We’ve got SUCH a powerful message for you today if you’re someone who struggles with sticking with healthy food choices or taking the time to move your body.
To reach most of the goals we’d like to achieve – losing weight, getting ahead at work, improving a relationship –it’s not just a matter of taking action. There are things we need to stop doing if we want to be successful.
We need to STOP:
- overeating,
- procrastinating,
- getting worked up over things that really don’t matter.
- put your obstacle here!
It’s hard to motivate yourself to adopt new habits, but it’s even harder to rid yourself of old ones. More often than not, it’s the latter that keep us from achieving our health and wellness goals.
We need help – we need strategies that actually work. We don’t care how much self-control you have – willpower alone is not going to do the trick.
Thankfully, there are strategies that work. Here is a particularly useful one discovered by researchers at Boston College and University of Houston.
It’s about your MINDSET … and how changing ONE WORD in your self-talk can change your entire outlook.
So, let’s say you’re at a nice restaurant and you’ve just finished eating dinner. After clearing the plates, your server says, “You know, we have an incredible chocolate cake on our dessert menu. We’re famous for it. Would you care to try it?”
You’re comfortably full and feel great…
You know that if you eat the chocolate cake, you won’t feel so great. In fact, you’ll feel blah, bloated, and ready for a major nap!
And that’s just in the short term. You also know that stacking dessert on top of a big meal won’t help you meet your goals.
At that moment, what do you tell yourself?
“I can’t eat dessert” … or … “I don’t eat dessert.”
Those two statements might sound similar but they are 180 degrees apart in mindset.
Hear us out.
- “I can’t” means someone or something else is in charge of your behavior or thoughts.
- “I don’t” means that YOU are making a DELIBERATE CHOICE.
“I don’t” gives you POWER. It helps you set clear boundaries that you are in charge of.
And it can completely revamp your approach to using willpower because it takes it out of the question.
Try saying these statements out loud to yourself and feel the difference. Here they are:
- I don’t stay up till 1 a.m. when I have to work the next day.
- I don’t skip my scheduled workouts.
- I don’t eat highly processed foods.
Scientific research shows that making the shift to an “I don’t” vs “I can’t” mindset can make a real difference in changing your behavior.
This research is based on the insight that the language we use to describe our choices serves as a feedback mechanism that either enhances or impedes our goal-directed behavior.
In one study, students with a healthy eating goal were instructed that when faced with a temptation, they should say to themselves either I don’t do X or I can’t do X. (e.g., I don’t eat candy versus I can’t eat candy.) On their way out of the lab, they were told that they could choose a token of appreciation for their participation in the study: a chocolate bar or a granola bar. Who chose the healthier option? Sixty-four percent of those who said I don’t, compared to only thirty-nine percent of those who said I can’t.
In another study, twenty adult women who were working toward a health and fitness goal were encouraged to use either I don’t or I can’t language when they were tempted to lapse (e.g., skip the gym, grab a donut, etc.) On each of the next ten days, these women checked in via email to report on whether or not the strategy was working for them – if not, they were told they could stop using the strategy. By the study’s end, 8 out of the 10 women using the I don’t strategy were still using it successfully, while only 1 of the 10 who used I can’t lasted that long.
The beautiful thing about using this strategy is that it could not be easier – every time you catch yourself thinking I can’t have this, or I can’t do that, simply say NO, I DON’T DO THIS, instead.
Because the truth is, it is your choice. The power to decide what you do and don’t do really is yours. When you are always thinking I can’t, it’s easy to lose sight of that fact.
It’s time to take your power back, and now you know where to start!
If you’re ready to make a REAL CHANGE in your health & fitness, we offer our clients next-level coaching that puts them firmly in control of their results.
To see if you might be a fit to work with us, let’s talk. Schedule your Success Strategy Session here:
