Ashley (00:00)
Hello there, my friend, and welcome back to the Midlife Mom Edit. I am super excited about this episode because today it's interactive and you're really gonna get a good chance to make a transformation today. So let's get right into it. Now, for the last couple of months, I've been keeping a running list. Every time a client says something to me on a one-on-one call, or I have a conversation with a woman on Instagram or threads, or a student inside of the method.
If they share something in our group, I've been writing it down.
And what I've been collecting are words, phrases more specifically, the things that you say to yourself about your health, your body, your weight, and your ability to actually feel good in midlife.
and looking at this list, something has become incredibly clear. The way that you talk to yourself is definitely making it harder for you to lose weight. That's a pretty bold claim, right? But I want you to stay with me because by the end of this episode, I know you're gonna see this too. So here's what I want you to do. I want you to grab a piece of paper and a pen.
And I'm gonna walk you through the list of phrases that I've collected, things that real women have said to me, real clients, real students. And I want you to make a tally mark every single time you hear something that sounds familiar and sounds like something you've said to yourself, maybe something you've said out loud, or maybe it's just something that has crossed your mind. We're gonna go through three different categories: food or nutrition, workouts.
And then sort of your overall approach to a quote unquote healthy lifestyle in midlife. Okay, are you ready? Let's do it.
All right, let's start with food because this is where I hear a lot of these phrases. And I want you to really listen and just be honest with yourself. So, number one, if you have said, I shouldn't have had that fill in the blank, I want you to give yourself a tally mark. I shouldn't have had that dessert. I shouldn't have had those extra fries. I shouldn't have had three margaritas last night. Any of that sound familiar?
If you've ever looked back on a meal or a night out or weekend and thought some version of I shouldn't have dot dot dot. I want you to make a tally mark. All right, number two, I never eat. I never eat vegetables. I never eat ground turkey. I never eat before 10 a.m. I never eat eggs. You've decided that there are just certain foods that aren't for you. And for some of those foods, it might totally be true, but
You've made a blanket statement that you will never eat those things. So make a mark if that sounds like you. Number three, I can't eat breakfast. my gosh, so many women say this. I'm not hungry in the morning. I just can't eat that early. My stomach isn't ready. I don't like food first thing in the morning. And so breakfast, it just doesn't happen. So make a tally mark if that sounds like you. All right, number four.
I don't like veggies or I've never liked veggies. Or maybe yours sounds like, I would like to try and eat more veggies. I just can't find any that I actually like. Does that sound familiar? Make your mark.
And number five, this one I hear a lot, especially when we start talking about losing weight and perimenopause. I don't want to give up my favorites. That could be sweets, desserts, appetizers. And very often when I'm talking to women in midlife, it's alcohol. I don't want to give up my nightly glass of wine. I don't want to give up cocktails on the weekends. I've earned this. I deserve this. It's my thing. If any of that sounds familiar,
Give yourself another tally mark.
Okay, let's move on to our next category. We're gonna talk about workouts because that like self-talk, it's just as loud under this category. So, how about I hate working out? I know that's really direct, but if you've ever said I hate working out, I want you to make a mark. I could never do that. Now, this one shows up when you consider trying something new, maybe weightlifting with barbells, Pilates, a spin class.
Maybe a country line dancing workout, anything that's gonna feel outside of your comfort zone. And you say to yourself, I could never do that. If that's you, make a mark.
How about this one? I am not a morning person. Now, a lot of women believe that the only workout that's going to count or the only way they can get it in is one that happens in the morning before the rest of life gets in the way. And if you've told yourself that you're not a morning person, which then means I could never get up and work out before work, I want you to give yourself another tally mark.
I am so out of shape. Oof. This one feels heavy. It carries the weight of believing that you are so far behind, so far gone, that getting started almost feels pointless. Like, where would you even begin? Right.
If you have thought, I'm so out of shape, or you've said it out loud, I want you to make a mark on your paper. And this last one, maybe you haven't said it out loud, but I guarantee you probably thought it. I don't know where to start. Let's be honest, there are workouts everywhere. YouTube, TikTok. I talk about my favorite fitness library all the time. There are options everywhere. And yet, if you're being really honest with yourself,
You probably still feel like you don't know exactly what to do or where to start. So if that's you, make another mark.
All right, now let's look at how you talk to yourself around this overall idea of a healthy lifestyle. These are like we're gonna get into like the bigger and deeper thoughts, the ones that kind of chug along quietly in the background. I think you'll recognize them. So maybe you've said, this never works out for me. Or maybe it's like the phrase that ran in my head for years, which is no matter what I try, nothing ever works.
