who wants more definition in certain body parts or who wants to look more athletic should include hypertrophy among their list of goals. You may even discover that training to build muscle is one of the most fun things you can do in the gym.

I’m a big fan of any kind of training that aims to build you up rather than make you take up less space in the world. If you want to learn more, I’d love to hear from you here or have you join my email list. I send out exclusive weekly content with my list that I don’t share anywhere else.

June 19, 2018

4 Ways You’re Sabotaging Your Progress

“I feel like I’m working hard and not seeing any results. What am I doing wrong?”

I’m asked some version of this question on a regular basis. It’s heartbreaking to hear stories of people who’ve been riding a never ending roller coaster of progress without getting much farther along than where they started.

I can also relate because for a long time, this was me. Before I got really serious about losing weight, I made a lot of half-hearted attempts to change my eating and start exercising. None of these attempts were ever successful. I either tried to do way too much at once and burnt myself out or I didn’t work very hard and ultimately gave up because I was impatient and expected more dramatic results. It took a serious health scare for me to take an honest look at what I was doing and make the necessary changes to actually move forward.

If you’ve been working hard for a long time with little to show for it, you may be sabotaging your progress like I was. Keep reading to learn the top four mistakes I see people make that interfere with achieving positive results.

Lack of Consistency

I put together an entire email course on consistency because it’s one of the biggest mistakes I see people making in and out of the gym. Losing weight, building muscle, getting stronger, or performing better don’t happen on accident. It takes months and years of repeated efforts to take you from point A to points B, C, D, and beyond. You don’t have to be perfect, but if you aren’t consistently exercising, eating well, and managing sleep and stress, you will have a very hard time achieving any health or fitness goal.

How consistent do you have to be to see results? This depends on your goals and experience. As a general rule of thumb, I recommend everyone do some type of exercise at least 2 to 3 days per week. Certain goals, like building muscle and strength or training for an event, may require more frequent training. If you’re trying to lose weight, you likely need to watch what you’re eating beyond just Monday through Friday. It’s depressingly easy to wipe out a hard-earned caloric deficit with just a few cheat meals on the weekend. In my experience, if you can consistently eat well 6 or 7 days per week, you’ll start to see much faster progress.

In order to become more consistent, it helps to have some semblance of routine. You don’t need to map out every hour of every day; if you’re like me, this level of planning is suffocating. However, you should have some idea of how you’re going to spend your time and energy. Schedule in the most important obligations including your training sessions. Decide when you’re going to go to the grocery store or place your online grocery delivery order. Make sure you get enough sleep, preferably getting up and going to bed at the same time every day. When you have daily routines, it’s much easier to build in time for exercise, cooking, and stress management.

Lack of Patience

Another big mistake people frequently make is giving up too soon because they aren’t seeing results as fast as they’d like. Everyone wants immediate, dramatic results. I know I’ve been guilty of this myself on numerous occasions. Unfortunately, most fitness goals take a loooooong time to achieve. The sooner you accept that you’re in it for the long haul and learn to embrace the process of change, the more likely you are to see real results.

One thing I’ve learned in my own fitness journey is the power of riding out plateaus. It can be super frustrating to step on the scale day after day and see little to no progress, especially when you think you’re doing everything right. This is when we are most vulnerable to quitting because it seems like our hard work isn’t paying off. However, if you are patient and ride out the plateau, you often make dramatic progress very quickly. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve held the same weight for 5 to 7 days and then dropped 3 or 4 lbs seemingly all of a sudden. If your progress seems to have stalled, wait it out and keep doing what you’re doing. You will often see a similar leap forward. If you go a few weeks and still haven’t made any progress, then you should consider changing some part of your approach.

Constantly stopping and restarting leads to slow progress at best. As mentioned in the previous point, if you can try to keep exercising and eating well on the weekends, you’ll be less prone to weekend binges and the accompanying setbacks, guilt, and frustration. Do your best to keep moving forward in some small way. If you’re working with a coach or following a program (which you should be), be patient and work through your entire program before looking for something else to do. Jumping from program to program is a surefire way to waste time in the gym.

Exercising too much

This seems counterintuitive, but hear me out. Some people are simply doing way too much work in and out of the gym. Our bodies need time to recover and adapt to the stresses placed on them during exercise. If you’re constantly training, you can run yourself into the ground and actually end up worse off than when you started. More is not always better; sometimes more is just more.

To avoid reaching a point of diminishing returns with your training, make sure everything you’re doing has a purpose. This is especially true of taxing activities like heavy strength training, high intensity interval training, and long cardio sessions. You don’t need to do these activities every single day to see results. If you’re feeling burnt out, beat up, overwhelmed by how much exercise you think you need to do each week, or frustrated by your lack of progress despite tons of effort, scale back your training. Do the most important things, take some days off of training, and cut everything else out for a while. Give your body time to rest and recover.

