Hey guys, welcome to the Lifting Lindsay podcast.
Today, I'm actually answering a question that I got on Instagram the other day
that I thought was really, really good.
And I feel like it's perfect as we move into Thanksgiving this week.
And then we move into the holiday season.
We move into the Christmas time next month.
The question that she asked was "How do you prevent fitness
from taking over your life.
How do you stay balanced?
So there's a few things that, that I feel like I need to be really honest with.
If you feel like Lindsay's over here, perfectly balanced in all aspects
of her life, let me just give you a little reality check that I'm not,
and neither is anybody else, right?
It's just, we're not, we're human.
A lot.
Of things pull at our time and our attention, and there's actually
no such thing as perfect balance.
Have you ever watched what are they called?
They're the entertainers that are spinning the plates.
Have you ever watched them before?
These are the entertainers that there's a long stick and they balance
a plate at the top and they're spinning the stick and it keeps the
plate spinning and balanced, right?
So the illusion is that they're all spinning at the same speed.
They're perfectly balanced, but they're not actually.
Because when you leave one to work on another, what happens is the one
you just left, you stop spinning.
will start to slow down.
So the illusion is that they're all balanced, but they're not.
And the trick is how can we keep just enough momentum that keeps them in motion.
That's the trick.
And that's the trick to life too.
So I feel like I am just a normal human being that I have a hard
time balancing things in my life, including my fitness goals.
But I can tell you some things that I've learned along the way of trying
to stay, uh, more balanced person, trying to keep my focus on the things
that really matter in life that aren't going to be pulled in all sorts of
directions where I start to lose myself.
But I, I'm human.
And there have been times looking back on the past, like seven, eight years of me.
Um, being into fitness, diving into weightlifting,
um, working towards my goals.
There have been times I've had really good life balance.
There have been times where I've been, I guess, spinning
the plate of fitness, uh, more.
I'm giving it more time and attention than others.
And there have been times where I've done it well and times where things
have crashed down and I've realized, like, I'm, my life is out of whack.
My fitness is taking too much of the highlight.
And there's this point of diminishing returns in that there's a point
of giving, giving, giving, and yet you're not getting back any more
satisfaction or joy from the giving.
Right?
So there have been plenty of times in my own life that many different things,
uh, have taken too much of a highlight in my life, and I haven't been balanced.
So here's What I have learned over my 38, almost 39 years of life is
that if you only have one goal.
You sit down, you write a goal, and it only is fitness, then it's
going to be a lot easier for you to get swept up and become obsessive.
Now just because somebody is dedicated doesn't mean that they're obsessive.
I think that that's really important to understand that you can be completely
dedicated and not be obsessed because you're flexible and you're coming at it
from a place of joy, fun, and excitement.
I think sometimes people look at people in fitness and they're like,
Oh, they are really good at nutrition.
They seldom miss a day working out.
Well, they're obsessed.
It just, it depends actually.
Um, are they not very flexible or are they actually flexible and you
just don't see how flexible they are?
All right.
If they miss a day, let's say they're used to training five times a week and
they can only train three times a week,
one week.
Are they beating themselves up?
Oh, I'm failing at this.
Oh, I just, I'm, I'm going to get fat.
Oh, I'm going to lose all my muscle.
Is all of that going on?
Then maybe they are obsessive.
I'll tell you a few weeks ago, I wasn't able to hit five days in the gym.
I got in my three, and I didn't care because I know that I'm
in maintenance right now.
I couldn't do it because of life and business and other goals.
I was very flexible.
I knew that nothing bad was going to happen because I
missed two days in the gym.
I didn't try to go back and somehow make it up the following week.
I just, whatever.
Moving on.
You can be committed without being obsessed and it comes down
to the narrative in your head.
Are you flexible, and are you actually driven from a place of, of
positivity and joy and excitement?
Or are you coming at it from a place of, I won't have value.
until.
Or I'm less than, until I hit this goal.
Well, yeah, if your whole identity, and value, and worth, and beauty,
and all of these things are hinging on that one goal that you've
written for your life, then yeah.
You will find it, it obsessive, it running your life.
So what I've found is that I need more than one anchor in my life.
Like goals to me are me striving for my future self.
And I can't just have one point of reference for my future self.
I have to have many.
So for me, I don't just have fitness goals.
I have other ones.
In fact.
Uh, in mentoring, in talking with people, it is interesting when, when
I see them becoming obsessed or, or they are worried that they're
becoming obsessed with fitness.
And I say, so what's the issue?
What is it taking away from?
Well, it's taking away from my family and being present.
Oh, okay.
So what's your goal right now with your family?
Most people don't have a goal with their family.
They have, they've never sat down and said, this is what I'm going to work on.
This is how I want to see my future family.
And this is how I have to act today to realize that in 30, 60, 90 days.
Most people don't do that.
They just want to passively show up for their family every day in hopes
that everybody else passively shows up as their best selves so that they
can all just have joy and happiness.
And then when they're They're not connecting with their child or their
spouse, then something's wrong with them.