I want you to make a mark on your page if you can relate to that. How about I will never figure this out? This one assumes that you have tried a lot. You've done the diets, the programs, supplements, you've done some research. And along the way, you just started to believe that you're not the kind of person who will ever figure this out. Give yourself a tally mark. I will never have enough willpower.
Or you can enter consistency or discipline. When this thought lives rent-free in your head, it actually tends to come out a lot. And then you start questioning your willpower, your discipline, your consistency in every area of your life. So if that's you, put another mark on your page.
How about this is just what getting older looks like. Now, when I hear this, this one kind of makes me sad because it's a sign that you're giving up. You know, you've looked at the belly fat, the fatigue, the way you feel in your clothes, and you've decided, yeah, this is just it. This is your life now. So make a mark if you've thought that way before. There's nothing I can do. Now, this is similar to the last one.
But it's almost a little bit more hopeless. Like you've just stopped looking for answers altogether because you don't believe that an answer exists for you. So if you have ever felt that way, even for just a moment, I want you to put another mark.
Okay, so if you've been keeping tally marks, you might be sitting with somewhere between 10 and 15 little tick marks, maybe even more. And I want you to take a deep breath here because I'm not sharing this list to make you feel bad. We're not being a Debbie Downer here. I'm actually sharing it because I need you to start seeing the full picture. I know you have good moments throughout your day and your week. I know that you have motivation and hope and
Days where you're like, yeah, I'm getting the hang of this. But if you're like so many of the women that I work with, these thoughts that we just went through, they show up constantly and they quietly sneak in day and night.
You get dressed in the morning, for example, and you look in the mirror and you think, this is just what getting older looks like. Or you have a great weekend full of fun and food and really good times. And then Monday morning rolls around and you kind of feel the fun from the weekend. It's kind of that low-grade guilt. And you think, I don't want to have to give any of that up. These thoughts feel so normal that you probably don't even notice them anymore. They just kind of feel like fact. And
This is where things get really interesting. So I want to explain why your brain keeps talking to you in this way, why these thoughts just keep showing up on repeat, and why, even though you're motivated and you really do want to lose weight and feel better, your brain keeps circling back to these same stories. Your brain has only three jobs to create safety, just three.
And every single thing that it does, every thought it generates, every feeling it creates, every story it tells you is aligned with one of these three jobs. So the first job is to avoid pain. Now, of course, your brain and you don't want to stub your toe or burn yourself on the stove. Of course not. Avoiding that kind of physical pain, it makes sense, right?
But your brain is also working overtime to avoid emotional pain. And so when you think about giving up your favorite foods, for example, giving up cocktails on the weekends, when you think about trying a hard workout when you already feel out of shape or about starting to eat in a different way that you have been, all of that, it feels painful emotionally. So your brain is just doing its job. It's just
Trying to protect you.
Now, the second job your brain has is to conserve energy. So this goes way back to our primitive human being days when food wasn't guaranteed and survival was the only goal. Conserving energy back then, it was essential. And your brain is still hardwired this way. So when it looks at something and asks, is this workout going to be hard? Is trying this new recipe gonna take a lot of energy? If the answer is yes,
your brain, it just puts on the brakes and says, No, thank you.
Think about saying, I am so out of shape. When you say that to yourself before a workout, your brain hears it and thinks, wait a minute, this is gonna take so much energy.
Starting from scratch, figuring out what to do, pushing through when you feel hot and sweaty and you can't breathe. Whoa, that's a lot. Your brain thinks about all of that and says, no, we're gonna skip that and we're gonna save and conserve energy. Now the third job is to seek pleasure. Your brain always, always is looking for the option that feels the best.
And right now, in this moment, not in three months when you've lost the weight, but like right now. So when you're at a barbecue and you're trying to make a healthy choice, your brain is looking at the food table for something that would feel even better. and then that ice cold beer comes across or a brownie from the dessert table. Yeah, that would feel good right now. So here's the thing.
When you look back at all of those tally marks, every single one of those phrases is your brain doing its job. I hate working out. Your brain is trying to avoid pain. I'm so out of shape. Your brain is conserving energy. I don't want to give up my night with a glass of wine. Yeah, your brain is seeking pleasure. Your brain, I promise you, it's not out to make your life miserable. And it's not working against you on.
