Stop waiting for someone to fix you.
😀 Plus: Eliminate the unnecessary, compounding optimism, and The Ted Lasso Effect.
Hola my friend!
Welcome to the 145th consecutive edition of the newsletter.
Each week I share mindsets, ideas and resources that have helped me transform my body, mind and life.
Here is what I discovered this week that might also help you.
Steal shamelessly. Share generously.
*****
On a personal note…
I’m still in Sudbury. I did have plans to head back to Toronto tomorrow, but there are unfinished tasks that need to be taken care of.
I will stay as long as necessary to help my daddio make the transition into the next chapter of his life.
I’m grateful I’m in a position to do this. The best part is that I won’t ever look back with any regrets. My father has been here for me for 57 years. I now have the great privilege to be there for him, however long that takes.
Get 5 new ideas every Sunday that will transform your body, mind and life.
1/ Wise words.
This makes me think about a discovery I made 4 years ago when I first began putting my Successful Body framework in place. I spent the first 53 years of my life waiting for someone to come along and fix me. It finally dawned on me that no one was coming. If I was going to succeed at losing weight and keeping it off, I would need to learn how to fix myself. And that’s exactly what I have done.
🧠Mindset worth stealing → Don't wait for someone to fix you. Start fixing yourself.2/ Question I constantly ask myself.
What can I eliminate to simplify things?
One thing I have learned is that complexity does not scale long-term. As a result, I am constantly looking to eliminate the unnecessary in all aspects of my life. Here are a few things I have eliminated on my weight loss journey to skew the odds of success in my favour.
My gym membership. I work out wherever my feet are.
Gym clothes. I train in the clothes I am wearing.
Meal plans. I have meal templates so no matter where I am I can build a successful plate and eat as planned.
Workout classes. I design my own program that I can do anywhere.
Equipment. I do body weight exercises. Equipment is a happy luxury, but it’s not a necessity.
This thinking can be applied to any aspect of life; finances, material possessions, relationships etc.
The simpler your life becomes, the happier you will become.
🧠Mindset worth stealing → Ruthlessly eliminate the unnecessary.3/ Something I am trying to teach myself.
To be non-emotional about emotional topics.
One of the greatest advantages we can teach ourselves is to be non-emotional about emotional topics.
My reality is that I am highly emotional, so the idea of being non-emotional is not realistic — at this time. What I can do, and what I have been practicing, is to catch myself in my emotional moments and use self-talk strategies that nudge me towards a less emotional state.
The other thing I have been doing is identifying areas I know set me off emotionally and mentally rehearsing how I would handle the situation before it ever happens.
I have a long way to go, but I have definitely seen progress. For example, the number on the scale no longer triggers any kind of an emotional reaction. I can see the number for what it is and quickly get to a neutral mindset.
🧠Mindset worth stealing → Teach yourself to be irrational. 4/ Article I really enjoyed.
Morgan Housel is one of my favourite writers on the web. Morgan has the rare gift to pull lessons from stories and apply them to money, investing and life.
In this article, compounding optimism, he talks about the power of, you guessed it, compounding.
We tend to think of compounding as something that only happens with money. But it’s a powerful principle that can be applied to many things including optimism, ideas, inventions and habits.
I have had great success losing weight because I have been compounding the same 10 successful body habits for the past 1430 days.
Compounding is not something we intuitively gravitate towards, but once it becomes part of our thinking, magic happens.
🧠Mindset worth stealing → Behaviours will compound when we bundle days into years and decades. 5/ The Ted Lasso Effect
The TV show Ted Lasso has a great underlying message that translates to real life.
The main character, Ted Lasso, is a coach for an English soccer team. He is an eternal optimist. He always manages to find the positive in the worst of situations.
The idea at play is that it is more productive to build up confidence through encouragement and focusing on what has gone well instead of dwelling solely on the negative.
I have applied this same thinking to my weight loss journey. I have a 3-2-1 Journal that I keep. Each day I write out 3 things that sparked joy, 2 things I need to improve on, and one big idea that will impact future me.
By starting with joy, I force myself to focus on the positive first which builds up my confidence. With that foundation in place, I can focus on my improvements without the the negative emotions that might normally be attached to such things.
The Ted Lasso Effect is also a great framework to use as a parent, your partner and colleagues.
🧠Activity to try → For one week, keep a 3-2-1 Journal. At the end of each day, write down 3 things that sparked joy, 2 things that need to be tweaked and one big idea that will have an impact on future you.That is all for today.
See you next Sunday my friend.
And hey — keep being awesome.
Dean 🇨🇦
*****
PS. I do one-on-one weight loss coaching for people over 40 who are looking to lose weight, reshape what their body looks like, and build a fitness program that can be done in 10 minutes a day.
My approach is simple, reasonable and most important, gets results for everyone I work with no matter how old they are.
Here are the current results of a client/friend I am presently working with.
He’s 59, married with children, works full-time in sales and travels extensively.
And the only thing we have worked on so far is fixing his eating and we have done that without doing anything extreme.
We are only now looking at phasing in a training program to help him begin to reshape what his body looks like and what it can do.
If you would like to book a free call to learn more about how I can help you get results like this, click here.
Think of the call as the fresh start you need to transform your body and your life!