Why can't they just be easier or right?
There's just, it's this passive reactive way to life.
And then they finally do sit down and make a goal towards something else.
And then they're shocked when that something else, the only goal in
their life that they've written down, all of a sudden becomes bigger.
Well, you have no other anchor points to hold you or to steer you
in the direction that you want to go.
You have none other, you just have that one.
So having goals for other aspects of your life is very important.
If you feel like fitness is becoming too big and it's taking away
from other aspects of your life,
maybe you need to sit down and write out specific goals for
these other aspects of your life.
So let me just give you some ideas here.
So I do have health and fitness goals.
Now, when I very first started, I would say they were bigger because I
was trying to create a new identity.
An identity of somebody who, uh, had balanced nutrition, got enough
protein, was aware and mindful of nutrition and how it fuels their body
and themselves to feel better.
I was trying to track everything to be in a calorie deficit, which in
and of itself increases cortisol.
It makes me very aware of the goal that I'm trying for, you
know, this isn't a passive thing.
I was going to the gym six times a week.
It was a big goal.
And it did consume a lot more of my time then than it actually does now.
So maintenance is where I'm sitting right now is actually You
still need awareness over food.
You still need to keep your habits, but my habits are in place.
So the amount of mental bandwidth that my lifestyle takes now is very little
compared to when I very first started.
It took a lot of my mental bandwidth because I'm trying
to create a new identity.
Now I am that individual.
And I wish I could go back to that Lindsay eight years ago and be
able to say these tips would help.
That's what I'm trying to do with my BeStrong community is help
people be aware of like, these are the things I wish I knew.
This is what the big rocks are.
Just focus on this.
Stop obsessing about those other things, right.
My only goal in life wasn't.
Losing 30 pounds.
Cause that's how my journey began was I wanted to lose 30 pounds.
But that wasn't the only goal in my life.
And even today, it's still not the only goal in my life
is to maintain my physique or
build muscle, that's not the only goal.
I love journaling, um, when I express that I love journaling, I think
people think I don't miss a day.
She doesn't miss a day.
She's, you know, rigid.
She always, no, I don't, you know, it's a good week if I
journal four, or five times a week.
That's a good week.
There are some weeks where it's like, oh, I only got two to three journaling
sessions this week, but I still got them.
That's still good, but I do love journaling.
I find it very powerful and I'm not talking about at the end
of the night being like, let's see, what do I tell my journal?
So it was a good day.
I was reading through my grandma's journal once.
I love reading through other people's journals.
I was reading through my grandma's journal once and I thought she only,
like, she always tells us what the weather was, the temperature today was
this, and I thought that was so funny.
There was light rain, mist on the grass, like it was very, that's not the type
of journaling that I'm talking about.
So I sat down and I wrote out who I want to be in 12 months, in a
year, the person that I want to be.
Um, and how, how emotional, um, things that, um, how I want to be a
more stoic individual, you know, the storms raging around me and yet I have
control over my emotions because I'm not that person and I'm striving to
become more stoic, more level headed.
Stoicism is very misunderstood and kind of becoming this, this student of stoicism.
I've been reading all the books.
I have daily stoic quotes that I read anyways, a lot of times people think
it's without feeling, but no, you feel everything, but you're seeing it from
a clearer perspective, you can take in the information, the feelings, but
you are proactive in your reaction.
You have control.
You're not a reactive person.
And so as a mother, I find myself reactive and I don't want to be that person.
I don't want to show up like that, right?
So here's this goal that I have.
This is who I want to, this is how.
I want to show up for my family.
So I write down exactly who I am as if I've already achieved it.
This is who I am as a mother in 12 months.
This is how I show up for my children.
Very present, not being constantly drawn away by my phone.
Um, they know I'm there.
They're important.
They're safe.
They feel safe with me.
They feel safe to be honest, and share all sorts of uncomfortable feelings
with me because I'm a safe person.
Like, so I write in detail who I am, the relationship that I want with my children
and my husband, as if I already have it.
I also write down, um, the relationship that I want with God, and how my faith
has developed, and my connection with him and who Christ is in my life.
And I write down my business and what's happening with my business?
And how am I serving people?
And what type of things am I creating to make this world a better place?
And I write these things out as if I have already achieved them.
And then every day, this is what I try to do.
I don't hit every day, right?
Cause I'm not perfect, but that's okay because I'm flexible.
I'm flexible.
And I try daily to open up this 12 month vision of who I am as an individual
as if I've already achieved it.
And I read through it and that in and of itself shifts because if
I have to be that person today, if I want it in 12 months, I'm not
overwhelmed by it, I'm excited.
I'm excited by the opportunity of I have a chance today, to be that person, to make
that family, to make that a contribution to the world, to all of these things.
So I have these goals in tons of different aspects of my life, and I
feel like those goals are anchor points, but do I stay perfectly balanced?
No, I don't.
I don't always, and that's okay.
Because I'm flexible, it's a constant monitoring and coming back.
