Ep. 95 Mindset Matters: How to Overcome Mental Barriers to Fitness

Let’s talk about something that often gets overlooked in fitness—your mindset. In this episode, I dive into why mindset matters so much, not just when you're starting out, but for staying consistent long term. I break down ten common mental barriers like lack of motivation, negative self-talk, time constraints, and perfectionism. I also share specific tools so you can have a rock solid mindset toolkit that is going to be a true game changer!

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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 longtime fitness professional and Midwest girl turned mountain living hiking addict. And 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, and today we are talking about mindset. Um, why this makes such a massive difference when it comes to starting a fitness journey, but also sustaining a fitness journey long term and really overcoming some of the mental barriers that are going to pop up at the beginning, in the middle and all along the the process of. You know, making fitness a lifestyle, because the reality is it's not going to always be a smooth journey. As you probably know, if you have ever tried to follow a New Year's resolution regarding your health and fitness or nutrition. Um, if you're currently on a fitness journey, or if this has really become a deeply ingrained part of your lifestyle, then you know that it is never going to be perfect and you're going to have barriers that pop up both in your life, your schedule, um, you know, things that are going on around you that you can't control, but also within your own mindset. And the reason that mindset matters so much is because it's one of the few things that you can control, right? We have so much around us that we really aren't in control of. We might have influence over some things, but our control is very limited. When you really think about the things that we have 100% control over. It's pretty much how we react to things, our attitude and our mindset. So we want to really be on top of the things that we can control in this process. And I am such a big believer after, you know, working on my own fitness journey now for well over a decade and helping hundreds of other women in the same process. I know how important mindset is because it kind of shapes everything else. So if you don't have a solid mindset in place, you're going to spin your wheels. You're going to kind of take one step forward, two steps back, because our motivation and our control can only get us so far. Then comes our mindset and what we do with what's happening, and the things that are not really within what we can control. Right. So let's talk about ten of the major barriers that come up when we're looking at a fitness journey. The common mindsets, common mentalities that you probably have experienced at one point or another. Things that tend to hold us back or pop up and make us think, oh crap, can I really do this? Or maybe I'll just start again next Monday. Those types of things. Right. Let's talk about ten of the most common, um, barriers to fitness mentally and what we can do instead, kind of how we can shift our mindset to have a winning mindset when it comes to doing this long term, right? If we're in this for the long haul, if we want long term results and not just a quick fix, if you want to be still feeling fit and healthy and have healthy habits that support your mind and body. You know, one year, five years, ten years, 20 years from now, then we have to start with the foundation, which is our mindset. Okay, so let's get into it. Number one is lack of motivation. I'm sure we have all experienced this at one point or another. Typically when you first decide you're committing to something there's this surge of motivation excitement. It's new, it's novel. You're like, oh yeah, this is going to be the thing that completely changes what I've been doing. Be a whole new person. I'm going to experience XYZ benefits. Maybe you see somebody else who did something similar. So you're like fired up, right? Maybe it's just the January 1st excitement of new possibilities with the new year. Whatever it is that has kind of triggered this wave of motivation. You also probably know that it doesn't take long before that motivation tapers off. Something happens that kind of thrusts you back into your old mindset, your old habits, and you just kind of go right back to that because the motivation isn't there anymore. So we fall back into what's familiar and what patterns we know. Um, so lack of motivation is really a tough thing to overcome because the reality is nobody's going to be motivated all the time. We might have moments or surges of motivation, but there's also going to be times when we're exhausted, when we have so much on our plate, when our schedule is overflowing, when things pop up that we didn't expect, um, or we're just not feeling it. So it's important to have some mental tools. When these lack of motivation time's come up. Okay. So one solution here is to actually set Smart goals that are small, clear and achievable and measurable. When we try to do these big unrealistic things and we talked about this a lot around New Year's. When we say something like, well, I want to just lose weight or I want to eat healthier, or even something like, I want to lose £50, or I want to lose even £10 when we only have these vague