How do you know what your next step should be with health, physique, fitness, and mindset? It can absolutely be confusing in today’s world, so we’re getting clear on that today. Why? When we’re not sure what the next right step is, we end up wasting SO much time when we do things “out of order.” Not what we’re about around here, amiright?
In this episode, I cover:
Feedback? Questions? Comments? Head on over to Instagram and let me know in my DMs!
FREE TRAINING
COURSES
How do you know what your next step should be with health, physique, fitness, and mindset? It can absolutely be confusing in today’s world, so we’re getting clear on that today. Why? When we’re not sure what the next right step is, we end up wasting SO much time when we do things “out of order.” Not what we’re about around here, amiright?
In this episode, I cover:
Feedback? Questions? Comments? Head on over to Instagram and let me know in my DMs!
FREE TRAINING
COURSES
[00:00:00] Welcome back to the Jesse Golden podcast. We are talking about. How to choose your next health mindset or physique? Cool. And this is really, really important if you're at all familiar with my work, you know, that there is a cadence to things in terms of priority. Most women. On this planet, we could go into whether this is a good or bad thing, or just a neutral thing. At a different time, but want to have their bodies look a certain way. We are social creatures.
This is fine. There's nothing wrong with that. But most women, whether they realize it or not, My job is to bring awareness to that have work, to do on other things before trying to jump into more advanced fat loss things like worrying about calories and tracking things. We don't need to be worried about.
Most of that. The vast majority of the population would benefit from working on what's going on upstairs. And consistency with [00:01:00] just focusing on their health, which can be a challenge to shift when you're coming from a sense of desperation. And no judgment because we are taught from a very young age that our soul sense of value in the world as females comes from the way that we look. So it makes sense that if you feel insecure in other parts of who you are, and you're just looking for acceptance outside of yourself. Too much focus on that. Then there's a sense of desperation that becomes tied to our appearance.
So we want to be working on that. So with that said it should be no surprise to you. That relationship with food exercise, your body yourself comes. First. So relationship with food and body image. What does this even mean?
Is your value. Solely coming from the way that your body looks again, with that sense of desperation. If you feel like the idea of taking a break from trying to change your body, sends you into a panic. Into a tailspin into a state of desperation [00:02:00] that indicates, okay. There's a lot of fear. Attached to the way that your body looks.
And we want to unravel that rather than just carry on for the rest of your life. Because if you even do lose the weight, Which chances are slim when it comes from that energy. Even if you do lose the weight and you somehow maintain it, you are going to be miserable. You will be trapped in a different prison. Desperate to maintain it freaking out.
The second you notice your pants getting tight, you will still be in prison. You will just be in prison. And a smaller body, but that mental prison not worth it. I promise you, it is not worth it. So many women need to get to that point of realizing it's not worth it. Please take my word for it. So relationship with food.
What I mean by relationship with food is truly how are you relating to food? Is it something that you feel joy around? Peace, confidence. There's a lot of trust between food and yourself, between you and your body. And this is reflected in your eating habits. Are you able to be around all different types of foods [00:03:00] without going into a panic and labeling yourself as, oh my gosh, I have a problem around this food.
Oh my you're just thinking about the food the entire time. You're at the party. You can't focus on the conversations in front of you. You're constantly running through new rules every morning. You wake up because you over eight at night and you're thinking, okay, this is exactly the plan for today that I have to stick with. In order to make up for yesterday because I know I'm probably going to go overboard tonight as well. Or maybe that's you every Sunday.
That was me. I would go ham on the weekends. And then every Sunday, when I was so full, I'd be planning on Monday exactly how I was going to be restricting, controlling things. White knuckling. Monday through Thursday until inevitably we repeated the cycle Friday through Sunday. And it was exhausting.
So it's, what are your thoughts and beliefs about food? What are your thoughts and beliefs about your body? About exercise and about your sense of self. And your sense of self is absolutely reflected in these behaviors. Do you think that you are worthy of feeling well? [00:04:00] Regardless of the way that your body looks, do you think you're worthy of enjoying food, of having a peaceful existence with food? Even if you don't look the way society wants you to look. This is really important work to do.
And these are the building blocks for everything. Else. And if you're like, okay, I resonate with this. But I still want to chase my body goes first. Just ask yourself why one day I want to prioritize this. Why wouldn't I want to feel better in my mind, in my body, the way that I'm relating to myself. And usually it's this idea that we cannot have both. That we cannot love ourselves to our goals. We have to shame ourselves into the way that we want to look.
And it's absolutely not true. And in fact, We know this, that having more compassion and treating ourselves well, actually contributes to accomplishing these goals. Much more effectively than trying to shame ourselves there. And you might be thinking, well, I'm just afraid of doing some of this deeper work because [00:05:00] of what I might uncover. We're all human. We're all human.
And I know in this day and age, when everyone I'm a content creator, I'm not showing you all of my. Dirty laundry. And my baggage, because that's just not appropriate for me to do. It's not helpful. Yet at the same time, everyone assumes everyone is just hunky Dory all the time. I'm a messy human, just like everybody else.
We all are. And we all have our stuff. That we have hidden underneath the covers that we need to work on. So it was just very normal and approaching it with a sense of, I'm just a human and I'm working through my stuff and that's okay. And it will truly make your sense of self-confidence skyrocket when you work on your relationship with food. I didn't realize when I was deep in my obsession with food and my body and control just how unattractive. That was from the outside. And how it made my energy dense.
And I was always caving inward. I was just so small. And even though in the outside, I [00:06:00] was fairly confident in a lot of ways. It's still, it was the sense of I'm not good enough and less. And that permeates in so many different ways in our lives and relationships and the way we show up in career. Of course, and we, that we dress the way we show up physically. You will feel such a deep sense of confidence within you. When you realize I can trust myself and I feel so good within my body and my mind. And food will just get to be food. Who knew you can enjoy it.
I'm such a foodie and I love food. I love going out to eat and making a social, love, everything about it. It's just a beautiful, pleasurable part of life. And at the same time, It gets to just have a little small piece of your life pie. He gets to take a back seat while you focus on so many other important life values. And life gets really, really fun. And food becomes a pleasurable experience.
Again. You won't realize it until you go out to eat and you're like, oh my God, I'm actually gonna order the pancakes. Not because I'm on a free for all, but because that's [00:07:00] what actually sounds good. And I'm going to do it in a mindful way, and this will all just be happening. On autopilot. Once you do the work and you'll realize, oh my God, this is what life gets to be like.
It's so much more enjoyable. It's so much more fun. You get to go to the fair with your family and enjoy the food without. Running through your head about all the ingredients or how you're going to have to make up for it. It just gets to be peaceful. And you radiate a new sense of power. That's the best feedback I get when clients work on their relationship with food is the people around them.
Notice you just feel so much more radiant and confident. It's a different energy that you bring to the table and it was so, so worth it to work on this. It's not just a checklist item before. Okay. Let me just rush through this so I can get to changing my body. If that's how it needs to start for you.
Totally fine. But I promise if you actually do the work. It will not end there and you'll be so grateful. So that's the first one. Number two is habits. And habits [00:08:00] just make our life better when they're consistent. And they are coming from a place of self respect and self care.
Life is just a thousand times better when we feel well. That's just the truth, right? And this will help us go on an upward spiral because if we start with the big ticket. Habits. And that's what we focus on. We're not focused on my new HSA around here. Okay. This, the details that don't fucking matter. When you're focusing on the big rocks, like sleep stress management.
Are you eating consistent meals? Are you eating protein? If that makes you feel well. For most women, it does. If you're trying to gain muscle, if you're exercising, moving your body regularly. These things will make you feel so well, which will make you want to treat yourself while even more. And on the upward spiral, you go. And we often don't realize how shitty we feel. And how well we can feel.
So even just having a little bit of time where you realize, oh, this is how good it can be. Just even a couple of days of that [00:09:00] will open your mind to, this is what I'm missing out on. And it's hard to go back once you realize that that's how good you can feel. This does tend to coincide with a healthy relationship with food in most ways.
So I have yet to see a woman who has really beautiful, consistent, healthy habits. Who doesn't also have a pretty damn good relationship with food at the same time. That being said, oftentimes when women are working on their relationship with food, they might go through a period where they're a little bit more loose with things because they're finally giving themselves more freedom. And they're learning about themselves and they're enjoying things that they haven't enjoyed in a long time.