I visualize this idea of somebody walking on this balance beam, and there's going
to be times where something pulls them a little bit more to the right and they
kind of have to re get their balance.
They notice I'm being pulled too far.
I need to now adjust.
Being pulled too far, starting to lose your balance.
There's nothing wrong with that.
A lot of shame often comes from people when they think, Oh,
I'm not perfectly balanced.
Oh, I let this goal take too much of my time.
And they want to go through these shaming cycles.
And we have to break ourselves of that.
There's no shame.
There's just learning.
There's curiosity.
There's what made me lose my balance.
I'm going to get curious about that.
And I'm going to learn from it and I'm going to move forward.
So as I'm walking through this balance beam of life, there will
always be something that is going to pull me one direction or another.
Always.
Because none of us are perfectly balanced.
Balance is an illusion.
We are not perfectly balanced 100 percent of the time.
And if you think somebody is, you don't know enough about them because
when they're really honest with themselves, they will tell you.
That they're not, but we'll find ourselves getting off the course a little bit.
We notice it, we take note and we make a course correction.
And then in a few weeks we'll notice we've gone a little bit more towards the right.
Then we pause, make a course correction, get curious, learn
from it, come back over, right?
It's this constant life long battle.
Don't think that you're going to ever master this.
Nobody ever has and nobody ever will.
But it's the consistency of course corrections that actually gets you
to where you want to be at the end.
And as you get better at spotting when you've gotten off, and getting curious,
you get better at not getting off.
But it doesn't mean that you're never going to get off course.
You will at one point or another, you will start leaning more
towards the left or right.
You will get a little off balance and you just need to course correct.
So my biggest suggestion for you would actually be to sit down and write out
your future self, who you want to be, not what you want to necessarily achieve.
Those things are great.
Don't get me wrong.
You can do it, but I'm talking about life experiences that you will have, that you
will make happen, um, better connections with family members, and write it from
a perspective of you have achieved it.
And then every day you begin the day by opening up and reading
this person that you are.
And then you write down if I'm to be that person, what does that look like today?
Who do I then need to be today?
And you'll get certain goals of maybe you want to connect better with a
child that you're struggling with.
Well, what does that look like day to day?
Well, maybe one thing I'll share a personal thing.
I have one daughter that I have a harder time connecting with.
I just struggle really finding how can I be more safe for her?
How can I connect better with her?
And through a lot of prayer, and thought, and journaling, this idea
came to me every single night she lays in her bed and she reads.
She loves, loves reading.
I love reading.
So I want to say every night, but I'm human, so it's not.
And I try to be flexible.
But ever since this idea came to me I've been doing it almost nightly.
When I go in and I say good night to her, I bring my book in and I say good night
to all of my kids, I leave her for last and I bring my book in, and I sit down and
we read together and she has been opening up to me and it is really exciting.
And then
I noticed that she'll just come up to me during the day and
hug me, and say, I love you.
Okay.
That was not her two, three months ago.
And so I feel like this has been every night that I've been doing this is
me putting in this investment of trust of, I care about you, of you matter.
And so that's one of my goals that I've really been working on.
So yours are going to be totally different than mine, right?
Your goals, your other anchor points that you need to sit down and make sure
you have and create quiet time in your life so that you can think through and
know what you are supposed to have as goals, based off of who you want to
be, the life experiences you want to have, and what you want relationships,
and family, and fitness, and health, and all of these things combined, what
you want them to be like in a year.
And then every day you act as though you are that person with these goals.
So that is something that I have developed over the past few years
and I'm flexible in my approach.
Every so often this changes, but the main overarching point that I want to
make is sometimes the methods change, but the overall point of I have to
have goals in other aspects of my life other than health and fitness.
Otherwise health and fitness becomes too big.
And it does, it starts taking over and ruling our life, especially those that,
that love it and just find it so fun.
It can get way too big.
And we don't even see what's happening, but we're missing out on
life, and connections, and people, which is what life is all about.
It's just passing us by because we're so concerned with our fitness
goals, and who's hitting what fitness goals on Instagram or whatever.
So I just want to encourage you to sit down and write your future self.
And then every day, , maybe it's in the pickup line.
When you're picking up your kids from school, maybe it's right after work when
you sit in your car right before you drive home or right before you drive
to work, you make sure you have five minutes where you can touch base with
that future self and write out goals of who you're going to be, what experiences
you're going to have, how you're going to show up for that future self,
today.
And that way you have way more anchor points that hold you steady, help you stay
more balanced, and thriving in your life.
Thank you so much for joining me today on the Lifting Lindsay podcast.
I hope each and every one of you have a wonderful Thanksgiving.
I realize it's just a.
American holiday, but, um, I think Canada, you've already had your Thanksgiving,
but I just want to let you guys know, I'm very thankful and grateful for you.
I'm grateful for your support.
I feel it.
And I am so grateful for things like podcasts, social media that have allowed
us to connect so that we can lift each other up and become better together.
You guys have a wonderful week.