goals without any action steps associated, then when things get overwhelming, we're much more likely to lose motivation because we don't know how to actually achieve these things. So it's more like a wish list when we just say, I want to eat healthier, I want to have better habits with my nutrition, or I want to, um, you know, lose, lose a certain amount of weight. We need some daily action steps that are actually achievable for us, doable and clear, so that we don't have to constantly mentally struggle through how do I actually do this? And we can start to move more on autopilot as these daily habits become ingrained in what we are used to doing. So we need to focus on the process, not just the outcome, when all we're looking at is the outcome that can become overwhelming, especially when you have periods of overwhelm or things going on in life that you can't control, right? So laying out exactly what those action steps are that are going to lead to the end result, the end goal that you have. So if weight loss is your goal, maybe you make a tiny, you know, daily action item of I'm going to go for a walk every single day of the week. That is something that is doable even when you're crazy busy. You can set aside ten minutes to go for a walk and get that habit going or saying, no matter what, I'm still going to have protein with every single meal. Yes, there might be things that are out of your control, but you still can prioritize protein at every single meal. Okay, so having a few of those things. And even just really establishing some non-negotiables. This is something that we work on with our clients within mountain. Metabolic coaching is having some non-negotiables that you can fall back to, especially during weeks or months or seasons of life where you are extra not motivated because nobody's going to thrive and feel motivated all the time. You might have a mountaintop season where you have three months where you're like, oh my gosh, I'm crushing it. I'm building all this momentum. Great. You can really hit your goals hard during that time, but then you might have a month that follows where you get sick or you have a little injury, or you have visitors in town and then you have a vacation and it feels like you can't really give it all you have anymore. And motivation is just low. That is a really good time to then deploy some of these non-negotiables. So having a few things that are very baseline for you to just maintain some healthy habits in your life so that you don't just let everything fall by the wayside. That is really important and ultimately understanding that where motivation ends, that's where habits and discipline need to take over. So understanding that nobody feels motivated all the time, there's going to be days where you absolutely don't feel like it literally at all. Maybe it's horrible weather and you don't want to get out. It's dark already at 4:30 p.m., and you don't want to go to the gym after work, or you've had a crappy day and all you want to do is go bury your face in a carton of ice cream. But you know that the benefits outweigh the sacrifice that you have to make. And if you want to reach a certain goal, there's going to be sacrifice involved. And that part of that is doing things when you're not motivated, when you don't feel like it. If we only do the hard things when we feel like it, then it's really not that hard. It's really not a sacrifice. And ultimately that's not realistic. So I know that some of this is just going to be some mental tenacity where you have to let some discipline take over. Okay. Also. Finally, my last point on this one with lack of motivation, is having an outside source of accountability. If you're only accountable to yourself, a friend, or a significant other. Typically we are not good at keeping ourselves accountable, especially when we're trying to establish habits and our friends, our loved ones are not going to give us the tough love that we need. I would say 90% of the time, maybe initially you guys text each other or you have some sort of buddy system and that's great, but are they really going to give you the tough love you need when you fall off the wagon? Probably not. If that were true, then there would be no need for personal trainers, coaches, people who work in this industry to keep other people accountable. Right? I would say, um, I don't know, probably 70% of the ladies that I talk to who are interested in mountain metabolic coaching and end up signing up, see that value of the accountability component because they've done the self-paced things, they've done the fitness apps they've done, they're just going trying to go to the gym on their own or having a membership or whatever. And when they don't have that high level accountability of someone who is actually checking in with them intentionally multiple times a week, they don't actually follow through. And that is so common. And it's not a weakness to need accountability. It's actually just how most of us operate until things become second nature to us and habitual, and we really find our rhythms, we need extra accountability to get to that point, and it's a strength to lean into that and recognize it and actually do something about it, instead of just staying stuck where we are and doing the same kind of repeat cycles over and over again. So that's where something like Mountain Metabolic coaching is so beyond helpful because the accountability is next level. We are not just going to say, okay, here's a program. Here's an app. Good luck. Hope it goes well for you. We are with you every step of the way. Everything is intentional. Everything is laid out in customized for you. But we're also going to be talking you through some of these mental barriers as they come up, troubleshooting things within your schedule that come up. And that is so valuable. Okay. Let's move to number two, which is negative self-talk. This is a big one. So really trying to replace negative thoughts with positive affirmations. So oftentimes we kind of build these mental identities for ourselves. We think well I'm just not capable of doing this. I've never followed through with that. I just can't eat healthy. I just am not someone who works out. So when we let these identities really take over, that is when we set ourselves up to fail. Essentially, we become a self-fulfilling prophecy when we're telling ourselves that we can't do something, or we really don't believe that this time will be different, why would it be? You're already telling yourself exactly how it's going to go, which means you are probably going to just fulfill that at the second that something becomes difficult. Okay. So instead of saying, I can't do this, I've never done this. Try saying I'm improving every day and looking for proof of like, wow, okay. Last month I was not doing any workouts. This month I'm doing one workout a week. It might not be perfect. It might not be exactly what you were hoping for, but it's more than you were doing last month. It's an improvement, and you're showing yourself that you are following through. Practicing that self-compassion and acknowledgement that setbacks are going to happen is really important, and that setbacks aren't a sign of failure. So when we're just too hard on ourselves, that's when we tend to kind of feed into that negative self-talk, when in reality nobody is doing this stuff perfectly. It's just not true. Even people who their whole account on social media is fitness or whatever, guarantee they are not doing everything perfectly. They're not hitting every single workout. They're not eating healthy every single meal. They're not hitting all of their goals every single day. They're working towards it. They're showing up. They're putting in the work. Sure. But they're not perfect, okay. And they also probably have days where they don't feel super great about themselves. So just knowing that setbacks are part of the journey, they're not signs of failure. Very, very important because when we let that negative self-talk take over, that's often when we just get stuck in these cycles of, um, not being able to fulfill what we want. Also, a big part of negative self-talk is when we do let ourselves down, then that kind of reaffirms that I never follow through with anything. So it's really important that we start to break that cycle by actually keeping promises to ourselves and doing the things that we say we're going to do. When we tell ourselves, I'm going to get up at seven and go to the gym, and then we hit snooze and don't go over and over and over again. We're reaffirming that belief system that I cannot follow through with this. So it's important that you start to break those cycles, recognize ways that you are setting yourself up, maybe to fail. And instead of saying, well, I just can't do it. Look and see. How could you set yourself up for success in the morning? Maybe setting your outfit up beforehand? Maybe, um, putting your shoes by the door, getting everything ready, having a coffee maker set ready to go at a certain time to motivate you to get up. Having somebody who's holding you accountable. Maybe you're meeting somebody at the gym, or maybe you switch and do home workouts instead, because it's more realistic that when that alarm goes off that you're going to be able to roll out of bed and do a workout at home versus having that mental barrier of going to the gym, right. So really evaluating how can I change this so that I actually am successful? Because that is so important when we show up for ourselves and do the things that we say we're going to do, it reaffirms that we can be self-reliant. We can show up, and that builds confidence. Okay. Number three intimidation or self-doubt in the gym. I hear this one a lot, especially with people who are new to working out. So really starting out with a little bit of structure, a little bit of help, because if you just show up at the gym and you have no guidance, you have no plan, that's going to really create some overwhelm, that's going to contribute to this self-doubt, this intimidation, because you have no plan. So you're probably more than likely just going to meander over to the elliptical or the bike or something simple where you're like, I can figure this out, and that's going to be your go to, and you're not really going to see a whole lot of progress when we only stick with the things that we know or we only go to the cardio section. Okay? So trying to have a plan going into this, knowing what form to do. And you can do this a couple ways. You can have like an app or some sort of self-paced program. As long as it's showing you form and actually giving you some really good guidance. Something like that's a really great place to start. You can talk to a gym attendant and ask them to show you around, give you some ideas of how to work certain pieces of