As a member of Strength Faction, I’ve seen the value of organizing my training week along the neurometabolic continuum. This is a fancy term that basically means you perform your most neurologically taxing activities at the start of the week and your most metabolically taxing activities at the end of the week. The first half of the week is a great time to lift really heavy weights, perform sprints, and do high intensity interval training. During the latter half of the week, get your pump on, perform higher rep sets, and do some low intensity recovery cardio. Since I started organizing my weeks like this, I’ve felt less burnt out and more capable of really pushing myself at appropriate times. Try this out to help you recover better and get more out of your training.

Not working hard enough

On the flip side of the previous point, many people aren’t seeing results because they aren’t working very hard. I’m not big on “tough love,” but I do think some people could benefit from taking an honest look at how much they’re truly pushing themselves. If you want to disrupt your current equilibrium and achieve a health and fitness goal, you need to test your limits and get out of your comfort zone.

There are many types of discomfort you can expect as you chase different goals. Building muscle requires enduring burning pain to eek out a few more good reps beyond what you thought you could do. Getting strong requires a similar kind of discomfort and focus to crush a new PR with great form. If you want to lose weight, you will certainly have to get comfortable with being a little bit hungry much of the time. The opposite is true if you want to gain weight; you’ll need to eat past the point of fullness to give your body the fuel it needs to build new tissue.

Few people want to experience these feelings for their own sake. But if you’re serious about your goals, you have to learn to embrace them. If you never feel uncomfortable, you likely need to kick your efforts up a notch. An absence of any of these feelings is a clue that you’re probably not doing the things you need to do to make progress.

If you want to receive more tools, tips, and strategies to help you get strong and feel great despite your crazy schedule, sign up for my email list here.

May 15, 2018October 14, 2019

Chasing Perfection? Do This Instead.

My name is Caroline, and I am a recovering perfectionist.

Growing up, I always felt pressure to excel at everything I did. I was the kid who always needed to set the curve on exams, win first chair in every audition, and get all A+’s in every class. If I couldn’t be the best at something, I usually gave up and quit.

Sports were a perfect example. Although I was a swimmer for most of my life, I was never the fastest. I grew to hate practice and resented the faster swimmers. Eventually I quit swim team and exercise altogether, which contributed in no small part to me gaining weight through the end of high school and my freshman year of college.

My perfectionist tendencies became even more problematic in my early twenties. When I started losing weight my sophomore year of college, I subscribed to several problematic nutritional dogmas. These diet plans restricted entire food groups and forbade me from eating outside narrow windows.

I was never able to stick with these plans for long. Each time I broke a rule, even if my infraction was small, I decided I might as well eat whatever I wanted the rest of the day. After a while, these binges started getting more and more destructive. Something had to change for the sake of my physical and mental health.

If you’re struggling with your weight, your eating or training, or your sense of self-worth, there’s a good chance you’re holding yourself up to the same impossibly high standards I once was. I encourage you to stop chasing perfection. Only by relinquishing some control and accepting that there’s no perfect plan can you finally make real progress toward your health and fitness goals.

Perfection is unattainable.

The first step to moving forward is to realize nobody’s perfect. We all know this on some level, but to truly accept and embrace it is extremely powerful.

There are many ways we chase perfection with our health and fitness goals, such as:

Attempting to follow a hardcore, 5-7 day per week training program that doesn’t work with your busy schedule.
Forcing yourself to perform the same heavy barbell lifts with the same loads you used to do as a teenager, but which leave you feeling beat up and exhausted now.
Following an ultra-strict diet with no wiggle room to navigate social situations or other contingencies.
Believing there is one best diet or training program and every other plan will give you such lackluster results they aren’t worth considering.

I hope you can see how all these approaches are problematic. It’s easy for elite athletes to build their lives around the most scientifically-optimized plan. For the rest of us, plans that demand perfection don’t work. We have unusually busy days at work, family emergencies, unexpected obligations, and active social lives. We need plans which give us space to navigate these situations and still be successful.

The most optimal diet or training plan for you is the one you can follow consistently while maintaining your energy, performance, and sanity. This means the way you eat and train has to be flexible and not overly restrictive. It’s better to do less but stick with it than to try and do too much and burn out.

your eating and exercise plans should be realistic

Chasing perfection leads to all-or-nothing behavior.

When you’re chasing perfection, it’s easy to use “screw ups” as an excuse to go off the rails. Perfectionists get triggered by failure and overreact with harmful behaviors.

My struggles with binging and restricting are a great example. I ate a bit of forbidden food and then said “screw it” and jumped face-first into a pile of junk food I often didn’t even want. These binges did way more harm than the initial mistake ever did.

Instead of living and dying by a long list of strict rules, reduce your focus to just one or two behaviors at a time. I recommend picking things you’re confident you can manage. Once you’ve identified your current focus, let everything else go. You can always tackle more things once you’ve nailed your initial commitment.

If this freaks you out, take a deep breath and realize you have plenty of time to get to where you want to go. Breaking your goals into smaller pieces and getting rid of strict rules keeps you moving forward and prevents overwhelm and all-or-nothing behaviors.

Read more: Do Less to Do More

Active acceptance and self-compassion

If you’re anything like me, you may have a tendency to be overly hard on yourself. This is a hallmark of being a perfectionist – you beat yourself up when you don’t live up to your impossibly high standards. You may feel bad about yourself all the time, wondering why you’re unable to stick with your strict diet and workout routine. You think something is wrong with you, when the real problem is your perception and expectations.

A crucial part of moving away from perfectionism is to practice self-compassion. Just as you accepted that nobody’s perfect, accept that you can’t get everything right all the time. You’re going to screw up. The important thing is to learn from your struggles and keep taking positive action. Don’t use your slip-ups as an excuse to binge or skip the gym for weeks at a time.

Just because you’re practicing self-compassion doesn’t mean you have to love everything about your life just the way it is. My mentor Jill Coleman talks about “active acceptance.” This means you accept where you’re at right now – flaws and all – without judgement, but you’re still trying to move forward and improve. This is a great place to be if you’re trying to change your body or improve your health.

when we aim for perfect, like a bullseye, we set ourselves up for dissapointment — You don’t need to hit a bullseye to see progress.

If you’ve been chasing perfection in the gym and kitchen with little to show for it, consider another way. Chasing perfection sets you up for failure and keeps you from achieving your goals. Instead, choose a few manageable changes to tackle right now. Accept that everything else will stay the way it is for now, and that’s ok. You’ll experience much more long term success making small changes that stick rather than aiming to be perfect and always falling short.

Looking for a way to become a more consistent exerciser? Sign up for my 4C System course below. Once you sign up, you’ll receive five days of free lessons sharing the strategies I’ve used to help hundreds of clients exercise more without losing their sanity.

May 1, 2018June 28, 2018

3 Things I’ve Changed My Mind About – Nutrition Edition

My relationship with food has been a roller coaster ride. After being overweight, I have lost weight, gained it, and lost it again multiple times. If you can name a popular diet, there is a good chance I tried to follow it at one point or another. These experiences, combined with years of working with clients, taught me many hard lessons about what really matters in nutrition.

I believe all the nutrition information floating around these days has actually done people a disservice when it comes to getting and staying in great shape. Most of us have too many rules we try to follow which sap our willpower and don’t leave us looking or feeling any better.

In my quest to pare back the steps it takes to live a healthy life, I work with clients to help them get rid of the BS and instead focus on the few factors which really move the needle: caloric balance, food quality, balance, and eating in a way you actually enjoy.

This week’s blog post shares 3 big ideas about nutrition I’ve changed my mind about since I began my own fitness journey. If you’re struggling to identify which food rules to follow and which to ignore, I think you’ll find this information helpful.

If you missed last week’s post sharing 3 training ideas I no longer believe, check it out here.

There are “good foods” and “bad foods.”

Almost everyone has a mental list of good and bad foods. Our bad foods lists vary widely and could include anything from fast food, gluten, dairy, sweets, carbs, fats, fruits, and meat.

When I was first dieting, I got swept up in some of the popular nutritional dogmas floating around the internet. At various times I followed a paleo diet, keto diet, carb backloading, intermittent fasting (more on this below), and did a Whole 30.

In retrospect, following these restrictive diets was very destructive for my long-term relationship with food. I always struggled with emotional and bored eating, but placing certain foods on a do-not-eat list took it to a whole other level. Now, these foods became even more appealing precisely because they were off limits. When I did break my strict rules (and it always happened eventually), I felt compelled to eat as much of these foods as possible all at once because I knew they would be off-limits again soon. This led to a battle with binging and restricting that I’m still working through.

These days, I’ve completely done away with my do-not-eat list. Instead, I follow a moderation-based approach. I can eat any food at any time, but I only eat enough to feel satisfied. This usually means eating just a few bites of a formerly forbidden food as opposed to gulping down as much as I could eat and not paying attention to how full I felt or if I even wanted to continue eating. Taking foods off a pedestal actually reduces my cravings because I don’t feel a sense of urgency to eat ALL the things at once.