Purpose. It's just doing what it's hardwired to do. But the problem here is that you are listening to this particular podcast, the midlife mom edit, because you want something different. You want to feel good in your body. You want to lose the weight. You want energy and strength and confidence going into this next chapter of life. And that requires skills, effort, and thoughts that your brain
Is hardwired to resist. So essentially you're living in this gap, a gap between the woman that you are right now as you are leaning into what your brain is telling you, and on the other side, the woman that you want to be, the one who feels healthy and strong and confident. And that gap that you're sitting in, it is actually filled with the words that you use to talk to yourself.
So I hope you're asking, all right, Ashley, so how do I start closing that gap? I have three steps for you. And these are actually the same steps that I use with my students inside of the perimenopause weight loss method. But I'm gonna give them to you because I want you to get started on them today. Step one, notice your thoughts.
We already did a version of this with the quiz exercise at the beginning of this episode. But now I need you to start noticing in real time. When you open the refrigerator, when you look at your running shoes and you think about working out, when you look in the mirror, when you decide whether or not to pour a second glass of wine, just notice what your brain says. That's all. You just have to notice. You're not trying to change anything yet. I just need you to pay attention. Now it sounds simple.
But noticing your thoughts is incredibly impactful. You've probably been living with these thoughts for so long, you don't even register them anymore. They just feel like fact. So getting to a place where you can notice a thought as a thought, not as the truth, that is a really big deal. Step two, I want you to challenge that thought. Once you notice it, you actually get to ask a question. Is that actually true?
And more importantly, do I want to keep believing this? Let's take the thought of, you know what, this is just what getting older looks like. You believe it. Like it feels really true to you. But is it really? Is that really the only version of aging that's available to you? Or is it just what your aging has looked like so far, up until this point? You don't have to have the answer yet. You just need to be willing to ask that.
question. Asking that question, it helps you take one tiny shift across the gap. And doing that enough is actually where things start to shift.
All right, step three, you're going to create a new thought that still feels safe. So I know this is where you have gotten tripped up before. You try to jump from one extreme to the other, from I am not a morning person to all right, I'm gonna wake up at 4 a.m. and work out every single day. That is never gonna work because your brain doesn't believe it. It doesn't feel true, it doesn't feel safe. And so your brain just shuts it down.
What you need is a thought that's different enough to move you forward, but not so different that your brain kind of goes into panic mode. So instead of I'm not a morning person and I can't work out in the morning, what if you tried something like, I wonder what it would feel like to get up early one day this week or one day this month and just see how it goes. Now that is something that your brain can consider.
It doesn't feel super threatening. You're not committing to 4 a.m. forever. You're just trying it on. And when you try it on, you get to gather information. Maybe you wake up and it feels terrible and you confirm, okay, mornings are not the thing for me right now. But maybe you surprise yourself and you wake up and you do the workout and you actually feel more energetic that afternoon. You would never know that until you just gave it a try.
So when it comes to losing weight in midlife and really truly getting healthy, this is the work. It's not super sexy, it doesn't happen overnight, but by learning how to challenge how you talk to yourself and how to change your thoughts, that is what's gonna get you over the gap so that you can actually reach your goals. If your brain is constantly running on
Nothing ever works for me and I'll never figure this out. The best nutrition plan in the world is not gonna stick. The most perfect workout program, it won't last. You have to change the conversation in your head first.
And here's something that is so important. The gap between where you are and where you want to be is not evidence that anything is wrong with you. It's actually evidence that your brain is working so hard to keep you safe. Your job is just to gently show it that the thing you're reaching for is losing weight, feeling healthy and strong in your own body, that those feelings can also be safe.
If this episode hit home for you, I would love to hear about it. Just send me a DM on Instagram. I'm at the Ashley Malik. And tell me how many tally marks you ended up with in your quiz or share the thought that really made you stop and think. I really get excited to read your messages. So just come connect with me over on Instagram. And if you want to go deeper with this work, if you want a trusted framework that actually challenges these thoughts.
Helps you create new ones and pairs all of that with nutrition and lifestyle habits that are specific to you and your body at over 40 years old. That's exactly what we do inside the perimenopause weight loss method. That is my eight-week course and group coaching program. And this mindset work is woven into every single week because I know from my own experience, my own personal experience and from working with
hundreds of women that the mindset piece is not an optional thing. It is the foundation to everything that you wish your life could be. I'll put a link to the perimenopause weight loss method into the show notes if you want to learn more. Thank you so much for being here today. I hope you enjoyed our quiz and I will see you right back here next week on the Midlife Mom edit.
