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This podcast is for people who want to feel fit, strong, and energised again – but haven’t found a way to make fitness hold when life is busy.
You’ve tried plans that work on paper but fall apart under pressure.
You’ve had periods of momentum, followed by long stretches of drift.
Not because you don’t care.
But because most approaches weren’t built for real life.
On this podcast, we talk about how to build strength, energy, and confidence in your body inside a full life – not an ideal one.
Training that adapts when work ramps up.
Nutrition that stays simple when attention is limited.
Habits that survive travel, stress, family, and changing weeks.
These are honest conversations about systems, mindset, and identity – and how fitness stops slipping to the bottom of the list and starts reinforcing the rest of your life.
Imagine this scenario, it's 8PM, the kids are finally down, you've got loads of work to catch up on and you're just thinking there is no time. You haven't managed to get your workout in, you haven't eaten well, and this just repeats itself again and again. You just feel like there's no space in your day. Now I've been there before and I've really recently really had an experience that's opened my eyes to the idea that time isn't something that you find, it's something that's right there, you just need to be able to see it. Now you might be wondering, Jake, you're looking pretty tired right now.
Speaker 1:Now just to give you a bit of background on what's been happening for me over the last few weeks, Our son Flynn, our third child was born on the September 27. We were home for five days and then unfortunately we were admitted to hospital. We had to go in an ambulance and he basically had a UTI which turned into sepsis. They put him straight away on antibiotics and he's better. He was recovering really, really fast.
Speaker 1:He's super healthy, he's putting on weight, but we had to stay in hospital for over a week, a week and a half, and we're having to go back there every single day to finish his course. It's been a crazy, crazy period. Obviously juggling two other toddlers, juggling the business, everything else that's required in a busy life. And yeah, it's been pretty crazy. I'm emotionally exhausted, physically exhausted, amazingly proud of my beautiful wife powering through and everything that's going on having to recover from actually giving birth as well as trying to emotionally handle the fact that your child feels like they're in jeopardy has been crazy and yeah, I'm so glad that everyone's home.
Speaker 1:But basically to cut that story short and bring it to a conclusion, The reason today that I really wanted to talk about finding time or creating time or the idea of I don't have time is that during this experience, I've still managed to actually find that time, create the time, do the workouts, stay on top of all of this despite everything that's been going on. That's one side of it. And then the other side of it is the way that it's pulled me back from the busy schedule that I was actually inflicting on myself. Now many of you will have heard the term busy fool, like don't be a busy fool and I really feel that I've learned that lesson of what a busy fool is this time because now I've returned to work, I feel like I'm much more productive, I feel like I'm finding more time in the day, there's more opportunities and we often fall into that trap of trying to plug all these time pockets with things that we feel are productive, but if we were to actually go and analyze that and look back, we'd find that we weren't as productive as we actually thought.
Speaker 1:So let me just pull up some visuals. Now obviously, some of you are gonna be listening to this. I'm gonna describe this as much as possible, but I do recommend you jump onto YouTube if you can so you can get the visuals that go along with this. So let me just pull up the iPad. So where are we?
Speaker 1:Let's go. Now if we think of our time as like a pie chart, right, and we feel like our day is completely full and this is the day that we are experiencing, so this shaded in area here, this is our perceived reality. So what I've done here is draw a pie chart, cut off, I don't know, like two thirds, and that's our perceived reality. And we feel like that time is totally full and we don't have any opportunities to actually get our workouts in, to dedicate time to self care and looking after ourselves. But we actually have this actual reality here, which is this block of time that kind of gets lost.
Speaker 1:We don't see it and it gets fritted away on all these little things. And the key to actually figuring out this issue of time is to unlock that actual schedule, unlock those secret areas of our schedule so that we can then go and create those times and do the things that we wanna do. So if we imagine our time like a funnel, and then all our time goes into this, and then out of this, we have loads and loads of time leaks. Right? So it could be overthinking, could be procrastination, could be making that third cup of coffee, which you could call procrastination as well, could be unnecessary tasks, could be maybe wasting time on, like, scrolling.
