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We've all been there, stuck between wanting to change and lacking the motivation to do so. If you are in a rut or a funk, this episode is for you. I go over some tangible tips that can help you start building up momentum again and get things going!
To try a free week of my signature Fit for Hiking program to get you fit from the trails (gym AND at-home options) start HERE.
To try a free week of my signature Fit for Hiking program to get you fit from the trails (gym AND at-home options) start HERE.
For next level fat loss strategies, hormone/gut health help, serious performance goals and unparalleled support, apply for Mountain Metabolic coaching. Learn more HERE.
For more free wellness resources, hiking/travel guides, and other blog posts, check out my website HERE.
What is Fit for Hiking?
Where fitness and outdoors meet. In this space we chat all things hiking, exercise, wellness, adventure, motherhood, and metabolic health from a female perspective! Get ready to learn + be inspired to live your fullest, most adventurous life!
Hi, my name is Brady and I'm a long time fitness professional and Midwest girl turned mountain living hiking addict. In combining my knowledge of fitness and passion for hiking, I've helped hundreds of women get lean and strong for the trails. Think of this as your one stop shop for both education and inspiration on all things female wellness, trail talk and adventure. Hiking, female metabolism, motherhood, nutrition, travel and fitness are all topics you'll hear discussed here. If you are outdoorsy and active, looking to level up your health, unlock your potential, and become inspired to live your most vibrant life, you're in the right place. You're listening to the fit for Hiking podcast. Hello and welcome back to another episode of the fit for Hiking podcast. This is your host, Brady. Today we're going to be getting into the topic of how to reset your motivation when it's low. If you're just like listening to this right now and you are in a place where your energy kind of sucks, you're feeling a little bit aimless, like every day. You're just getting through it and you don't feel like you're thriving and you feel like you're just kind of going through the motions of each day and not really fulfilling your potential or living optimally, then this is for you. I feel like anyone who's listening to this can relate to having periods of your life when you felt that way, where you look at other people and you're like, how do you have the motivation to do all these things and to be crushing it in all these areas? When I'm struggling to get out of bed in the morning, I'm struggling to just kind of like do the basic things. I don't feel like I'm very creative. I don't feel like my energy is good. Um, it's a hard place to be, and it's a hard place to pull yourself out of. And ultimately it has to be you, right? You can have people in your life who are like, okay, I want to help you. Let's kind of work through these slumps that you're going through right now. And ultimately it has to come from within. It has to come from you. And I've experienced a lot of this especially. Since having my daughter, I feel like the hormone toll and the roller coaster that you go on is pretty crazy. And it has left me in multiple points postpartum feeling just really lackluster. Not myself, not like my normal energy. And it's really hard to be in that place when you've also been on the flip side of the coin, where you feel like you're crushing it, you feel like you firing on all cylinders and you really have a good direction. You're feeling passionate about your day to day life and what you're doing and your hobbies and your habits. And then if you feel the opposite, you know just how frustrating that place can be in. And it can be hard to pull yourself out of that. So I want to talk about how to reset when these times of low motivation come, when you're just kind of dragging, you don't feel like yourself and you want to pull yourself out of it. Okay, so these are things that have worked for me and just tried and true methods for resetting your mind. And a lot of this does start with our mental space and setting the proper mindset first. And then that is kind of going to be the foundation and the catalyst for everything else. So number one, let's dive into it. Number one is establishing a morning routine with just 3 to 5 things that feel enjoyable realistic. That's a big one, and that kickstart your day in a positive way. I know everyone in their brother preaches about morning routine, morning routine, but what I'm saying here is different than wake up at 5 a.m. and do 30 minutes of affirmations and meditate and workout and cook a five star meal and kind of go through this like 20 step morning routine that just feels so out of reach. It doesn't feel attainable. Maybe you're like, there's no way I'm waking up at 5 a.m. and I am with you on that. I am not a 5 a.m. wake up early. I like my sleep and I've never been one to wake up super early. So just because you don't have a 20 step morning routine that starts at 430 or 5 a.m. does not mean that you are failing at this. I want us to think about just a few things that you can put in succession every morning. So you have the routine. You have this like kind of fall back habit, but it doesn't feel daunting and it actually feels like something you start to look forward to. You enjoy. And it's ultimately realistic. That is huge. Because if you are like me, maybe you have a kid, maybe you have multiple kids, and every morning is different