Furthermore, much of the “science” behind restrictive eating plans is misleading. While it’s true our bodies behave in certain ways, there is a ton of individual variation regarding food tolerance. We all have different immune, digestive, and hormonal systems. Some people are very sensitive to many foods; others have no food sensitivities whatsoever. For example, I’ve learned I don’t have any negative reactions to eating gluten, even though some people report feeling dramatically better when they remove it from their diets.

There is no magic that happens when you follow a restrictive diet. In most cases, the impressive results you may experience happen simply because you’ve eliminated a lot of calories from your normal diet. You can achieve this same effect without the unnecessary suffering caused by highly restrictive diets. Additionally, the psychological benefits of taking a more moderate approach will continue to serve you long after you hit your goal.

Takeaway: You don’t have to remove certain foods or food groups from your diet just because someone else told you to. Experiment to learn about your body and decide which foods leave you looking, feeling, and performing your best.

You have to eat (or not eat) certain foods at certain times to see good results.

There are a lot of ideas surrounding the best time to eat (or not eat) certain foods. Here are a few ideas I once believed:

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.
You should skip breakfast and fast for 14-16 hours each day.
If you don’t eat within an hour of your workout, you’ll lose all your training gains.
You should eat as little fat as possible on training days. On off days, eat as little carbs as possible.
Don’t eat carbs before bed.
Eat more frequently throughout the day to stoke your metabolism.

Reading all of these in a single list reveals just how silly this is. How can all of these ideas be true when some of them contradict each other? The answer is many of them are not true, or at least not important for every person at all times.

For elite athletes and physique competitors, nutrient timing is an important part of results. But at most, nutrition timing makes up about 10% of your results. It’s just not a big rock for most people. If you’re not consistently nailing your calorie balance, getting enough sleep, training hard, and eating mostly high-quality foods, it doesn’t matter when you eat.

Takeaway: Don’t worry so much about the most ideal time to eat. Instead, find an eating routine which controls calories, works with your schedule, manages hunger and cravings, and provides consistent energy and focus throughout the day.

Food issues are always about food.

I’ve learned through my coaching and personal experience that many times, issues with food are rooted in deeper psychological and emotional problems.

If you’ve been yo-yo dieting for many years without much to show for it, another diet is likely not the solution you need. Many people use food as a coping mechanism to deal with deeper personal struggles. Going on a diet treats a symptom rather than going after the root cause.

I used food for many years as a way to numb uncomfortable feelings like anxiety, boredom, and loneliness. Some of my clients have used food to exert control when they felt powerless to change other areas of their lives. There are a million reasons why we may have learned to use food to cope with or get through difficult situations.

If you truly want to change the way you eat, you need to realize these behaviors are no longer serving you. This requires you to get more in touch with your thoughts and emotions to determine what’s really going on. When you can more clearly notice and name your emotions, you can respond to them appropriately without food.

Mindfulness practices like meditation have helped me get more in touch with my feelings and recognize when I’m using food as a tool to blunt or numb uncomfortable emotions. Meditation was challenging for me at first – I’m a very wired person most of the time – but taking time to sit with myself without distractions has taught me to be less reactive to my feelings and environmental stimuli. Journaling can also be a helpful tool to get out of your head and look at things more objectively. (You can learn more about these and other tools in my Beat Emotional Eating blog here).

Takeaway: You may not need another diet. I encourage you to take some time to learn about yourself on a deeper level. Aim to be less reactive and rely less on food as a coping mechanism. Also, learn to get more comfortable in your skin. If you don’t like yourself now, you won’t like yourself 20 pounds lighter.

Food is an important part of life. We eat not only to survive, but also as a way to celebrate, try new things, and get in touch with our roots. If you’ve struggled with your relationship with food, or simply haven’t experienced success changing your body because you never know what advice to believe, there is hope for you. By filtering through the noise and learning to listen to your body, you can create a nutrition approach which balances calories, works with your lifestyle, and is enjoyable and fulfilling.

If you want some help figuring all this out, please reach out to me here.

March 20, 2018October 14, 2019

3 Strategies to Combat All-or-Nothing Eating

Let’s say you’ve been following your strict diet perfectly all week when your friends invite you to Sunday brunch. Although you’re nervous about finding menu items that fit your plan, you accept the invitation anyway.

When you get to brunch, you cave to peer pressure and order a bloody mary. Then you have a few bites of a shared fried appetizer. Your defenses are down and you’re mentally exhausted from a week of white-knuckling your eating.