Speaker 1:Right? Or it could be a too long lunch, or it could be taking unnecessary meetings. Right? I'm sure you can think of lots of different leaks from your own funnel, and you could probably add them into your own thing and think, where are those opportunities for me? And then what we actually get out the bottom is the time that we feel we have.
Speaker 1:And with all of those things, it's no wonder on top of work, family, everything else that we do feel like compressed and we do feel like we have no time to do the things that we wanna do. I think on top of this, there's also things like time that we spend thinking like decision fatigue, over planning, trying to perfect everything. And they're really important too because when it comes to finding or creating time, it's not just about actually seeing that window, but it's actually about making the most of even small pockets of time and not thinking, I don't have an hour, so like what's the point basically. And we will get into strategies that we can use for that, and I can point you in the right direction for some of those things. And then, yeah, what comes out at the bottom of the funnel when we've removed, like, all the actual necessary stuff and then all this wasted time is they're the things that actually get done, at the end.
Speaker 1:Right? So you can see that time isn't necessarily lacking. It's just leaking in lots of different ways. So on one side, we've got the leak, and then on the other side, it's actually utilizing the opportunities within those leaks to get things done that we need to get done. So if you can imagine, we've got two people.
Speaker 1:Right? And what I really wanna talk about now is awareness because when we have awareness over where our time leaks, then we can actually go out and seize those opportunities and actually create that time. So the unaware person has energy and time flying everywhere. They're all over the place. They feel like they're busy.
Speaker 1:It's scattered and there's no direction. Whereas the aware person that's actually mapped out what the day looks like and identified those areas of procrastination, of decision fatigue, of overthinking, of two long coffee breaks, whatever it is, they are very, very clear. They have one simple structure to follow and they're very clear on those opportunities where they can actually create time. And that's why actually having awareness and just taking a bit of time to map out your day and what it looks like and where those opportunities are can create like a very clear focus when it comes to actually getting stuff done. Obviously, our case, we're talking really about workouts and self care, but anything that you wanna get done on your schedule.
Speaker 1:So if you actually wanna find those times in the week, what I recommend doing is mapping out your day or your week on some kind of graph. So you could basically plan in those blocks for whatever they are, and then suddenly you create these areas of opportunity. So it might be you have a meeting here. For me, it might be working on social, replying to clients, and then just general admin stuff here. Right?
Speaker 1:So let's say that's the day. Suddenly, we've identified these pockets of opportunity here, and these aren't necessarily even just five minute blocks. Maybe they are. Maybe they're thirty minutes. Maybe they're sixty minutes.
Speaker 1:Right? But we have all these different opportunities which we are probably then gonna fill with mindless busy tasks. So once we've identified these things, then we can actually start to utilize them and actually make the most of them and use them for our workouts, for our self care, anything that we wanna get done. Now actually identifying them and taking action on them, that is a skill in itself, and you're gonna have to practice a little bit of discipline to move away from the procrastination, move away from the mindless scrolling, actually stop yourself partaking in those habits that are sucking your time away and that are leaking your time. There's almost two different things, like we can know it, but then actually having the discipline to act on it is a different thing entirely.
Speaker 1:But I know a lot of you guys, you are very successful. You are very disciplined in your work. So I think it's more about the mindset of actually identifying that time and going, oh wait, I actually do have time to do this versus actually having the discipline to go, I'm not gonna waste it procrastinating, I'm not gonna waste it scrolling. I think once you've got a clear visual of this, I'm a visual person, this kind of helps for me, then it's very easy or easier to act upon rather than feeling like the day is just a whirlwind and it's getting lost. So let's say this is our day.
Speaker 1:Right? So what I've done is I've drawn a graph. I've mapped out different time blocks for things that I'm doing throughout the day. For me, there's all sorts of stuff on this as well like family, like life chores, all that sort of thing, but this is just an example. So we've identified a five minute block, a thirty minute block, and a sixty minute block.
Speaker 1:Right? So we could just go, right, cool. That five minutes is gonna be five minutes of mobility. That thirty minutes is gonna be a thirty minute body weight workout, and we just do it in the office or we do it at home. And that sixty minutes, it could be just prep some food for the next day, prep food.
