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Tired But Toned
Tired But Toned is the podcast for busy women doing their best on low battery.
Hosted by fitness and nutrition coach Tina Wieland, this show is all about building real strength, managing stress, and creating habits that actually work in your real life — whether you're running on caffeine, chaos, or a solid eight hours (rare, but we dream).
Expect a mix of bite-sized tips and deeper dives into movement, mindset, hormones, recovery, and how to feel good in your body without burning out trying to “fix” it.
Whether you’re navigating autoimmune challenges, the weight of modern life, or just tired of the all-or-nothing fitness game — this podcast gets it. And more importantly, gets you moving in a way that lasts.
Because you don’t need more motivation.
You need a smarter strategy — even on your tired days.
Tired But Toned
260 | When Workouts Suck: The Truth Nobody's Posting About
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Ever feel like your workouts are rarely as amazing as fitness influencers make theirs look? You're not alone—and there's a scientific reason why.
The bell curve concept offers a refreshing perspective on fitness reality: out of approximately 100 workouts, only about 10% will feel truly amazing. Another 10% will inevitably feel terrible, regardless of your experience level. The remaining 80%? They'll just be okay. Not Instagram-worthy, not particularly memorable—just adequate. And that's exactly how it should be.
This revelation is particularly liberating for perfectionists and all-or-nothing thinkers who beat themselves up when every workout doesn't feel transformative. Just as you don't perform at 100% capacity every day at work, or brush your teeth with perfect technique every time, your fitness journey will include a spectrum of experiences. The magic happens not in chasing perfect workouts, but in showing up consistently through all three phases of the curve.
For those with neurodivergent tendencies or heightened sensitivities, traditional fitness advice often misses the mark. The standard "push through it" mentality may actually be counterproductive for your brain's wiring. Finding accommodations that work with your unique thinking patterns—whether that's managing sensory input, creating different types of reminders, or developing personalized routines—can transform your relationship with fitness entirely. You're not broken or lacking discipline; you simply need approaches aligned with how your mind operates.
Have you experienced this bell curve in your own fitness journey? Share this episode with someone who needs this perspective, and remember that consistency, not perfection, builds the foundation for lasting results.
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Hello everyone and welcome back to the Toned but Tired podcast. I apologize if you hear construction noises in the background, for, like the past month, I have had people working on the sidewalks and such, literally right next to my house. So yeah, that's fun, but you know we keep moving forward. So, with that being said, today I wanted to talk about a concept keep moving forward. So, with that being said, today, I wanted to talk about a concept.
Speaker 1:Anytime that I like, listen to a podcast or read something, so I'm always kind of consuming stuff when I don't actively need to be like 100% present. So if I'm walking, I'm driving, I'm cooking, I'm doing dishes, whatever, I kind of use that time to educate. Additionally, or sometimes, you know, I'll watch, like you know, sims or Hello Kitty or something stupid as well, but when I come across something that makes me think and go, huh, that was really good, I want to share it with you, and I think this is really eye opening. I think visuals, comparisons, metaphors, whatever you want to call them, can be very helpful in your health and fitness journey to really truly convey what you're experiencing, because I think a lot of the things we see online, people are showing their highlight moments, their best moments. You're seeing like fitness models, fitness influencers, who are jacked and shredded. They give you no context of how they got there and they're just like do these workouts. Like the message you're seeing is do these workouts, you'll look like me. They're happy, they're excited, everything's fun because it's their job. Their job is to make you want whatever they got Right. So, with that being said, let me share the little tidbit I have today.
Speaker 1:I want to talk about the bell curve. Have you ever heard of the bell curve? If you don't know what the bell curve is, you've probably seen it before and you've probably learned about it in science class and math class, especially if you took calculus. Okay, so the bell curve I want you to picture. It looks like a hill, okay, it's on a chart, and it starts at the bottom and then it peaks at the top or a mountain, I guess would be a better description on a chart and and it starts at the bottom and then it um, peaks at the top or a mountain, I guess would be a better description or a bell, and then it goes back down. So the theory behind this is this shows kind of just the average of everything, so you can use this for literally anything. Whatever you do, on average, about 10%, so that bottom half of people will be in, like the lower region. Then the other end that top 10% are people in the higher region or whatever you're measuring and then the big middle. The chunk in the middle is 80% and that's where mostly everybody else falls, right.
Speaker 1:I'm trying to think of a good example for this. That's okay, we'll use the example that I want to share today, and then that'll make a little more sense. So I want to relate this in the idea of working out. So think about 10% on the lower half, 10% of your workouts out of you know all the workouts that you do. Let's just use the nice round number of 100. So 10% or 10 of your workouts are going to suck, guaranteed right Now, of course, there's obviously like for my people who are politically correct yes, this isn't exact science.
Speaker 1:Of course. If you measured 100 workouts, would exactly 10 of them be terrible? Maybe some people have you know more terrible ones or less terrible, or maybe your experience is a little bit different, but this is just again, the average, right? So 10% of them are going to suck. The top 10%, 10 of them are going to be amazing. But then here's the kicker that other 80% the other 80% are just okay, they're meh, they're average. So why am I telling you this? Okay, they're meh, they're average. So why am I telling you this? I'm telling you this because I think we get caught up in beating ourselves up for the perfectionists out there, the all or nothings out there. It's like if we didn't have like a coming to Jesus, amazing, high workout, you know we're a failure and in reality, only 10 of your workouts probably are going out of 100, are going to feel like that.
Speaker 1:I've been through stretches. I've been through months of grinding through workouts. Let me tell you, I have been consistently moving, even through injuries and things, even if it was just walking or yoga, for over 10 years now. The longest I've maybe ever taken off from moving, I would say would be like two months, right, but I move in some capacity. And there have been periods three, four, six months of my life that I'll just be showing up for these workouts. I'm like, yeah, I'm not feeling it, but I know I got to do it. It's okay, it was all right, but it wasn't like amazing. And there have been phases where I've been like, wow, these workouts are hitting. I'm so excited for my workouts and there's been times where I'm like this sucks, this sucks ass. I hate it, I don't want to do it here. I'm giving up early. I did something, you know, so you're going to experience those things one way or another. And so what I am telling to you is, for the days that you're like shouldn't I, shouldn't I be feeling something more? Should I be feeling amazing, like that workout was just man, am I doing this right? Yes, you are only doing it wrong if you give up and you stop showing up.
Speaker 1:You need to keep moving forward, and I want to relate this to brushing your teeth, but I have a little bit of nuance for my critical thinking friends out there. So it is similar to brushing your teeth, right? I like to compare it to brushing your teeth to work, because, regardless, work is probably a better example. Well, I don't know. I think they're both the same, I guess. Um, if you don't want to do it, if you don't want to brush your teeth, if you don't want to go to work, you still do it right, because you're like man if I don't brush my teeth, my breath is gonna stink, my teeth are gonna fall out, I'm gonna get cavities. Um, if I don't go to work, I'm gonna get fired or written up or whatever. So I still have to go.
Speaker 1:Some of us, even a little too much, will go in when we're actually sick, but that's a whole other conversation. But you need to treat your workouts like that. It is your duty, it is a responsibility to be healthy, but you don't necessarily have to be perfect with it, right? You're not like brushing your teeth 100% perfectly every single time. I know all of us skip that flossing. I know we do. And when you go to work you can't tell me that you're being 100% perfect. I know you're playing around on your computer some days and you're just not feeling it and you're just there, right. So you know that's the same thing with workouts. That doesn't mean that you're any less than if you don't show up perfectly. The fact that you're just ingraining the habit, cementing the habit that is really what counts in the long run. And give yourself enough time and I promise you you will get better, I can tell you.
Speaker 1:I distinctly remember I was working out for months probably close to a year, maybe even a little bit more at this point, dabbling in and out. But I remember when I was working out and there was a move I was doing and I felt the muscles activate, like I knew it, I was like, oh, this is what I'm supposed to be feeling. It was a tricep extension, a tricep push down no-transcript, actually. Have that mind muscle connection to engage the right muscles, squeeze it, feel the burn, control it. Totally different experience. And you're going if you haven't experienced it yet, you will experience it one day and I was like, oh, and that was amazing, right, but it wouldn't have happened if I didn't keep going through those messy days Because, like, you can't get it perfect right off the bat.