based on like when your kiddos are waking up and what's happening with childcare or school that day, and what activities everybody has and what's required of you with with work and your responsibilities. And not every morning is going to look the same. So that's where having just a few things, whether you're doing it at 6 a.m. or you're doing it at 8 a.m., that just help you start your day. And after that, you feel like you are ready to start the day in a positive way. So I'll share what some of mine are. And every morning looks very different for me. We have a couple days where we're doing childcare, a couple days where I'm home with my daughter a week. Um, so some mornings, you know, I'm having to get around for the day to take my daughter to childcare. Some days we have more of a slow morning, and I'm just focused on getting breakfast ready and kind of getting the day started for her. She's also waking up at different times every morning, and so it's not always the same. But I have a few rituals that I do every morning that help me feel like I am a productive person and I'm ready to go. I think especially if you work from home, you work for yourself, you're a stay at home mom and you don't have like the typical structure that you would have if you were getting up, getting ready and driving to a job. This becomes even more important so that you're not just rolling out of bed in your PJs. You throw on a nice top and you get on your zoom calls, right? Like have some structure to your morning. So a few things that I do after I obviously like brush my teeth, go through just some basic stuff. I have found that doing my hair and putting on at least a little bit of makeup helps me feel my best. If you're someone who doesn't wear makeup, that's totally fine. The point is that getting ready for me in some capacity, even if it's just putting on a little bit of concealer and some mascara and like putting my hair back in a clip where it doesn't just look disheveled and I don't have bedhead for the next three hours while I go through my daughter's morning stuff, it helps me feel more put together and then putting on an outfit straight away so that I'm, again, not just like running around in my PJs for the next few hours, depending on what that day looks like. So getting ready straight away to at least be able to exercise, go for a walk, something like that. It doesn't have to be that I'm putting on a really nice outfit. Most of the time I'm wearing athletic wear during the day. It's just the act of kind of getting ready. And also I make my bed. Those are two things that I do. First thing, making my bed makes me feel like my room is put together and I can begin my day from there. Everything just feels better when my bed is made. Um, so I start with those two things. The next thing I try to do is get outside for some morning light. And this doesn't happen every single day. But I try to do it as much as humanly possible, especially if I have some time before my daughter's awake. I put my face in the sun outside. No matter the season, I get outside, even if I have to bundle up a little bit. Um, even just a few minutes of some morning light in your eyes, on your face, that is going to do wonders for your, um, your body clock, your circadian rhythm kind of setting the day. It helps regulate your cortisol curve to make sure that your cortisol is peaking as you go throughout the morning and then starts to taper off throughout the day. So sunlight exposure is huge for that. I just did an episode about that. Um, if you are interested in that is the cortisol episode. So definitely check that out. If you're interested in kind of how to structure your day to optimize your cortisol, which helps with your energy, your other hormones, um, feeling your best throughout the day, balancing all the things. So. Getting outside also is just going to improve the mood when we go from sleeping to just like scrolling our phone right away to sitting inside all day at a laptop. It's not so awesome for our mental health. And then we wonder why we have so much of a mental health crisis. Because we're spending so much time in artificial light, staring at other artificial lights, and we're not getting outside nearly as much as we should. So I get outside, I'll try to either have my breakfast or my coffee outside. I like to do devotions in the morning. Um, so for me, that looks like, um, reading my Bible app and doing a little bit of journaling, whatever that kind of routine looks like for you, maybe you are doing some affirmations. Maybe you're writing out your plan for the day, maybe you're doing a prayer journal. Maybe you're just writing out your thoughts and kind of where you're at for that day. Something to kind of just brain dump set your intentions for the day, um, can be really, really helpful Get yourself in a positive headspace. Um, so if you can do that outside, Maybe not year round, but even just a few months out of the year. Do it outside. Get outside as much as you can, especially first thing in the morning. Getting that morning light exposure is going to be huge. Um, and then if you're able to add some movement into your morning routine, awesome. I try to go for walks in the morning when I can. This one is not an everyday thing, because there are some days when I am rushing off to, like I said, take my kiddo to childcare so when I can, I do it. Um, but those are just a few of the things that are really important to me that kind of set my day up for success. Like I said, it's not a 10 to 20 step thing. I'm not having 80 million supplements and lemon water or