You are listening to the Weight Loss for Successful Women Podcast with Shannan Christiansen, episode number 186. Welcome to Weight Loss for Successful Women, a podcast for women who are ready to break the diet cycle and end their struggle with weight for good. Here’s your host, fortune 100 executive and certified life coach, Shannan Christiansen.

Hello love. So happy to be back with you. Oh, you know, ladies, I cannot wait to share what I’m gonna share today. You know, if you’ve listened to this podcast, maybe you’re new, but you’re thinking is so much a part of long-term weight loss. So if you want to lose weight and you want it to be for the very last time, you have to start to believe and think something different. And there are some thoughts that I think for many of you, you’ve thought, even including myself, they still pop up that you know, you think, and those thoughts are actually keeping you stuck. They’re keeping you from moving forward. And so I can’t wait for this episode.

Now, wherever you’re listening, or maybe you’re watching this on YouTube, make sure that you follow. You can follow by, if you’re on Apple you can hit the plus sign; on YouTube, I don’t know, I think you just hit follow. I’m not sure. Oh, you subscribe. That’s it. You subscribe to the channel. Is that bad? I know ladies, I’m not a very good YouTuber. I know I’m not. If you’re watching it on YouTube, I’m grateful for you. I’m grateful for all of you ladies who listen. When you listen to this, especially all of my regular every week viewers and listeners, you help it to show up in searches so other ladies can find this amazing work of learning how to live your best life in a body you love. So, subscribe, follow, rate, review it. That again, just helps other women. Ah, so good.

So let’s talk about these thoughts that you wanna change them. When they come in, you want to start to think something different. So this first one is all about this thought around, I should get back on track. I should do something different. I should eat better, I should get moving. As you know, all of those thoughts have one word in common. They have the word should. S H O U L D. When we use the word should, it’s a way that we are actually not doing anything. We’re just, you know, making some sort of excuse in our mind, or we’re puddling in the puddle about something.

And we’re telling ourselves one, that what we’re doing right now is not good enough. When we say should, we’re saying what we’re doing right now is not good enough. And then also we are staying in sort of this overwhelm, confused, I don’t know what to do. I think I should do this, you know? But we’re staying in this kind of confused mindset, which just keeps us doing nothing. It keeps us in inaction.

And the third piece of this is when you say, I should do something different, I, you know, should get back on track, you’re anchoring yourself in the past, somewhere where you think I did better. And if you could only get back to that, it’s very similar to like tomorrow thinking. So tomorrow is the day I’m gonna start, right? Tomorrow, next week, you know, after the holidays, after this, after summer, you know, all the things we tell ourselves. And so this all starts with a very simple thought that turns into a belief that what you’re doing right now is not good enough. And it keeps you looking back to somewhere in the past where you thought you were thinner, you did better, some past diet you were on that you’re like, if I could just get back to it. And it doesn’t keep you in the present of what you’re working on now, you know, ladies, it just keeps you puddling. It keeps you from moving forward. It just keeps you stuck.

The second thought that, and I’m gonna tell you, you know, at the very end what to do, right, how to start to change these thoughts. The second one is, I need to start over. I need to start at square one. I need to go back and redo everything. Ladies, I can’t tell you, and this is for some of my Transform Bosses too, right? Like, oh, maybe they were doing great and then something happened, and then they’re like, oh, I just, I need to start over. Ladies, starting over is just, it’s such an arbitrary thing, because what does that even mean? I know. I really want you to think about that.

When you have this start this thought, I need to start over, what does that mean? And our brains are like, oh, you know, for my Bosses, they might think I need to do the coursework again, or I need to do, you know, whatever it is. But is that starting over? Or is it just like, Hey, I’m gonna listen to this again. I just want you to notice the difference. I need to start over versus, oh yeah, I’m just gonna listen to this course. I loved this video on this. It is such a different thought, and it produces such a different feeling. When you think, I need to start at square one, I need to start over, what happens is mostly you don’t start, you just feel overwhelmed, and you feel like that you have this huge task at hand.

And then you know what you do, you do nothing. I know, ladies, this is for so many parts of our lives. You know, let’s say you have a closet and suddenly it’s turned into like, let’s just throw everything in there kind of closet, and you have this thought, I need to clear out the closet. And you know what happens? It just feels overwhelming, right? That’s kind of like in the same vein as starting over because you think, oh, I need to do it and I need to do it all. And instead of just like meeting yourself where you’re at, like, okay, here’s a closet. I got lots of things, and today I’m just gonna focus on one to two things. I’m gonna pick those out and I’m gonna find a different place. Or take ’em to Goodwill. Or maybe they’re trash, whatever it is.

But we do, and it leads me into this kind of third thought. I’m gonna do it all perfectly. Because these two thoughts, I need to start over, and then they go together like peanut butter and jelly. Because you say, I need to start at square one, I need to start over. And then the next thought is, and I’m gonna do it perfectly. I’m gonna do it all. I’m gonna be perfect. Because if I was just perfect, if I ate perfect, if I did this perfect, if I did Transform Boss perfectly, then everything would be great. I know. But you know what ends up happening is you just keep pushing it off because it feels so overwhelming. I mean, you tell yourself, I’m gonna start eating chicken and salad, I’m gonna meditate. I’m gonna meal prep.

Ladies, I can tell you, when I was on the diet rollercoaster how often, I was like, I’m gonna meal prep. Now, some of you like to do it. I do not. I, I don’t. I just don’t. And if you do, great, love it. Do it. You know, if it helps you, makes your week easier, love it. But I don’t, and I tell you, I would tell myself over and over again, I’m gonna meal prep, I’m gonna do all these things. And then I would just say, it goes right on back to thought number one, I’ll start tomorrow. I know ladies, these three thoughts, they all go together. And it’s because it comes from this place of perfection, and I’m going to do it perfectly, and that I’m gonna somewhere become a different person.