equipment, or having a personalized program like what we do within Mountain Metabolic Coaching is so helpful because it just takes out the guesswork. You don't have to show up and wonder, what should I do today? Or is what I'm doing actually making a difference? Or is my form right? Um, so that sort of program very, very beneficial, especially if you are new to the gym and experiencing some of that intimidation or overwhelm. Also knowing that everybody starts somewhere and I know it's so easy when you go to the gym to kind of feel like everyone's watching you. Everyone's aware of your confusion over how to do this or that, I promise. They're so focused on what they are doing that nobody is paying that close attention. Also, as someone who's been in the gym now over half my life, I still will go to a new gym and not know how to work a certain piece of equipment. Maybe I don't know how to adjust something or the bench is weird and I haven't seen one like that before. That is totally normal. We're not going to be experts at something immediately, so I don't mind asking for help or looking silly. That's just part of the learning process. So allow yourself some grace to know that not everybody is staring at you. Everybody has questions initially. Everybody's been a newbie or a beginner. Um, it's just part of the process. It's part of the journey. All right. Number four is having overwhelming expectations. This is a big one. When we expect immediate perfection from ourselves, we are going to set ourselves up to fail. And this is where having appropriately gauged expectations can be. The difference between someone being successful on a lifelong fitness journey versus someone who's going to do the whole, like, start and stop New Year's resolution. I'm really good for a month and then I fall off the wagon. Why? Because when we tell ourselves that we need to be perfect, that is when we are setting ourselves up to be disappointed, to fail to throw in the towel, to be either on the wagon or off the wagon. There is no wagon. You are just doing the best you can each day, each week. And that is a really important distinction. Okay, so starting small and gradually building on habits is important. There's this thing called habit stacking that you can try. So think about like if you were to come into this thing and you're hearing, okay, I need to get eight hours of sleep at night. Right now I'm only sleeping six, so that's a change. I need to start drinking 100oz of water a day. I have no idea how many ounces of water I'm drinking, so that's a change. I need to completely overhaul my diet. I need to add more protein. I need to cut out processed foods. I need to reduce alcohol. I need to start working out four times a week, doing something I've never done before. I need to start walking 10,000 steps a day. I need to do x, y, z, right? All of these things at once. That is overwhelming. You hear all of that and you're like, oh, that sounds like a full time job. How am I ever going to have the time to do all of that at once? Or just the mental fortitude to actually make all of those changes? The answer is, you probably don't. You probably can't. That's why habit stacking is such a valuable tool. Because when we start small and maybe implement 1 or 2 changes, then once we've really nailed those down, say three months later, then you can stack another one on top of it. It's when we try to do everything at once that we tend to only succeed either for a little while. Or fail right off the bat. Off the bat. Because it's too overwhelming. Um, so this is why I don't love things like 75 hard or these programs that are like 30 days of, like, doing these crazy intense things where it's like you have to wake up and do faster cardio every day. You're only eating, you know, 1400 calories and half of them are from protein. And you also have to do this specific juice cleanse. All of that is so unrealistic for someone who has maybe not done any of that. And now you're trying to implement all of these things that you're not going to be able to keep up with long term. That's going to start to feel overwhelming even just a few days in. So really starting out, small habit stacking over time. Um, and understanding that progress is not linear. So it's not going to be realistic that you are always, always, always making progress. Um, so think about like if you're starting to learn a new instrument, would you expect that within the first week you're going to be perfectly playing these songs that are expert level? No. So why do we start these programs and think I'm going to immediately be perfect and do all of these things just right? That is so unrealistic. And we really are setting ourselves up to feel like a failure. All right, number five. This is a big one. Time constraints. I don't have enough time. I just can't make it happen with my schedule. So this is one that probably everyone has thought or said out loud at some point or another. So let's talk about it. One thing that is really important here is finding pockets of time and doing what you can with them, which really kind of goes into our next point of not being all or nothing, which we'll go into here in a few minutes. But I think a lot of times when we start out, we think, oh, well, I need to be working out like 4 to 5 times a week for at least 45 minutes each time. Otherwise, what's the point? And that is simply not true and probably not realistic all the