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Ready to Stop Starting Over?
If you're tired of bouncing between being "good" during the week and starting over every Monday, it's time to build a lifestyle that actually lasts.
Inside the LiftingLindsay App, you'll learn how to train smart, eat smart, and create sustainable habits that support fat loss, muscle gain, and long term health. Sign up HERE for a free 7 day trial.
Inside you'll get:
✓ Science based workout programs
✓ Exercise video demonstrations and form coaching
✓ Nutrition guidance and macro education
✓ Meal plans and recipes
✓ Weekly live coaching calls
✓ Mindset coaching and education
✓ A supportive community of women focused on strength and health
The goal isn't just to help you reach a goal. It's to help you become the person who can maintain it.
Need More Personalized Support?
If you know your biggest challenge isn't knowing what to do, but actually doing it consistently, FitSpace Coaching may be the next step. Sign up HERE
Inside FitSpace, you'll work with me, Alex, and our coaching team to create a personalized plan built around your goals, lifestyle, and challenges.
You'll receive:
✓ Personalized nutrition coaching
✓ Custom macro recommendations
✓ Accountability and regular coach feedback
✓ Help navigating real life challenges, vacations, holidays, and setbacks
✓ Support breaking self sabotage patterns and building lasting habits
You don't have to figure this out alone.
Creators and Guests
What is LiftingLindsay's More Than Fitness?
Dive into the joy of fitness with Lindsay and other guests exploring how it goes well and beyond the gym floor, the number on the scale, the size of your waist or the calories you're counting.
Hey guys, welcome, welcome to
the Lifting Lindsay podcast.
this episode is actually
inspired by my husband, Alex.
in, in our basement.
We share an office.
And I was listening to him talk to a
client, and he said this, and I was
like, "Ooh, that'll be a good…"
That like… It got my…
Okay, he-- I'm jumping ahead.
I'm jumping ahead because I'm so excited.
Okay.
He said, "Your reward thinking is
sabotaging your progress." And it just
like got my mind going, and I just sat
there and typed up this entire like
script of just like me venting and
the things that I wanna talk about.
And it dr- this, it is so true.
Think about that.
Think about this question: Is your
reward thinking sabotaging your progress?
What do I mean by that?
Well, it's this idea that I've earned it.
I've earned a treat.
I've earned a night off.
I've earned a cheat meal.
I've earned a weekend off.
I've earned not to work out today because
I've been working out, you know, so much.
I've earned a few days off tracking.
I've earned a break from not thinking
about, you know, lifestyle, nutrition.
I've earned it.
And every single time I hear
that, I think, "What, what,
what are we doing? What are we
doing?" Th- food is not a reward.
It's not what you've earned.
We are mistaking the reward.
It, it…
We've completely lost track of
what the real reward actually is
What you've actually earned
is the reward of consistency.
You've earned the strength
that you're building.
You've earned the fat loss that
will happen over time, especially
if you stop telling yourself you've
earned every single, you know,
dessert every single day, right?
y- that's the real… The
reward is the consistency.
The reward is the strength.
The reward is the fat loss.
The reward is the muscle you're creating.
The reward is the confidence that
comes from making a commitment
to yourself of, "I'm going to
follow a plan," and keeping it.
That's the reward.
That's what you've earned.
Does that make sense?
You've earned, and the reward is the grit
you're developing, the resiliency you're
learning, the discipline you're building.
That's the reward, guys.
The reward is we are
becoming something better.
That's the reward.
The reward is not a cheat meal.
That should not be it.
But somewhere along the way, we've
started treating consistency like
something that needs to be escaped
from rather than something that
ultimately creates the life we want.
That mindset is killing your
progress Think about this.
This is how it usually goes.
Monday through Thursday,
man, you're dialed in.
You're tracking.
You're getting your protein,
hitting your workouts.
You're getting your steps in.
You're feeling good, maybe even
feeling a little tighter, a
little stronger, a little leaner.
Then Friday rolls around and you
think, "Well, I've been so good.
I've earned a little break." So
Friday night kind of becomes this
free-for-all that you've earned, right?
Because you've been so good.
Saturday becomes kind of
tracking, but not really.
Sunday turns into this, "Well, I'll
start again tomorrow," because,
you know, nothing can really
start except for on a Monday.
So… And then Monday arrives and you're,
you're back on track, but you repeat that
cycle, and you repeat it often enough, and
after a month or two, you're exhausted.
You've been working hard.
You've been thinking about dieting
constantly, yet you don't have much to
show for it, and you're wondering why.
The reason is because you've been
dieting in your mind more than
you've been dieting with your body.
I call this the diet mindset.
Women come to me all the time
completely exhausted by dieting.
But when we actually look at
what's happening, they aren't
consistently following the plan.
They're repeating this
starting and stopping.
But the mental fatigue is there
because they're like, "Oh,
no, no, no. I'm in a diet."