And that's so normal. It's okay. But eventually the novelty wears off a mat and I'm not talking about extremes. You're still connected to your body taking care of your body, but things might be just a little bit less structured. And then when the novelty of that wears off, is it usually does. Then you come back to a place of, okay.
I want to have a little bit more structure. And this is especially true. If you do have physicals, this is where we want to [00:10:00] start. So. This will also make. More advanced fat loss, which is what I cover inside of sustainably lean academy. And if you're focused on. Uh, diligent or deliberate rather calorie deficit. That's what I'm talking about. You want to have this dialed in first, otherwise once you lose the weight, you're going to be scrambling to figure out how to have consistent, healthy habits.
After the fact trying to maintain your weight, it's going to be so much for you to focus on the chances of you maintaining then decrease. So you want to have this first. And just see where your body ends up. If you just have to focus on consistent healthy habits, which means. A lifestyle of moderation that prioritizes both your life values and your health. You could achieve your goals, just doing that.
Why the fuck wouldn't you. Right. And especially if you want to get more advanced with fat loss down the road. And you don't want to track. You need to have a stable foundation to start from otherwise the process won't work.
Having these [00:11:00] habits and places also really important for building muscle. Which brings me to your next goal might be resistance training. Now. This is a component of healthy habits. The CDC recommended, recommends at least two days per week, a full body resistance training. Now, what are some examples of resistance training?
You can do reformers Pilates, you can do things that orange theory, CrossFit, things that are putting. Stress and resistance on your muscles and your soft tissues, like your joints, or excuse me, like your tendons and your ligaments. And of course we want your joints as well. This is important for bone health. For women, as we want to be putting stress on our bones. This is why this whole low-impact craze. Drives me a little crazy because we do need to have heavy resistance on our bones as women. As we age super important.
So we do not lose bone mass. Now while you can do reformer Pilates, you can do these things like [00:12:00] orange theory. There's a difference between, and this is where people in social media get really heated is they say, well, my body changed because I did floaties. That's wonderful. But there's a difference between saying any equals one.
My body changed, and this is the most effective way to build muscle. That's not an opinion. There's science. I think people forget that there is nutrition and exercise science. And especially in the last decade, the amount of research that's being done by people who actually lift to test the different variables has gone up exponentially.
So we're getting so much more data. On the most effective ways to build muscle. And right now we have a pretty damn good idea. That we need to progressively overload our muscles over time. And so progressive overload training. If that's what you hear on social media, which is so great that it's becoming such a popular term. Essentially, this means that you are able to lift more or do more reps over time. So having a proper [00:13:00] program that allows your body to adapt so that you're able to lift more over time.
That's what we want.
Further. While resistance training in and of itself has its own health benefits. Having muscle mass. Also has a different set of health benefits. So just resistance training. I would encourage you to say, okay, but if I just put on 10 pounds of muscle, which is, if you're a beginner, you could do that. Within maybe a year or two, which is awesome. I would have to really, really focus at this point for me to be able to do something like that. But adding 10 pounds of muscle to my frame, the health benefits that would come from that. Immense.
That is a very worthwhile goal for women to embark on. Of course do whatever you want to do. But I'm just sharing the pros and cons here.
Again, there is science to this. So I recommend that if you want to improve your health or change your body composition [00:14:00] that you consider putting on muscle, not just doing resistance training, but actually doing progressive overload training. Two full body workouts a week, and then do your plots and other stuff on the side. Just consider it. And this is especially true if you're in a calorie deficit, because we want to ensure that most of the weight that you're losing is coming from fat. Not from muscle.
And if you're not doing anything, that's telling your body to keep your muscles, you're gonna be losing a lot of muscle as you lose body fat, which means. That your body fat percentage is not actually going down as much as you think it is. And certainly not as much as you could be. If you were preserving that muscle mass, so lifting while you're in a calorie deficit, super important.
Now the fourth thing to consider is asking yourself, and this is for a very small group, but am I under eating?
And I don't mean under eating as many people use it in the sense of okay. Under eat during the week. And then I overeat even the weekends. And if you zoom out on a weekly, monthly [00:15:00] basis, I'm actually at maintenance or surplus, same thing could be sad if you under eat during the day and overeat at night. I'm talking about on average. You are under eating. And this usually is for women.