doing all of these crazy things, but I do try to at least do those few things to set myself up for success. The other one would be having a high protein breakfast. I do this every morning. It's just part of my routine now. And so I'll either do that before I get out from my morning light. If it's something quick or after the morning light if I'm cooking kind of a bigger breakfast for my daughter that day. So find a few things that you make time for, right? It's not going to happen on its own. You're going to have to make the time, but it should feel like things that are somewhat enjoyable to you. So maybe it's like a podcast that you love to listen to, and you do it while you go for a morning walk, or you do it while you make a healthy breakfast. Picking something that doesn't feel daunting. Otherwise you're not going to do it. If you try to have these crazy, unrealistic, I'm going to do a cold plunge and then I'm going to, um, you know, go for a fasted cardio run, and then I'm going to have a breakfast that I hate and do all these things that don't feel at all enjoyable to you. The chances of you following through after the first few days are very unlikely. So yes, you might not love it every single day. You might not be feeling every single day, but finding things that in general don't feel super daunting and they feel realistic and you can do them most days of the week. All right number two examine your time sucks. So time suck is something that. You're just spending tons of time on, and it's not doing anything to boost your mood, your energy, your relationships, your productivity, or promoting you having your best possible day. So really be honest with yourself. Like, what are the things that you're doing every single day that are not positive for your life? They're not contributing to your mental health. They're not contributing to your physical health or your relationships or your energy or your mood. They're not helping you in your career pursuits or your side hustle or your hobbies or anything. Um, and also, they're not really that restful. Like, obviously there's something to be said for you're going to have to rest at certain points every single day. So that is something that someone could argue, oh, that's not doing anything to boost productivity or energy or whatever, but rest is essential and you're going to need to do that in order to have harmony and balance in your life. But there are certain time sucks that are not actually even that restful, such as scrolling your phone or maybe sitting on the couch and watching episode after episode of a of a TV series and you're like, I know I should stop, I know I should go to bed, I know I should do something that is like boosting my life in some way, but instead you just stay on the couch because it's hard to get yourself moving in a different direction. So I mean, those things that. Are not serving you, but they're finding their way into your day to day life and trying to either cut way back or eliminate those, or put some parameters on those things. And you are the only one who knows what those are in your own day to day life. But really get honest with yourself about what are my time socks? What are the things that I don't even know why I do them, but I do them and they're not helping me live my best life. Okay, number three is pinpointing a few habits on the opposite end of the spectrum that do improve your mood, productivity, and energy. Typically, these things are going to be things that naturally produce dopamine. So here are some examples. Engaging in community. Community is huge for our overall mental health, physical health and quality of life. So engaging in some sort of community exercise, going for a walk, being outside just time in nature bonding with family and friends, having that quality time, accomplishing tasks that have been hanging over your head for a while, or just doing a hobby that brings you joy. So most days, realistically, we're not going to be able to do all of these things, but you can make time for 2 to 3 of these every single day. So whether that's calling a friend and having that community, one thing that's been amazing for my mental health and connecting with friends that don't live close by is the app. Marco Polo. A couple of my friends, my girlfriends who live all over. We created a group and we're on there all the time just sending each other little updates. It brings me so much joy, and it's a nice way to feel like you're getting that face to face time without necessarily getting on a FaceTime call or getting on the phone, but you really feel like you are staying up to date on each other's lives. Little things like that are huge for staying connected and just feeling like you have that friend connection. Um, so finding 2 to 3 things on that list that provide natural dopamine, whether it's going for a walk every day playing with your kid, you know, setting aside 2 to 3 hours after dinner where you're having quality time with your family, um, exercising, having a hobby that you do every day, whatever it is that feels realistic for you to do every day, that fits into your life and and really, truly does boost your quality of life. Find 2 to 3 of those and do them every single day. Make the time, even if it's only ten minutes, right? Even if it's a ten minute walk outside. Um, and then the other ones fill in throughout the week. Like, realistically, as a mom, I don't have time for as many hobbies as I used to have. I'm not hiking every day like I used to when I lived in a van and didn't have a kid. Um, life looks different for me, but I try