Maybe Monday through Thursday your
body actually is in a calorie deficit,
but Friday through Sunday it's not,
and that's enough to stop progress
or really, really slow it down.
And the mental fatigue is real It's
there, but the physical results aren't.
So mentally, you have been more in a diet
than your body has physically, because
every week they're rewarding themselves by
undoing the consistency they just created.
They are rewarding themselves by
stepping away from the very thing that
they are re- getting rewarded for that
will get them the real reward that
they want, which is a certain body
composition or strength or fat loss.
Does that make sense?
Yeah, it's kind of, it's kind of
circular thinking, and it's actually
w- that's, that's the point.
That's, that's why people are
constantly spinning their wheels and
saying, "But I'm doing the things. I'm
trying so hard." And mentally it is
tiring because you are at the reward.
That, that reward thinking
is sabotaging you.
"Oh, I earned this. I
get this reward." No.
one phrase that also catches
my attention is, "I've been
so good, I can now eat this."
Oof.
Whenever I hear that, it's
a little bit of a red flag.
Yellow flag, red flag, it's kind of
in between, but, but sometimes it's
because there's a deeper issue, because
that statement reveals something.
"I've been so good"?
What do you mean good?
It reveals that fitness has
kind of become a moral issue.
Good food, bad food, good days, bad
days, good behavior, bad behavior.
Guys, fitness isn't a moral issue
, it's a lifestyle thing, right?
Lifestyle issue.
Eating a cookie doesn't make you bad.
Eating a salad doesn't make you good.
Skipping a workout doesn't make you lazy.
Going to the gym doesn't
make you virtuous.
Those things simply reflect choices.
Actually, what they do
reflect is your values.
Do you value your body and the
health of your body, or don't you?
Ooh, people don't like that though.
They're like, "Yeah, I do. I value it."
Then your choices will reflect that.
Right now it's just wishful
thinking that you have that value.
Think about that.
If your choices on the daily don't reflect
it, then you don't have that value.
You want to, you wish you did, but
you don't just yet, and that's okay.
Accepting where we are right
now in the moment is the most
important thing to move forward.
But the people who succeed
long term, these people are
not consistently rewarding
themselves for basic commitments.
They don't think, "Well, I
tracked my food for four days,
so I get to quit for three."
Now, nobody's really thinking that,
but they're kind of leaning into it.
But imagine if we approach something
like brushing our teeth that way.
"Well, I brushed my teeth Monday through
Thursday, so I've earned a weekend off."
The people around you would be like,
"Please, nope, you didn't earn that.
Nope." Nobody thinks that way,
though, because brushing your
teeth is part of your lifestyle,
or at least we hope, right?
It's simply what you do.
It's how you show up in the world
with hopefully brushed teeth.
So that's where fitness needs to move.
Not something you're doing temporarily,
not something you're surviving through
until the weekend and then you get to
go back and enjoy who you really are.
No.
Not something you're
earning breaks from, guys.
It's a lifestyle.
Alex and I talk about this
all the time on this podcast.
It's a lifestyle.
We create a lifestyle we can maintain,
then we stay consistent, and over
time, we reap the real rewards Now,
to be honest, this actually reminds
me of something in, in my own life.
Um, I'm a religious person
and a spiritual person.
I actually do think that they
are-- they can be, they can coexist
and they can be very independent.
And I'll discuss that.
Um, oftentimes all people will think,
"I go to church, that makes me a good
person." I personally don't believe that.
church it doesn't make you a good person.
My belief is that God, allowing
God to change your heart is
actually what helps you become
better, and it's a lifelong goal of
becoming, right?
But let me, let me just say this:
church is not the pinnacle of my
worship, and I believe I've shared
this a, a few times on here.
Church is not the pinnacle of my worship.
Church is where I gather with others.
It's where I serve.
It's where, um, I take the sacrament and
remember covenants I've made with God.
But simply showing up doesn't
create my relationship with God.
My daily worship does.
My personal time with God does.
My daily choices do.
Church is where I practice my
religion or my spirituality.
It's not where I get it.
I get it, if you will, from my
relationship that I try to cultivate
with God every day on my own, actually.
That's, that's where I get it
I honestly think the
gym can be the same way.
Just showing up isn't what gets you
to be the person you want to be.
You also, when you show up, if…
One thing is it's how you show up.
Just going to church doesn't
make you a good person.
How you show up and how you practice
your religion with other people, 'cause
that's where it gets hard, right?
It's easy, to be honest, building
my relationship with God alone in my
office as, you know, every morning
as I read scriptures, as I pray, as
I talk to Him, that's kind of the
easy part, but that's my relationship
that I'm building with Him.
And then practicing becoming like Him,
that's where it gets hard, because going
out into the world and rubbing shoulders
with people who are broken and who their
brokenness rubs against my brokenness,
their scars rub against my scars, that's
where who I am as a person comes out.
