“I’m sorry I ate that box of donuts. I was bad.”

“I ate those wings last night, I’m sorry I  was bad.”

“I’m sorry I was bad this weekend. I ate like a pig.”

Have you said this before? Maybe to yourself or to your coach or trainer?

I want to talk about mindsets here. Because you weren’t “bad” when you got off the plan for that one meal or that one night. Yes, you may have deviated off the plan you agreed to with your coach or the plan you set up for yourself, but you most definitely have not been “bad.”

Life happens. You are not going to be perfect all the time. You are not always going to stick to the plan. Shit gets in the way. It happens. The less you beat yourself up about it the more successful you will be.

The mindset I want all my clients (and everyone out there who is trying to change their body and life) to adopt is that when you get off the plan stop feeling guilty. It happens to me. It happens to every fitness model out there that you think is perfect. It happens to everyone. What you can and should do is…learn from it and move on.

The more you tell yourself that you did “bad” the more you are beating yourself into the ground. The more you beat yourself down the more you fail and the more you fail the less confidence you have. Yes, you already know that confidence is huge when it comes to this nutrition and exercise stuff. Without confidence you can’t get very far in my opinion. Building that confidence can definitely be very tough, I am not denying that at all.

But….

You must first get rid of that mindset that you are constantly failing. 

One box of donuts is not failing.

That cheese platter is not failing.

Those 6 beers is not failing.

That week of not working out at all is not failing.

That date night pizza is not failing.

You were not being “bad”in any of those situations. You were living life. You have to live life, you only have one of them to live.

When you wake up the next day after one of those situations how do you feel? Guilty? Or do you move on?

When you move on and get back on track you have won; you are truly ready to conquer this lifestyle change thing. Until you have that mindset it will be very…very…difficult to be successful in the long and more importantly to actually enjoy your progress. This body and life transformation needs to be fun. Now, I get that if you have a coach or trainer and you feel accountable to that person you might feel that you have let that coach down. I played organized sports until I was 22 years old and I know that feeling of letting a coach down. But, if your coach or trainer understands that “life happens” and he or she isn’t mad, there is no reason to beat yourself up.

**Side note. All my clients know that I have never accused them of being “bad.” If a client comes in disappointed in their weekend adherence to the plan we talk about what they can do better next time and get the workout going. No burpees til they puke. No “workout from hell” to punish them. It’s in the past, we can’t do anything about it now so being punished will do nothing. No reason to punish yourself either by starving yourself until Thursday.

I didn’t say that you can just be laid back about your workouts and nutrition and expect progress though. You still need to bust your ass and have discipline the majority of the time.

Cut yourself some slack though. Life is long, one day doesn’t mean you are a “bad” person and pizza isn’t a “bad” food. Pizza is a damn good food, so enjoy it…in moderation. The bag of family sized Cool Ranch Doritos that I ate half of this weekend doesn’t mean shit in the long run. I wasn’t bad…I ate the chips I wanted to eat and that’s that.

That’s it. No practical advice. Just something I had to get off my chest.