to get out and hike once a week because it's a hobby that I love, and I know I can't do it every day, but it does bring me a lot of joy. So I try to do it once a week or, you know, my softball league doing that once or twice a week in the summer, finding those things and filling them throughout the week, time with friends, time with family. Make the time for those things because your mental health is so connected to connectivity and community. And so if you're feeling disconnected and low motivation or low energy, it might be a connectivity issue with with the people in your life. All right. The next one, number four, is to find a way to make the mundane moments a little bit more enjoyable. So the reality of being a human is that we're going to have to do the boring crap all the time. We're going to do so much laundry in our lifetime, so many dishes. We're going to have to spend a lot of time driving places and just doing chores and things that aren't that enjoyable. But when we can find a way to make these things just a little bit more enjoyable for ourselves, it's going to motivate us to get them over with while not just feeling like we're dreading all of these aspects of life that are kind of an everyday thing, right? So one thing would be like listening to an audiobook podcast or a really fun playlist while you are cleaning or doing house tasks. Maybe you've been dreading painting a room in your house, so you put together a painting playlist, or you find an audiobook that you're super excited about and you say, okay, I'm only going to listen to this while I'm doing these, like specific tasks in my house, or I'm only going to listen to it when I'm on a walk. Those are some good ways to kind of motivate yourself to find enjoyment in those activities. Another, uh, option is inviting friends or calling someone while you're on a walk. Meeting somebody for a workout. Turning one dinner a week into a picnic or a candlelight dinner or something, that it's like an exciting thing. Maybe you're getting the whole family involved and everybody's making something, or you're teaching your kiddo how to make a certain dish that will make it more enjoyable than just feeling like, oh, all the pressure's on me. I gotta cook again, and I'm not looking forward to it at all. Kind of just flips your attitude ever so slightly. Another thing you can do is having some little luxury rewards after big daunting task. So think about like your little luxury items of life. Maybe it's going out and getting an iced coffee drink, or maybe it's going for a walk in a certain spot, or watching an episode of this certain show that you're loving, or reading a book in silence on your deck and having a moment to yourself, having a glass of wine, whatever. Having some sort of incentive for like a big, daunting task, whether it's a work task or a thing around your house or just something you've been putting off. Having those little luxury rewards is going to help from a mental standpoint. All right. Number five is to remove barriers from your exercise routine. So if you're struggling from an exercise motivation standpoint, which is a very common thing to struggle with, this one is going to be helpful for you. So while exercise is always going to require certain sacrifices right, you're always going to have to sacrifice your time, your energy, your mental motivation. It's never just going to be something that comes super easily all the time. We do want to make it as easy as possible on ourselves to show up and just do it. Just do the things and implement so we can do this by one. Having some basic equipment at home for days when the gym isn't feasible. If the gym is your only option, then days when it's like blizzard outside or your kids are having meltdowns and you can't leave the house or whatever reason, it's going to make it hard to show up consistently and you're going to kind of have that all or nothing like, oh, if I can't go to the gym, I can't do anything. Having just even a few dumbbells, a few pieces of equipment at home that you can still stay consistent with your workouts even when you can't get to the gym, it's going to be huge. I've had to completely adopt this tactic. As a mom and a business owner, I cannot always get to the gym. I get to the gym maybe two days a week, and the other day I'm filling it in at home and I've made that work for years now. Um, consistently. Next is having a plan. That can be adjusted with the seasons of your life, or even just each week, each month. Our lives are not going to be static. Things are constantly going to be changing, and you're going to have to travel. You're going to have time to. Maybe you're not going to the gym at all and you've got to do all at home workouts. So working with a coach who is going to actually hear out, like what's going on in your life this week, like hands on and this is what we do in Mountain Metabolic coaching. If I have clients who are going on a work trip for a few days, I'm like, all right, let's look at the hotel gym. Let's look at what your schedule is like, what's realistic here. And then we're adjusting the workouts based on what they have that week. This is huge. If you're just trying to piece it together or you're following something that's extremely rigid, you're way less likely to stay consistent on the weeks when things change up. Okay, so having a coach who's with you every week and is going to adjust based on what's going on in your life is really important. Um, doing a form of exercise that you don't hate or dread, like, yes, I don't love weightlifting every single day, but most