The small habits feel insignificant as they don’t seem to add up to much. Which can leave you constantly questioning whether your actions are going to make any difference.
As with investing, the downstream of compounding only becomes a reality as you repeat a habit, day after day, month after month.
The hardest part isn’t doing the actual habit.
The hardest part is not getting distracted by the temptations of “better” along the way.
-J
It’s common for alternative health solutions and remedies to lean heavily into the spiritual or religious language and symbols in selling their stuff. Often delivered with highly sexualised marketing.
After all, most of them got nothing going science-wise. The dogmatic scaffolding is the only thing keeping the circus together.
And it’s not only the alternative health industry that uses this strategy. Plenty of diets, supplements and other health trends also have some of this cultish aura around them.
The stronger the cult vibes, the faster we should sprint right past them.
-J
When you feel like you’ve tried everything, it’s easy to get caught up in the latest health and fitness craze. Or to allow friends and family to pursue you with their well-intended but often utter bullshit health recommendations. Whether that’s about potatoes, exercise or vaccines.
With the sea of misinformation getting deeper by the day, it kind of makes sense to improve your critical thinking life raft right about now.
I’ve been digging into the free Cranky Uncle app lately and found it helpful to better understand logical fallacies and improve my critical thinking. From their website:
Cranky Uncle is the creation of scientist and cartoonist John Cook, who uses cartoons, humor, and critical thinking to expose the misleading techniques of science denial and build public resilience against misinformation.
Give it a geez. The app’s free.
-J
If we’re not exercising, we’re practicing being inactive.
If we stay up late and get up early, we’re practicing being tired.
If we’re not managing our stress, we’re practicing being stressed.
Shifting the language can help us move towards doing the things that benefit us in the long run.
-J
How does 1% better look tomorrow compared to today?
How about next week? And next month?
Exercise 1% more. Eat 1% healthier. Sleep an extra 1%.
Give your kids an additional 1% of your time, attention, and patience.
It doesn’t seem like much. But each increase will shift you closer to the person you want to be.
-J
Running, strength training, dancing, skiing, horse riding, shotgun wrestling, whatever.
Pick the skills you want to get good at.
Put effort into learning them.
Show up with consistency.
And your goals will follow.
-J
There are a bunch of reasons why the fitness industry is doing such an excellent job of alienating people, especially women, from fitness. But none more effective than the pervasive message that the entry point into fitness is about losing weight.
All we have to do is look at most of the mainstream fitness marketing. We see images of people, most of them genetically predisposed to a leaner physique*, perspiring their way toward glory.
Maybe you see these glistening photos and think, “Not for me.” You believe you don’t belong here because weight loss isn’t your goal.
Just because the fitness industry seems to think your goal should be to lose weight, it doesn’t have to be your goal.
Being fit is about having the strength, stamina, and energy to live life to the fullest. It’s about navigating through challenges and getting the most out of the stuff that brings you joy and meaning.
And you can achieve it all without ever having to step on a scale.
-J
*A group of which I am a part. Although, you won’t find glistening photos of me online. And yes, in 2018, I put two slim, “fit” looking people on my book cover. But hey. Live and learn.
Getting even remotely excited about exercise is tough when you’re always tired.
When simple things feel hard, and you have to wrestle with the general lack of energy on an hourly basis, lacing up your trainers probably isn’t the most appealing thing you can think of. And I get it. Juggling a family and running a business takes it out of you.
But. The thing that you feel too tired to do is the thing that helps you shift the energy.
The trick (there isn’t one, but stay with me here) is to do just enough that you’ll feel a boost in your energy. But not so much that you’ll end up commando-crawling through the next few days.
And the only way to figure ‘enough’ is to have a go. And the more you do it, the higher your ‘enough’ will be.
That, and maybe not watching Netflix till 11 pm.
-J
This month’s coaching intake is closing on Sunday. We’re kicking off on Monday. And today’s a great day to sign up. If you’re a parentpreneur and want to reclaim your energy and strength with an approach that works with your life, hit reply. Let’s chat to see if my coaching would be a good fit.
And yes, today’s the last day you’ll hear about it this month.
It’s easy to feel overwhelmed about the changes you think you should implement to improve your health.
Whether it’s the widely different expert advice online. Or the well-intentioned but often always misfiring advice from friends, colleagues, or the nana next door who really wants you to know her opinion about how you should eat, parent, and live.
Would your health be better off if you exercised an hour daily, ate 21 healthy meals a week, and permanently duck-taped the cork on the pinot? Yeah. I’d say your health would improve.
But let’s be real. Unless there are some significant health issues on the immediate horizon, or you possess the mind of a reinforced concrete, that’s just not going to happen.
Meanwhile, an hour of exercise a week instead of zero is an improvement.
Eating 14 healthy meals instead of 13 is a win.
And going every second day pinotless is worth a parrot sticker.
Is any of that perfect? Nope.
But we don’t care about perfection. We care that you’re doing better than you did before.
-J
I am taking on new clients this week. And we’re kicking off on Monday. If you’re a parentpreneur and want to reclaim your energy and strength with an approach that works with your life, hit reply. Let’s chat to see if my coaching would be a good fit.
“I’ll be more active once the kids are older.”
“I’ll exercise once my business isn’t as hectic.”
If the change seems hard now, it’ll seem hard in the future. Once your work and the kids don’t need as much time and energy, something else will. That’s how life works.
You don’t have to make drastic changes. And you don’t have to implement all the changes at once.
But no one is going to give you the time. You’ll have to take it.
Start by carving a little time for your health today.
-J