That… So going to church, rubbing
shoulders with people who are broken
as I am, who are scarred as I am.
So showing up in ways that I have built
connections with God throughout the week,
and He's helped change my heart so that
when I show up at church, I can show
up in greater ways for other people.
Okay, I'm kind of getting off on this
side, on, on a tr- tangent there.
But it's the same thing personally
when I think of the gym.
Going to the gym is one thing.
Walking into the, the
building is one thing.
But actually training hard, actually
training with intensity and not just going
through some reps of sitting there, you
know, on a machine or, you know, sitting
at church just kind of listening, but
are you leaning into the heart of it?
that's awesome.
But then when you go home,
are you taking it with you?
Too many people think that fitness
about what happens during one hour of
the day or, uh, three to, you know,
five times a week you go for one hour.
It's not.
The real question is, how are you treating
your body every hour of every day?
It's about when you go home from
the gym, what are you doing?
How are you treating your body?
How are you feeding it?
What are you feeding your mind?
What are you consuming?
What habits are you practicing?
How are you speaking about
yourself and your body?
That is so important because
what you put into your mind and
body is how you treat your body.
There is a connection between mental
health and physical health, gut
health and mental health, food quality
and energy, sleep and recovery.
Fitness isn't just gym time.
It's how do
you love your body when
you go home from the gym?
Does the gym come home
with you kind of thing.
Are you choosing mostly
whole foods because you care
about how your body feels?
Are you prioritizing sleep because,
once again, you care about your body?
Are you moving because
you care about your body?
Not because you've earned something,
not because you're trying to burn
off something, but because you value
yourself That's what determines who
you become and what your body becomes.
One of the biggest reasons people struggle
to maintain fat loss is because they
never actually build this lifestyle.
I've said this time and time
again, and research shows this.
Many people regain the weight.
Why?
Because they treated a f- they treated
fat loss like a temporary project.
They never became the person
who lives the lifestyle.
They were waiting for a reward.
The real reward was becoming the
person capable of sustaining the goal.
That's what they missed.
Stop rewarding yourselves, guys,
especially with the things that
tend to hurt you in the long run.
If your reward for consistency is
abandoning consistency, that's a problem.
if your reward for movement is now I
get to just be inactive for the rest
of the day, then that's a problem.
If your reward for eating healthy
throughout the week is to not eat healthy
on the weekends, then that's a problem.
The reward isn't the escape,
the reward is the result.
The reward is becoming stronger,
healthier, more resilient,
more capable, more confident.
The reward is becoming the person
who keeps promises to themselves.
The
reward truly is
becoming.
You become what you look up to right now.
Guaranteed you've been on social media,
and there are certain Instagram people
that, that you do, you look up to 'em.
They seem to have to get it.
They seem to… Fitness clicks.
Why does it click for them?
'cause they made it into something
that they didn't have to escape from.
They don't look for every
opportunity to not be the fit person.
They look for every opportunity
to make choices that align with
their values, and their values
truly are they love themselves.
They love being healthy.
Being healthy is the
reward, not the donut.
Now, for any of you who have followed
me for an extensive period of time,
I don't think that there's anything
wrong with the donut, but stop treating
it as it's some, quote-unquote,
"reward" for being good, right?
The reward is you are becoming.
That's the reward.
Stop telling yourself every weekend
that your reward is a Snickers that
doesn't fall in your plan, or this big
binge that doesn't fall in your plan,
but it's okay because I earned it.
No, no.
Change this idea of what the reward is.
The reward is you are becoming
the person you want to become.
The reward is you are achieving
health and sustaining it.
If you're listening today and
recognizing yourself in this
cycle, I want you to challenge that
thought the next time it shows up.
The next time you think, "I've
earned it," ask yourself,
"What have I actually earned?
Have I earned self-sabotage or have
I earned another opportunity to
become the person I'm trying to be?
I've earned I'm becoming that person."
Those are the daily choices that
really matter and really add up.
If you're struggling to make fitness
a lifestyle and not just another
diet phase, I would love to help you.
Inside my Lifting Lindsay app, I teach
women how to train smart and how to eat
smart and how to show up for themselves.
I have courses in there that walk
you through, um, mindful eating,
how to make this a lifestyle so that
you're not always tied to a tracker.
I have courses showing you how to
do a fat loss phase, how to find
maintenance, how to hit your goals,
so I can help you self-coach.
But if you need more personalized
support, you can join my husband
Alex and I and our incredible t-
coaching team at FitSpace Pro.
I will link both the app and our
personal coaching in the show notes.
We'll help you identify the self-sabotage
patterns holding you back and build
a lifestyle that finally sticks.
We will help you become the healthy
person, the strong person, the
resilient person, the capable person
that you truly are capable of becoming.
I really appreciate each one of you.
You guys have an incredible week.
We'll talk to you next time.