But tomorrow. And I’m not gonna allow myself to fail. I’m not gonna l allow myself to do it in small chunks comes from this perfectionistic fantasy. You know, we look on social media. We, you know, look at folks, and we just think, oh, they’re doing it perfectly. I need to be like that. And it’s real deep. I mean, I think this even happened when we were kids and we were in school, and maybe so and so we thought had a better life than us. Or you know, as we got married or had a partner, we started thinking like they have a better marriage or partnership than I do. Right? In your job, you think so and so is doing a better job. Or the boss likes them better.

This all comes from, ladies all of it, from this feeling that what you are and what you’re doing is not good enough. I say this because it’s so important. Thinking what you’re thinking and how these thoughts, they’re in your subconscious. And for some of you, including myself, as you’re doing this work, you might just have to look at the results. So you know, for example, if you’re overeating and you don’t want to, you just wanna ask, okay, so what am I thinking? You know, what’s happening? What’s going on? What am I believing right now today?

And then you might get some of these thoughts, oh, right, I think I need to do it perfectly. I think I should be doing something different. Again, that I need to start over. I need to start at square one. You never have to start over. I know, I tell my Bosses this all the time. You never have to start over. Today you just take the next best action. Today you just decide, okay, this is the one thing, and I’m gonna focus on simple and small steps. You will go farther faster by doing less.

What? Did I just say that? I know your brain explodes, especially for all my A type personalities like myself. What? More does not equal better? I know. I really want you to just hear what I am saying. More does not equal better. It doesn’t. If you do more, it doesn’t mean that you’re gonna have better results. It just means mostly that you just stay in the puddle and you don’t get started. And you don’t just take a simple step. You just keep telling yourself and putting yourself off. And the next thing you know, five years, 10 years, 15 years, I know ladies, we have ladies who come to us who are in their eighties and nineties, and this is no judgment because this work wasn’t around 20, 30 years ago. But they’re still not having love and kindness and grace for themselves.

And I just wanna offer you that today is the day. Today is the day. It doesn’t matter what happened yesterday. Right  now, as you’re hearing my words or watching me, I want you to know that all you need to do is take the next best action. What is one thing that you can do for yourself? Look my loves, this is the work that we do in Transform Boss. I love this work. I was just talking to my Transform Bosses, we had a workshop over the weekend. I was talking about this word work. You know, hard work, right? The word hard and work. And I love it because actually hard work has provided freedom for me. That’s how I think of it.

It’s provided freedom, it’s provided actual simplicity in my life. It’s helped me achieve all of my goals and my dreams and I continue to grow. Hard work is growth. And so how you think of things, what you believe about things matters because the language that you use is then correlated into how you feel. If you think, I need to start over at square one, I need to do it perfectly, I should be doing more, you’re gonna feel overwhelmed. That’s not the same energy as, oh my gosh, you mean all I have to do is my next best action? What is it? Okay, one thing I’m gonna do today, one thing, at one meal I’m gonna pay attention to my hunger. I’m gonna see if I’m starting to feel satisfied. That’s all I have to do. That’s all you have to do.

This is why long-term weight loss, I think, has been such a fleeting thing for so many of you, including myself. The diet rollercoaster, I was on it for so long because of these thoughts. These three thoughts are just so pivotal in keeping you stuck on the diet rollercoaster, keeping you looking for some magical food plan. And this is the thing, the magical food plan will never solve it. You have to understand what you’re thinking, what you’re believing, and then how that’s correlating to how you’re feeling, and then what you’re doing. Go to last week’s episode. It was so good. Yes, I know all the episodes are good, for sure, but if you missed last week’s, you for sure wanna listen to it.

We’ll put the link in the show notes, but this is my take on it ladies, ready? Number one, become aware of what you’re thinking and what you’re believing. And one of the ways to do that is just when you have a result that you don’t want, like maybe you overeat, maybe you don’t do something for yourself that you thought you were gonna do, just ask yourself, Hey, love, what are you thinking? What’s happening? What are you believing right now?

Number two, then I want you to challenge these thoughts, I should, more equals better. I’m gonna do it perfectly. I need to start over at square one. Ugh, I need to get back on track. Ooh, ladies, challenge all of them. Do you want to believe that? Is that serving you? Is that helping you take the next best action? Hmm, probably not. And then number three, just take the next best action. Yeah, that’s it. One simple thing. Focus on today and just do one thing. And it can be anything. You can make your realistic plan, you could get a little more hydration, better sleep.

I have three basics: brain basics, body basics, and eating basics. And you can find this throughout the episodes. All of my Bosses, just go into our coursework or reach out in our community. We’ll help you. And you’re just going to pick one, and then you’re just going to take a step forward. So good, right? And next week, ooh, I’m gonna talk all about control. I know, and feeling like you have control around food. I know we think that there are foods and that we’re outta control. I’m gonna challenge that. So don’t miss next week’s episode.

This goes back to my original ask of all of you who are listening. Follow the show. You can follow it on YouTube by subscribing and any podcast app you’re listening to follow. And if you wanna take this work deeper, then check out Transform Boss. It’s my monthly membership program where we do all of this work together in a community with a course and coaching, and we just, you know, I watch ladies just blow their own minds. Really, I do. They lose weight, they get off the diet roller coaster. You can learn all about it at jointransformboss.com.

All right my love. Bye for now. Thank you for listening to this episode of Weight Loss for Successful Women. If you love what you heard today and wanna learn more, come on over to bflycoaching.com. That’s B F L Y coaching.com. See you next week.