After indulging in the drink and appetizer, you feel a wave of guilt. Since you’ve already “blown” today, you go all in on your favorite cheat foods. You order a heaping plate of pancakes and two more drinks. On the way home, you stop and pick up a pint of ice cream, which you eat mid-afternoon. When it’s time for dinner, you order Chinese take out and eat way past the point of fullness.

At the end of the day, you feel bloated, overstuffed, and riddled with guilt and disgust. You vow to resume your restrictive diet the next morning.

couple eating out at a restaurant

It’s easy to get caught up in this vicious cycle of restricting and binging. This rarely leads to success with your fitness goals; instead it almost always leads to decreased self-confidence, guilt, frustration, and an unhealthy relationship with food. If this story sounds anything like you, it’s time to try a different approach. Keep reading to learn my top three strategies to combat all-or-nothing eating.

Get rid of rigid rules.

One of the best ways to set yourself up for all-or-nothing eating is to set strict rules about what you can and cannot eat. If you struggle with this problem, don’t make any foods completely off limits (the exception here would be if you have a serious food intolerance or allergy).

As soon as something is forbidden, it becomes much more appealing. Indulging in just one of your forbidden foods can create a chain reaction leading to an all-out binge. These binges do way more damage than simply eating enough to satisfy your craving.

Instead of setting rigid rules, allow yourself to eat whatever you want, whenever you want. This can be scary at first, especially if you are someone who is constantly dieting. However, giving yourself the freedom to eat anything makes you reconsider your choices. Combined with mindfulness practices (more on this below), you will be more likely to eat only foods you truly want and stop when you’re satisfied.

Another strategy is to have small amounts of “cheat” foods throughout the week. Jill Coleman calls this “preemptive cheating” and believes it can help moderate weekend eating. A preemptive cheat would be any less-than healthy food you enjoy such as chocolate, alcohol, fatty foods like cheese or butter, and carbs. Rather than telling yourself you’ll never eat your favorite foods again, allow yourself to eat just enough to make your meals taste good and to satisfy any cravings.

Don’t take on too much at once.

Psychological wins are very important when building new habits. It’s crucially important to set yourself up for success early on in the process.

One of the surest ways to fail is to try to change everything at once. For example, if you are currently eating McDonalds for breakfast, skipping lunch, eating 2 heaping plates of food at dinner, and snacking on chips and ice cream before bed, attempting to overhaul your entire diet is likely to completely overwhelm you. After a week of trying to manage 20 new habits, the smallest slip-up may trigger a binge. This only fuels the vicious all-or-nothing diet cycle.

If you have a long list things you want to change, start with the one thing you are most confident you can manage right away. Slow, small improvements are easier to sustain and will build confidence in your ability to change. Accept that you’re not going to be perfect right away and acknowledge that you will surely slip up along the way. Give yourself permission to start small and grow to relieve some of the pressure that can cause all-or-nothing eating.

Slow down and sit.

My final strategy to combat all-or-nothing eating is to practice mindfulness. It’s easy to get swept away by uncomfortable emotions or to lose touch with what our body is actually trying to communicate. The best ways to get back in touch with these signals are to slow down and take some space every day to sit quietly with your thoughts.

Practice eating slowly and without distractions. Focus on the taste and texture of each bite of food and chew fully before swallowing. Put down your utensil between bites to breathe or take a sip of water. Stop eating when you are satisfied or when the food no longer tastes as good as the first few bites. Slowing down can help you take back control of your decisions around food and potentially interrupt the whirlwind of emotions that can fuel a binge.

If you do notice the self-talk or thoughts that precipitate a binge, do something to halt the process. Set a timer, find something engaging to occupy your mind, or call a friend or family member. Whenever possible, remove yourself from the situation tempting you to binge.

Finally, establish some daily practices to connect you with your values and long-term goals. Keep a journal or spend time reflecting on how you’re feeling. When uncomfortable emotions come up, allow yourself to sit with them until they pass. This sounds cheesy but it actually works. When we learn to manage our emotions appropriately, we no longer need to use food as a coping mechanism.

mindfulness practices can help you lose weight and improve your health

If you struggle with all-or-nothing eating, you’re not alone. Many people are silently caught in this vicious cycle. The good news is there is always hope to move forward. Start by accepting you don’t need to be perfect to see results. Get rid of rigid food rules that set you up for failure. Focus on making sane and sustainable changes and give yourself room to make mistakes. Slow down when eating, identify and interrupt binge triggers, and spend time exploring yourself and your emotions. And always practice compassion toward yourself; building healthy habits is hard, but you have what it takes to see it through.

If you want exclusive access to tips, tools, and strategies to take charge of your health and fitness, despite a crazy schedule, please sign up for my email list here.