Speaker 1:And suddenly, you found all these opportunities to do the things that you wanted to do, and you haven't actually had to create more time. You haven't had to compress anything that you're already doing. And I'm not gonna say that everyone's schedule is gonna have this hidden ninety five minutes available, but what you might have is a ten minute, you might have a fifteen minute, you might have a thirty minute. Right? So once you've identified those for yourself, then you can go and do something with them.
Speaker 1:Now the big problem that we see with a lot of people and a lot of clients that come in is it's not just about identifying that time. This really helps and scheduling it into your calendar really helps and learning to respect that time, I guess. Because let's say 9AM is this important meeting. We don't have any problem putting that in our calendar, turning up punctually and committing to that, but maybe when it comes to our workouts, we are fickle and we give up on it easy and we let other people pull us away. So one skill that we have to learn is that ability to actually put this workout into the calendar.
Speaker 1:Let's say we put it in this slot here, which is between two slots that I've created on this graph, and actually sticking to it and saying this is important and we respect it and it's a sacred time for me. And if anyone's like, oh, can we chat at this time? I'm busy. Really firm, really kind of stubborn. Right?
Speaker 1:That will help you. So doing that with your time and treating it as sacred is just as much as a skill. Now the other thing that's really important, and I'm just gonna do a kind of brief overview of this and I will send you another training if you're interested in hearing more about this. But the other thing is actually how do we make the most of that time that we actually have and change that perspective to see go from the idea of I don't have enough time or it's only worth it if I do sixty minutes to actually go, I have this time, that's amazing, let's celebrate that. So switching from almost the glass half empty to the glass half full mindset.
Speaker 1:And you've probably heard me talk about this before, but this is what we call the tiers of opportunity. So let's say we, in an ideal world, we do a sixty minute workout. Right? So sixty minute, perfect. We do it from the gym.
Speaker 1:We have time to have a shower afterwards. Like, we perfect. Right? That's plan a. Now we also what we don't wanna do is fall into that trap of, well, what if we don't have sixty minutes?
Speaker 1:What if we can't get to the gym? Then option a is to do nothing at all, which is that all or nothing mindset that we wanna move away from. But option b is actually move to plan b. So plan b might be thirty minutes and we do it from home. And then plan c might be fifteen minutes and when it's body weight from home.
Speaker 1:Right? So you can see it's about having these safety nets and these fallback plans so that you actually make the most of the time that you have available. It's not just about identifying the time and being like this is the perfect slot for me to get the thing done. We also want to be flexible with our time as much as we can as well. And being flexible with our time, it's not even like a physical thing.
Speaker 1:It's actually more of a psychological thing to go, okay, I really wanted to do sixty minutes today and I wanted to go to a gym. I've only got fifteen minutes and I'm not gonna have time to get out the house. You could either go I'm not gonna do anything at all or you could actually go let's make that fifteen minutes count. And I promise you just like investing, right, if you compound those fifteen minutes every day or every other day over a year versus doing nothing at all, you're gonna see profoundly different results, profoundly better results than you would doing nothing. And something that's kind of, I guess, a modern piece of wisdom that's thrown around is that the sixty minute workout that you never did is never gonna be the ten minute workout that you did consistently.
Speaker 1:Right? So trying to be as consistent as possible and actually seeing time as a gift rather than seeing this as something that you don't have and something that feels busy all the time. So now I wanna just explain something called the capability graph. And this is basically just the visualization of what I've just talked about then. So what we typically do, we'll make time really strict in our schedule and we'll have this period of intensity.
Speaker 1:So this is really sharp line up the thing. And then when life gets busy and when we get thrown off, we then peak come back down. Oops. Sorry. We come back down.
Speaker 1:And then we don't do anything at all. We feel busy, and then we have another push of motivation, another peak, and then it comes back down. And we don't really get anywhere when we approach things like that. Now the other option is that we can basically make the most of the time that we have available. Now it doesn't mean that we're gonna hit these, like, great highs all the time, but what it means is that we maintain a much higher baseline over time.
Speaker 1:There's still gonna be ups and downs. Maybe this is the thirty minute workout. This is the fifteen minute workout. But you can see that that baseline that we have in the middle is much higher than the baseline that we have down here. So if we can really make the time, a little bit of time every single day, we're gonna raise our baseline so that our normal day, our worst day, our busiest day, we continue to take action.