time, especially certain weeks. So finding pockets of time, even if it's 20 minutes to 30 minutes and doing what you can, doing things that have less barriers. So like I said before, doing at home workouts, maybe instead because it eliminates some of that drive time and just getting into the gym, that whole process, if that sucks too much time out for you, then maybe you swap it out and do some home or outdoor workouts, at least for a while, until you can maybe carve out a little bit more time. So think about it like this. If you were to do a 20 to 30 minute workout even two times a week, compounded over an entire year. You would be doing either 34 to 52, depending on if it's a 20 minute or a 30 minute workout hours. Okay, so 34 to 52 hours of working out that year versus if you said, I just don't have time because I can't do a full hour, I can't do 45 minutes. I'm just not going to. I'll start Monday. I'll do it next week. If you take that mentality and then you do zero hours that week, you're missing out on 34 to 52 hours across a whole year. That's a lot of time, right? If you hear 52 hours, you're like, oh wow, that's kind of a lot. That is going to make a big difference. The compound effect of that is huge. Right. So you have to think about it. Larger scale than just. I only have 20 minutes to give today. Instead say I have 20 minutes. I'm going to make the most out of that 20 minutes. I'm going to get in an awesome full body compound lift type of workout from home and then move on with my day. And I've still made that little daily deposit. That's another analogy I love for this is thinking about it like a bank account. We have, you know, the ability to add to that account every day, every week, or the ability to not contribute, not do anything to it or to make withdrawals. So when we actively choose to do little healthy deposits every day, the 20 minute workout, the ten minute walk, the protein at each meal, veggies, you know, at least once a day. Those are our deposits that are adding things up over time. Whereas if we just do absolutely nothing because it's not going to look perfect, we don't have the time. We say, I don't have the time, I just can't do it. Then things are going to stay exactly where they are. So you need to just kind of expect, okay, if I'm not going to be willing to make these deposits, then I'm either withdrawing from my account or I'm not ever going to save anything. I'm not ever going to make a dent or make a change. So I can't expect a difference. Okay, so that's where just being honest with yourself about do I actually not have the time in the 24 hours, or am I just making excuses because I don't have as much time as I would like? Um, also doing a little bit of a time audit. Okay, so get honest with yourself if you're saying I don't have the time, but you're spending two hours every night watching Netflix, you look at the amount of time that you're spending on your phone every day. That is a very humbling thing to do. Looking at your screen time, seeing how much time you're spending on certain apps, looking realistically at how much time that we spend on leisure, or just doing nothing like mind numbing scrolling type of activities that you could dedicate 20 to 30 minutes of that to a workout instead. Okay, so when I say I don't have the time. Do you actually not have the time or are you not making the time a priority? All right. Let's talk about this next one which is all or nothing mindset. This is probably the biggest one that I would find. Leads to success or leads away from success. If you fall into this all or nothing mindset long term. Um, so really, when we hold on to this perfectionism mentality, we are getting in our own way because like we've talked about, with many of these kind of ties in, there is no such thing as perfection. There's no perfect schedule. There's no perfect time to start. There's no perfectly maintained fitness journey because that's just not life. When we take on an all or nothing mindset and we say, well, I've already ruined it, this week or this week is just crappy because I travel a few days or I, you know, I'm eating out multiple times, or I can't get in as many workouts as I want. And then we kind of go to the other extreme and say. Screw it. I'm just gonna start Monday. That is when we do some major damage versus if we could just take a moderation approach and say, yeah, I can't. I can't get any workouts in this week, but instead I'll just go for a walk every day. I'm going to really focus on nailing my nutrition. I'm going to really focus on getting lots of fruits and veggies and protein and minimizing processed foods, minimizing alcohol, because I know that I don't have control over the workouts that I'm doing. That is when we're able to just maintain our results. Even if you're not making progress, you're maintaining instead of taking backward steps. When we just decide to throw in the towel, that's when we become completely just like, not aware of our choices. And we're really kind of taking away from any progress that we've made. So we're doing this whole one step forward, two steps back thing. So a couple analogies that I want you to think about. One is when we do this, it's essentially like if we were to get a flat tire and then we get out of our car. We see. Oh, crap, I have a flat. And then we decide to go slash our other three tires. That is essentially what we are doing when we say, oh my