Speaker 1:It's like asking a baby to get up and run. Right, they have to crawl, stand up, fall down, walk a little bit. It's not like this perfect progression of where they just stand up and then they start walking and running immediately. Right, there's a lot of mess ups and that's that is how working out is, that's how a lot of things are. But before I wrap this little tidbit up, I did want to go back to the kind of work and toothbrush example, because something that I have been looking at is I actually recently have been working with a lot more neurodivergent individuals and I would even classify like highly sensitive people into this as well, because whether you're medically diagnosed with neurodivergence, like you know, executive dysfunction, overstimulation, different things like that.
Speaker 1:So I found it helpful for me and my clients who maybe struggle with this and I found that these types of clients are attracted to me who maybe have these same types of tendencies to use some of the coping tools that neurodivergent use, like, for instance, wearing headphones, if you're overstimulated by noise, to kind of zone in listen to music so you can kind of chill out a little bit right, like such a simple fix. But it approaching my life in that way and not forcing myself to be like, just push through, you know you're overstimulated, what's wrong with you? Just just push through, suck. You know you're overstimulated, what's wrong with you? Just just push through, suck it up Instead, accommodating myself properly, has made my life 100 times easier. And with that, though, I think that's a big issue with fitness as well.
Speaker 1:I think a lot of us who and this has kind of been a bigger mission of mine that's been developing as I've been training more and more clients is, I've realized that the standard way of working out that kind of like bodybuilder mentality of just push through again, suck it up, does not work for people's brains who work like that. And this goes back to the toothbrush and the work example, because I have seen a lot of people in the neurodivergent community actually comment on this and say I hate when people say you know, it's as simple as brushing your teeth, because someone who has neurodivergence not everybody, because it's a spectrum and everybody's so different, it's so complex but they may not find brushing their teeth an automatic habit. It may be, especially if you like ADHD or something. It may be something that you have to make a conscious effort for and force yourself to do so. All I'm saying is take this with a grain of salt. So if you are somebody, um who maybe you're thinking, yeah, like brushing my teeth does not come naturally, I have to kind of like force myself to do it, no matter how many times I do it, no how many months and years I've been doing it, like it still sucks and I have to force myself and and working out can kind of feel like that as well for some people. Um, you know, I would maybe research in and look into like that executive dysfunction, neurodivergent stuff and just look into it, because it can be very helpful. I particularly like reddit forums, um of people because they share more of their personal stories and you can really relate to a lot of things. That was really eye-opening for me, especially if you're a female. Neurodivergence in females expresses itself very differently, especially adult females, compared to like what the textbook classifies, which typically leans towards like young boys. So when you hear some of those stories like oh my god, I was like my life makes so much more sense now, so you might find an explanation.
Speaker 1:I'm not saying anybody is neurodivergent. I'm not saying, oh my god, if you exhibit these things, you are neurodivergent. But, like I said, it can be even just helpful looking at it and just saying, hey, some of these techniques like if you're a highly sensitive person, it can help you kind of cope better so you don't feel so overwhelmed by day to day life. And again, it can also help you if you feel like you've been somebody who's struggling with workouts and eating right and you're doing everything that they tell you to do, but you're like my brain does not work this way. I'm broken, something's wrong with me. No, you're not broken. Something's not wrong with you. You have just not created a routine that supports your way of thinking. It's a different way of thinking that they promote out there, which doesn't surprise me.
Speaker 1:So if you need more help with that by the way, if you feel like you are someone who struggles, I'm really good at coming up with custom programs and habits and routines that fit unique brains, um, so definitely feel free to reach out to me and I would love to help you. I love the unique cases. I'm not a cookie cutter coach, all right, but I hope that this um helped you remember, out of a hundred workouts, 10% are probably going to suck, 10% are going to be amazing. The other 80% are going to be all right. All right, guys. So thank you for tuning in. If you enjoyed this episode, I would actually really appreciate it if you would share it with somebody or share it to your social media. That is how other people see this podcast, and it's free. It's easy. I don't make any money from this podcast. I just love sharing information with you guys.