Speaker 1:So we've found time in the schedule, that little pocket, even that five minutes, and we've actually utilized it to the best of our ability. If we have sixty minutes, amazing. We don't fall right back down to this bottom level of doing nothing, and we actually go, cool. Today's super busy. Today's crazy.
Speaker 1:I've only got five minutes a day, but I'm still gonna make five minutes a day count. And the thing is, if you can make five minutes, you'll probably find that you can make ten minutes, that you can make fifteen minutes. And a lot of this is really going back to what we were looking at before. Where were those leaks for you? Like, is it overthinking?
Speaker 1:Is it procrastination? Is it scrolling? Is it a really long, leisurely lunch? Is it unnecessary task, busy full task? I know I'm definitely guilty of that one.
Speaker 1:Third coffee of the day. Or is it unnecessary meetings? Like taking a big meeting that takes two hours when it could have just been done in an email. And going back to kind of the story at the beginning for me, having to dedicate so much time to family, step away from work, only do the necessary tasks, what I actually realized was that probably 75% of the things that I do to fill a day aren't actually moving the needle forward. They're just filling in gaps and making myself feel busy.
Speaker 1:And the knock on effect of that is that when you then get home and you're with your family, that stress and that feeling of I don't have time then passes on to the quality of time that you're spending with your partner or with your kids. And I've really noticed that in myself. Whereas if I focus on the needle moving tasks, give the day a bit more space, give myself lots of time to do things for myself as well. When I do get home, a, I don't feel like I've got loads of pressure, I don't feel like I compressed all the time. And then I can then give that love and attention and presence to my family, to my wife, to my kids because that time pressure isn't on.
Speaker 1:Now, obviously, I appreciate the fact that I'm more in control of my time as someone that runs their own business, but there's a lot of, obviously, pressures that come with that from different angles. Obviously, if you are employed, you don't have as much time over your schedule. But if you are in a senior position, I'm sure that there is ways that you can optimize and adapt that time. And actually, the thing is things can wait. Right?
Speaker 1:They can wait, and we often just feel ourselves and create pressure ourselves versus it actually being genuine pressure that we need to act upon right away, right in this instant, and cram everything into that day. So this is what I wanna leave you with, the idea of you don't find time, you make time. So you're not just gonna if you're telling yourself, oh, I'll start when it's better, when this happens after summer, after Christmas, after spring, or the it's gonna be better this week or when I don't have this project on. I promise you that those times will never come, and there will always be something else. So you need to actually make the time now.
Speaker 1:Now making the time is not about sacrificing it elsewhere necessarily or trying to force it in somewhere. It's maybe as simple as going back through the things that we talked about today, identifying those those time leaks within your own day or those opportunities within your schedule. Step two is to then so let's go back actually. Step one, opt identify those opportunities, identify those time leaks. Step two is to then block it into your calendar and then make that time sacred so that you're not pushing it around all the time.
Speaker 1:You're not treating it like it doesn't matter because it does. Step three is then applying the theories of the tiers of opportunity. So having your plan a, your plan b, your plan c, and trying to move away from that mindset of it has to be this way or there's no point at all because that means that 50% of the time plus, you're probably not gonna do it at all. So being flexible with that and flexible with your time. And then d, I guess, is just being consistent with that.
Speaker 1:Practicing that, finding better flow, and living it. Because when you live it, then it becomes a habit, and you don't have to actually think about this so much, and it'll just be something that you do naturally. And that is kind of the problem with most plans out there is that there's a massive intensity focus. So it relies on this big push, this motivation at the beginning where you get stuck in and you create a lot of friction and you force things aside. But then when things pick up and that motivation dips, then suddenly it just drops off completely.
Speaker 1:So this is really about the idea the complete opposite with that. It's putting consistency and sustainability first so that you can keep taking action. Now if you wanna find out more about the tiers of opportunity system that I mentioned before, you can find that on my YouTube. Just search tears of opportunity. I think it was actually the last podcast that I did, or you can send me a message on Instagram.
Speaker 1:Just put tears or ask me for that training, and I'll send you the link. If you have any questions about what we talked about today, please fire them over or leave them in the comments. Have a great day, guys, and I'll see you soon.