gosh, I totally binged at brunch today. I had such a massive portion or I didn't choose healthy, so I'm just going to literally binge the rest of the weekend because I've already ruined my diet. That is exactly what we are doing versus if we just treat it for what it is, is one meal where we overate and then we eat a moderate amount the rest of the day. We try to make the rest of the weekend as healthy as possible. Then you're going to come out at the other end pretty unscathed. It's one meal. Okay, so have some perspective. Similarly, it would be like breaking a glass in your kitchen and deciding to just shatter the rest of the glasses in your kitchen. We would never do that, right? So why do we take this all or nothing mindset when it comes to our nutrition, or our workouts or our habits around this stuff? So really focusing on making our next decision as healthy as possible, instead of just self-sabotaging and throwing in the towel and saying, well, I've already ruined it. We ruined it. When we let one decision turn into ten bad decisions, or an entire weekend, or an entire week, an entire month of saying, screw it. Okay. In the grand scheme of things, 1 or 2 poor decisions is nothing compared to 20 poor decisions because you let your mindset go down this negative spiral. Okay, so that's where mindset is so massive because it can be the difference between saying, okay, I made a poor decision. Wasn't the healthiest thing I could have chosen, but I'll just make my next two decisions really healthy around what I'm eating, or I'll just go get a workout in and kind of reset myself versus saying, screw it for an entire week and sending yourself back. Okay, let's go into our next one, which is burnout. So really the key to not getting into a state of burnout is to not try to do too much. When we just try to kind of fire on all cylinders all the time, that's when we tend to get into a state of burnout. So you really got to make sure you're giving yourself adequate rest and recovery time between your workouts, not pushing it too hard again. You don't want to do that all or nothing thing where you're just giving it all you've got, and then you get to a point where you have nothing left to give. So finding a healthy balance for you and being willing to adjust to that as you go, because there's going to be different seasons of life. There's going to be times when you might be able to work out five days a week and feel really good with that, and there's going to be times where you have a lot going on. Maybe you're a new mom, or you have a big job transition, or you're moving, or you are going through something pretty big and you just don't have the capacity to do as much as you did before. Um, and so even doing three times a week is really hard. Okay. So you've got to be able to gauge and adjust because our lives are not going to look the same all the time. So you want to just kind of balance the intensity and recovery to avoid that physical and mental burnout. Number eight not seeing immediate results. I can't tell you how many times people just throw in the towel because it's been a month and they've only lost £3, which is actually a lot in a month. To lose £3 of fat is huge. Okay. So it's really important to not just throw in the towel because you didn't see what maybe you expected to see in a certain amount of time. This is a long term commitment ultimately. So when we make changes only for a certain result and then expect to just kind of go back to what we're doing before we've kind of missed the point and we're not going to be able to maintain those results. How do we expect to maintain something if we just go back to what got us into that spot in the first place? It's also important to go into things with healthy perspective. If you've been slowly gaining weight over the past decade, why would you expect that one month of making some small adjustments is going to completely undo all of that? Right. It's really kind of ludicrous to have that mindset. So you're setting yourself up for mental frustration when you say, I'm expecting to completely undo all of these bad habits, all of these mindsets that I've built up over the past decade and undo all of this physical damage as well. Like, you're not going to be able to completely overhaul your health and lose £50 in a month. That is completely unrealistic, completely unhealthy, and really not setting you up for long term success. So celebrating the small victories, not only looking at the end result. So for instance, if your goal is weight loss. Weight loss is a super common goal in the fitness space, right? So if your goal is weight loss, maybe across the month you only saw £3 of loss, but you also lost five inches total off of different body sites. You also noticed increased energy. Your mood was better, your habits were better. You're actually following through with some of the things that you say you want to do. You are going for more frequent walks. Maybe you noticed improved strength and stamina in your workouts already over the past month. Look at all of those benefits too. Instead of just obsessing over the end result of weight loss because when we only obsess over the end result, we're less likely to really adopt the whole process as a part of our lifestyle. And if we're not going to make it a lifestyle, then chances are we're not going to be able to maintain those results. It has to just kind of become a part of what you're doing. Habitual second nature. You're not having to think so hard about all of this stuff in order to really maintain. So just not going into this with unhealthy, unrealistic expectations goes a long way. Committing to the long term when it comes to this whole process. Placing more emphasis on the process goals versus just the outcomes. And I have another analogy. Lots of analogies. Today I want you to think about a roll of toilet paper. Say, every little square that you rip off equates to a healthy decision that you've made in it in a certain day. Okay, so one day you make three really great healthy deposits or decisions that support your goals. So you're ripping off three of those. At the end of that day, are you going to notice a massive difference in that toilet paper roll? No. It's going to look the exact same to you. Okay. So then that keeps going. The next day you have two, the next day you have four. After that you have one, the next day you have five, and so on and so on and so on. You're probably not going to notice a difference for several days, maybe even weeks, but eventually you're going to look at that toilet paper roll and say, oh wow, that thing's almost out like super small now. It's going to look vastly different than it did at the beginning, even though in the day to day you're not noticing that difference of one square or two squares or three squares, right? The same goes for our results, especially when we are noticing ourselves every single day and analyzing ourselves. We're not going to see progress in ourselves every day, every week, maybe even every month. But when we keep doing that consistent action in those little daily deposits. Things are going to look vastly different when you look at yourself six months from now, a year from now, two years from now. So it's really important to not expect crazy, unrealistic results. You're not going to see things immediately, but commit to the process and know that things will look different when you compound those efforts over time. All right. Number nine comparing yourself to other people. This is a really, really tough one. I'm not going to lie, I struggle with this too. I think almost everybody probably does, especially in the age of social media. We are kind of front row to everybody else's successes. What they're sharing online, what their day to day looks like for, you know, certain people, if they're really vocal and sharing quite a bit. And it's really hard not to compare what we're doing to somebody else. However, it's really important to remember that we are seeing such a, um. Such a small snippet that is also extremely carefully cultivated by that individual. What they want you to see, they're setting their best foot forward. They're only showing the good most of the time. I love a good, honest influencer. I love it when people really do share. Kind of like the negative side of things, or the hard parts or the reality behind the really good stuff. Um, and I try to do that on my own personal page as well, because I think that's really valuable and it's more realistic. Um, but most people are only sharing the highlights. Um, so it's important to remember that we don't know what's really going on in these people's worlds. You could see someone who loses weight really fast and think, oh my gosh, I want to do exactly what they did. And they're only sharing a small snippet. Maybe they're just showing their workouts or whatever. You don't know what their diet was like over the last month. Maybe they had a horrible bout of depression or anxiety and they had no appetite. Maybe they were taking really unhealthy measures. Maybe they were using ozempic. Um, we don't know what their mindset was like if they actually had a healthy mindset as they were doing those things. What was going on in their personal life that maybe led to a huge drop in their weight? Maybe it was health related thing that wasn't so good. Um, you know, maybe they had really crazy regimens during that time and they didn't have the balance that they portray online. Maybe they were doing two hours of cardio a day and eating 1300 calories. Maybe their relationship with food really suffered. So there's so many other components that we cannot see. They might say that they're doing a certain thing or not doing a certain thing, but we don't really know. I know this firsthand because I experienced extreme weight loss when I had my first daughter. After I had her, I suffered with postpartum anxiety really badly, and I had a hard time keeping up with my milk supply and eating enough because my anxiety was really bad. I didn't have a ton of help or support. Um, so I struggled to just eat enough calories to keep up with breastfeeding and all of that. Um, and I lost weight really fast, and it's just so interesting because you get a lot of compliments when you lose weight, right? Everyone's like, oh my gosh, you bounce back so fast. They had no idea how I was mentally struggling during that time, that I actually wasn't losing weight from healthy methods. I was really not in a super great place. So we don't always know the backstory. That's why not comparing is really important, because one, we might never want to actually have to do the things that those people are doing to get those results. Maybe it's extremely unbalanced, very unhealthy, or not realistic for us. Um, but also we just don't know what the deeper root is for certain