The two populations that I see with this are women who just really don't care about food. They're the kinds who can it's 2:00 PM. They haven't even thought about food and they're like, huh, I should probably eat something. So they are not, they tend to not be in my sphere whatsoever because they tend to not really be focused on fitness or health or any of those things.
They just kind of don't care about any of it. So that's the less likely group. The other group are those who are more, the type a day are really focused or have been really focused on clean eating ingredients. Subbing things. So they'd make a lot of substitutions to lower calorie things. So they're filling up on food. But it's lower calorie foods.
And while they might feel full or satisfied in terms of, okay, my [00:16:00] stomach is full, they might have that mental hunger where they just are constantly craving things and thinking about food. They might not feel very well. Their exercise tolerance might be poor. Now, all of these things can just be attributed to stress, which is happened to me many times for my nervous system has just been overloaded. And if you're in that state, under eating is only going to further exacerbate that, but you might be eating enough and just be experiencing those symptoms due to due to other things. So what I recommend that you do. Is experiment with eating more and seeing what happens. The worst thing that can happen is you realize, okay, I gained one or two pounds. Of body fat. And this will be different from the scale, because if you start eating more, you should expect to see the scale jump just because you have more food in your system.
And usually you're eating more carbohydrates, which means you have more water stored in your body. That's different from gaining body fat, but let's say you gain because you're doing this methodically, which [00:17:00] I teach in the maintenance master class. It's linked below. $27 highly recommend if you are even on the fence of this. About this. Let's see you gain two pounds of body fat, big fucking whoop.
If that means that, you know, What your ceiling is right now in terms of calories for you to eat in order to maintain your weight, that's valuable information and information. I would definitely want to know. If you suspect you're in this camp. And it will make fat loss so much more effective down the road. If you're chronically under-eating and you then try to get leaner from that place, you're putting yourself into an even bigger hole. And the way that you feel. You're down-regulating your metabolism even more?
And you're not going to last long because they're already going into it, feeling tired, feeling exhausted, already thinking about food more.
It's not going to be a good time. And if you're concerned about, oh my gosh, you don't want it. Increase my calories and maybe gain weight. Then I would consider doing both the maintenance masterclass and food freedom evolution, because there's [00:18:00] a mindset component that we need to address there. When it comes to your health, that should be a priority.
And the last one, which is last for a reason is fat loss.
And this is not to negate the fact that fat loss can have an impact on our health. But the other components need to come first and they also have a big impact on our health. So we can cover and address this after the fact, because I care about you sustaining the results and also losing fat in a way that feels really nourishing to your mind and body as well. Right. Soft life, fat loss.
And if that doesn't appeal to you, then just sustainable results. So you don't have to do this shit again, should be top of your list. So if you already have a healthy relationship with food exercise, body image. Your healthy habits are solid. You have a lifestyle of moderation that balances. Values health enjoyment.
And you feel chill about food and exercise, but you're also consistent with your habits. Then absolutely you can jump into fat loss if. That is a physique [00:19:00] goal that is yours. And I love to do the deserted island test. If you want a deserted island. No one else is around. Would you give a shit about changing your body? I do this with myself all the time.
Now, when it comes to beauty trends or aging, Do I actually care or am I being influenced by what everyone else is doing? And I feel this pressure to do it because you want it to be coming from you. Do you really want to look jacked or do you feel like that's what everyone else around you is telling you?
You have to do. That's the ideal body. Just be clear on your own body. And if you find I do want to be leaner, wonderful. Then sustainable fat loss and doing in a way that feels really good to you. There are so many different ways to do it. Track don't track. Fast don't fast. There's no right or wrong way.
As long as it feels really nourishing to you. And it should not deviate very much at all from your healthy habits, your lifestyle of moderation, which is why we cover that. First. Okay. [00:20:00] So hopefully this gave you guys some insight into where you might want to go next. To checklist and say, okay, I'm good here.
I'm good here. And I think that this is my goal. If you have any questions about this, because it's important to me that you guys do not skip to the end, the end, meaning fat loss before you are ready. I care about your results three years from now. Not in three months and I really hope you feel the same way. So, if you were at all unsure about what your next step should be pleased, DME on Instagram, and I would be more than happy to help you figure that out.
And if you do want to jump into any of these resources, they will be linked in the show notes below.
And I am going to go get to my sweet little puppy from my neighbors, and I will talk to you all next week.