of the time I don't hate it. Um, that is important. You need to work in things that you like. So maybe you're like, I know I need to do weightlifting for my health, for my muscle building, all of these things, but I really, really love spin classes or running or. Ladies, then make sure you're working in also the things that you like around the essentials. Doing 1 or 2 classes a week of the things that you love so that you're still kind of motivated to show up. Um, being realistic about the time of day that you can work out and the length of your workout if you are constantly like, oh, I can't do my workout because I don't have an hour to spare, then you need to be doing shorter workouts because something is better than nothing. So it's so much better and more effective to show up consistently and do a 30 minute workout versus only going twice a week because you only have an hour to spare twice a week. Okay, so really being realistic and adjusting as you go if you need to. And also the final one here is looking at your week in advance based on each day's schedule and planning your workouts. Because like we said before, every week can be different. Every day is going to be different. So instead of just saying, okay, I'll work out at 6 a.m. every day this week, well, why don't you really sit down and look at your calendar and make sure that that's realistic for every single day before declaring that? And then you're less likely to break promises to yourself, which can kind of lead to just feeling like crap about your efforts. All right. The next big one is get around other people who inspire you to be your best self. We do not thrive in isolation. So I experienced this firsthand. I was feeling in a huge slump with my business a few years ago, and I was really just feeling directionless, like I wasn't loving where things were, but I didn't know how to get out of it because I was a solopreneur at the time, I was by myself. I didn't have a team. I didn't have a coach. I didn't have anybody guiding me. I felt like I was just on an island, and it was very demotivating and I didn't know what I was doing wrong. I didn't know how to get out of it. And what really turned things around for me was attending a coaching kind of seminar. It was a weekend away, and it was all for fitness coaches who are learning how to grow their businesses, how to scale their businesses. And I got so much out of that experience, not even just the information that the speakers were providing, but just motivation. I was very much revived. I was around other coaches. We were sharing our business structures, our ideas, our brand, um, kind of what was working for other people, what wasn't working. And I found it so, so helpful to get around other entrepreneurs who are in the exact same boat as me because I didn't feel so alone, I didn't feel so isolated, and it was a huge catalyst for me. I ended up hiring a coach through that whole situation, a business coach, and it completely changed the structure of my business and got it in a in a much better place after a lot of hard work and kind of resetting things. So all of that to say. It is so important if you're feeling isolated in a certain area, especially whether it's business or motherhood or just friendship in general. Um, whatever that area is that you're feeling a slump, you're feeling, um, low motivation, like you're not connected, like you're alone. It is so important to get around other people in that same situation who can help you feel less alone and kind of get you motivated again. Um, so here are some ways that you can do this. Listening to podcasts that give you ideas, hype you up, and get you motivated in whatever area that you're kind of feeling a slump in attending community events. Um, this is a big one. Like, look for ways to get involved in the thing that you are feeling isolated in and that you can find a lot of stuff through like Facebook groups. Um, there's so many like hiking groups and mom groups and, um, different like sporting leagues and business entrepreneur groups. There's so many different options now, we really don't have the excuse that there's nothing that we can do to join a group. Most areas at least. Um, the next is to plan weekly or biweekly meetups with people who do help you feel connected in whatever area you're struggling. So maybe you're a mom and you're feeling really alone in that season. Plan a weekly walk or a weekly playdate with someone who lives close to you and just do it every week. It's going to help you feel so much less alone. I've learned this the hard way, just kind of kind of trying to white knuckle my way through motherhood. And I'm so much happier now that I have, like, rituals every week, things that I do with other mom friends and their kids. It really helps me feel way less alone in this season. Um, and don't be afraid to join an actual group. So things like moms groups, small groups, book clubs, local sports teams, hiking clubs, all of those things. If you don't have people in your circle that meet those qualifications of like, oh, okay, I have a few people I could like plan a weekly walk with, or plan a weekly playdate with with our kids, then join a group and you're likely to find like minded people for whatever that group is for. All right. Our next one is get clear on your purpose. We are a purpose driven people that we just are by our nature. Um, we naturally want to feel like we are part of a bigger purpose in our day to day life. We thrive on this. It gets us out of bed in the morning. Um, so when we lose sight of what we feel like our purpose is, or