people. Okay. So we don't want to compare. Also genetically we are not all going to be the same. I could do the exact same workout as somebody else. And have the exact same diet, have the exact same habits, literally lead duplicate lives for a month. And maybe my results would be completely different based on our genetic makeup, our body types. I'm never going to have like a model type body. I'm five foot five and I kind of have a stockier build. I tend to hold on to muscle really easily, and I'm never going to have stick skinny legs or arms or anything like that. That's just not my genetic makeup. Um, and I've had to just make peace with that. Right? So there's kind of a, a really great benefit in just accepting while we can control to a certain extent, what goes on with our own bodies. Um, we can't control everything. We can't control our genetics. We can't change this body structure that we have. Um, so accepting ourselves for how we are and just trying to be our healthiest self is such a great route and a great mindset to have. You can only control your own actions, mindset, attitude. And so part of that is having a positive attitude towards your own body and just saying, yeah, I'm never going to have a model build or I'm never going to look like this influencer, but I can still be my healthiest self. I can still try to get stronger. I can still maybe try to get a little bit leaner with the body that I have or, um, really focus on these healthy habits that make me feel good instead of just obsessing over trying to look exactly like somebody else. Um, along those same lines, your progress will probably not be the same as other people. So the rate of progress, how fast or slow your progress happens is going to be different based on your genetics, your metabolic state, as you are going into something. Also your compliance. Maybe you're comparing yourself and you're saying, oh, I wish that I could see fast results like that, but they are like 100% compliant to the program and you are 80% compliant to the program. Okay. So there's a lot to it. We can't just cut and dry, say, oh, I just can't do it like they can or I'm failing and they're succeeding. All right. Our final mental barrier. Number ten discouragement from setbacks. Setbacks are going to happen. Setbacks being things that maybe you didn't see coming. Scheduling things injuries, sickness, um, relationship changes, whatever it is. Setbacks are inevitable. So reframing setbacks as a part of the process and not a reason to quit will go a really long way. If we throw in the towel every time there's a setback, then we're kind of getting onto that all or nothing on the bandwagon, off the bandwagon. Again. So if you miss a workout or have a really bad body image day and end up bingeing, or your period is brutal and you end up just having tons of chocolate or whatever it is. Just pick up where you left off rather than starting from scratch. I hate the whole like, oh, I'm starting from square one or I'll start this day. We are not starting or stopping anything. This is just our life. It should be a continuous effort at improving and growing. Okay, so the key is persistence, not perfection. Also knowing that plateaus are physiologically expected. So if you're looking at plateaus like a setback, that's just kind of not the best way to look at it. Because if you are part of this process, you're going to hit a plateau. That's actually a sign that you are doing the things you are showing up, doing things consistently enough that your body has adapted. So it just needs a little bit of tweaking and reframing. And we're not going to make linear progress. So it's important to kind of go into a fitness journey, understanding that that's where having a coach who can work with you on not only working through these setbacks, but pushing through plateaus so that we aren't just getting frustrated and throwing in the towel definitely makes a big difference. All right, you guys, we have gone over ten of the biggest mental barriers that we see in fitness. I hope that this has been helpful. Just a helpful conversation around the realities of what this looks like for people. It's not as simple as just saying, I'm going to start a fitness journey, and I'm going to just do it and be perfect at it. That is not the reality, and we are complex people and we have a lot going on up top in our heads. So it's important to address some of those root things that are going to trickle down into our attitude, our behavior, our habits, our motivation, all of that. So I hope that this has been helpful. Um, as always, if you are interested in coaching and getting some true accountability to work through some of these things, if you find yourself really relating to a ton of these barriers, then working with a coach is going to be absolutely massive in overcoming these barriers and really kind of reframing things to succeed long term. So you can check out the link in the show notes to apply for spring coaching. I would love to chat with you about your goals. Um, so check out that link. And if you want to start a conversation on Instagram, you can find us at the Fit Underscore for Hiking Instagram page. You can also just kind of stay up to date on new episodes and find some helpful information there. All right you guys, thanks so much for joining me today. 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 ponytail on the trail.com. Happy and healthy trails.