we just have no clue what our purpose is during a certain season of life, the days really do kind of start to feel less meaningful and we can kind of lose our spark. So spend some time really journaling or talking with a close confidant about your passions, your purpose, and your goals. This is going to shape the direction of your habits and your actions, and ultimately what your day is look like, your day to day life. And when we're excited about our purpose, we will find it a lot easier to get out of bed in the morning. So easier said than done to just find our purpose. But know that this is going to shift throughout our lives. Like your purpose right now is going to look different probably than your purpose in five years is going to grow and ebb and flow and develop. So don't feel like you have to know your entire big life purpose this second. But what is important to you right now? What do you feel like? Your gifts and your talents and your passions are pointing you towards? And what are the areas of life that you really feel fulfill you the most? So for me, it's my daughter being a good mom, really feeling like I'm helping her grow into an amazing person and feeling connected with her and my family. And then my business feeling like I'm meeting the needs of women who are coming into the mountain metabolic program and seeing their fulfillment through their goals. Getting met is very rewarding to me. Um, and just growing our team and being able to see their needs being met is is everything to me. So those are kind of my big purposes right now in this current season of life. It might not sound that big or like that exciting or important, but to me, those are the things that drive me and get me really excited and I feel passionate about them. So take some time to journal and really figure out what you feel like those are for you right now. If you're not clear on those things, and you feel like that's kind of leading you to feel in a slump. All right. Our final one today is to take immediate action instead of waiting for next week to map out some morning habits or do reflecting to change up your habits. Start implementing today. When we stall or delay things, we tend to kind of just fall back naturally into our comfortable patterns. However, you wouldn't be listening to this realistically if you were completely happy and content with how your life looks. So remember that and don't stay comfortable or get sucked back into complacency. Once this episode is over, take action while it's fresh and while you're feeling excited about making some changes and know that the excitement and the motivation are not going to be linear. Like, you're going to have times when you feel like you're falling back into that slump. It's not going to be just this constant high. But when you start doing the work to make forward progress and you're consistent, that's how you start to form habits, which cause your days to look different, which causes your energy to energy to change, which causes your mindset to improve. And ultimately this changes our life like it's these day to day little habits that change every day every week, every month. And that ultimately changes your life when you look back, right? So I hope that you can have some takeaways from this that you feel like you can implement right away. And if you are feeling extremely low motivation in your workouts or your relationship with food, your health, um, and you know that your energy is correlated to poor health habits. And you're just like, I have been in cycles of trying to figure this out on my own for years, and nothing is changing then now is the time. Like, don't just get sucked back into, oh, figure it out on my own. When you know that you haven't done that in the past, look at the patterns and let that kind of dictate your next move. And this is exactly why we have one on one coaching. Because we are better when we're in community. We are better when we have support and accountability. This is how we change and reroute our habits. Um, so if you are interested in metabolic coaching specifically based on what you've maybe heard me talk about on the show, or you just want to learn more, uh, make sure you apply at the link in the show notes. Um, you can also DM us at the Fit Underscore for Hiking Instagram page. And if you mention the podcast when you are on a call with me to chat about the program, you will get half off of your first month, so that's a pretty big, awesome deal. Um, hopefully that will motivate you to make some moves. If you're listening to this and you're like, oh, I know that I need to change my energy and motivation around my health habits. Um, it's not something you want to wait for because we got to just we got to take action if we want to be happy where we are a year from now, two years from now, five years from now. All right, you guys, thank you so much for listening. I hope that this episode gets you fired up and ready to take some action to kickstart your motivation and your energy. Again, thanks for tuning in and I will chat with you in the next episode. Thanks for tuning in to this episode of the fit for hiking podcast. As always, I hope it leaves you feeling inspired and informed on how to take your health and adventure into your own hands. For more content like this, be sure to follow along with my daily posts at Ponytail Underscore. On a trail that's ponytail underscore on a trail. You can also stay up to date on my new episodes being released at Fit Underscore for hiking, and find more free resources at Pony Tail on a trail.com. Happy and healthy trails.