How to Actually Get Fit Without Overhauling Your Life | Ditch All-or-Nothing Fitness Thinking

In this episode of the Muscles and Mindset Revolution Podcast, host Anne Jones, a certified life coach and personal trainer, addresses the common struggle of balancing fitness goals with a busy life. Highlighting the pitfalls of extreme fitness programs and the ineffectiveness of doing nothing at all, Anne advocates for a middle-ground approach that is both sustainable and effective. She emphasizes the importance of mindset, realistic goal-setting, and finding time within a hectic schedule. Anne also discusses the need for enough stimulus to create change and the value of external accountability. If you're ready to abandon the 'all or nothing' mentality and adopt a practical plan that fits your real life, this episode offers valuable insights and next steps.

00:00 Welcome to the Muscles and Mindset Revolution
00:33 The Struggle of Finding Time for Fitness
01:15 The Problem with Extreme Fitness Programs
03:41 Introducing a Realistic Fitness Approach
08:55 The Importance of Mindset in Fitness
12:52 Recognizing Capacity and Seasons in Life
16:01 Creating a Sustainable Fitness Plan
17:02 Invitation to Transform Your Life

• [FREE YOUR BODY YOUR WAY GUIDE]

• [Join our Free Facebook Community]

• [https://musclesandmindset.ca/]

Ready to build strength, feel confident AF, and lose fat without obsessing or stressing over it? [Apply to Join the Muscles & Mindset program here].

Connect With Me:

• Instagram: [@annejonesfit]

• Website: [https://www.annejonescoaching.ca/]

• YouTube: [https://www.youtube.com/@annejones]

Love This Episode? Share & Review!

If you found this episode helpful, take a screenshot and share it on your Instagram stories, tagging [@annejonesfit] so I can say thanks! Don’t forget to leave a review on your favourite podcast platform—it helps more women discover the show and start their transformation!

Transcript

0:00

Welcome to the Muscles and Mindset Revolution Podcast. the podcast for ambitious women who want to build strength, feel confident af, and lose fat for good without counting calories or BS quick fixes. I'm your host, Anne Jones, certified life coach, personal trainer and mindset expert, and after 15 plus years in the fitness industry, I know that the real key to lasting change isn't just what you do, it's how you think. So if you are ready to shift your mindset, build a lifestyle you love and feel confident af, you're in the right place, let's dive in. Today's episode is for every woman who's ever said, I want to feel better. I want to get strong. I want to lose weight, but I just don't have the time. I hear you. I've had hundreds of clients just like you, and I coach hundreds of women who still feel like they have to choose between two extremes. A program that asks for everything or just doing nothing at all. In this episode, show you what I've built instead, A third option, one that fits your real life. The time you actually have, the life you're actually but will still require you to change. Because if you want a different result, you have to do things And here's the thing that change, it has to be enough to actually work, but not so much that it breaks your life. This is where most programs go wrong. They either ask for way too much hours of prep, constant tracking, long workouts, intense gym visits, cold showers, or they don't actually do anything. They're too soft, too vague. They don't require any personality, personalization, customization, coaching, accountability. They're just another version of just wait until life calms down. Right? Two passive like that. An example of that would be like a cookie cutter fitness plan that you download or buy or whatever. Or just doing nothing at all and waiting. Waiting till life slows down. And here's what I wanna say, that wait is costing you. It's not free either. You're in a program that demands so much that it can't last, and the result fades when life gets lifey. This is what happens with, diets and fad diets and really intense programs. You know, weight Watchers, noom, anything that requires a lot of intensity. Or you're just in no program at all. You're following nothing inaction, overwhelmed, delay or just randomness. And while you're doing nothing, it's not costing you Your symptoms are compounding, particularly after our late thirties to be frank. And so my thing is like, let's find the sweet spot. Enough stimulus to change your body, enough stimulus to start to change your mind, your thoughts. And your life, but not so much that you can't maintain it long term. If you want to experience change, you're going to have to change something, right? Okay, so here are the two extremes and why neither works. I see two camps that women fall into most commonly, right? All or nothing. The all camp, these are the programs that will get results. If you can give them your entire life, if you can keep up for your entire life. Meal plans that take four hours of prep workouts that take 75 minutes a day, five, six days a week, macro tracking down to the gram with a scale every day for the rest of your life. They're intense and they can work, but most, if not all, people cannot maintain them long term. So the results, they vanish or you may be able to do it for a few weeks or a few months. But then generally people fall into the nothing camp, and I don't just mean doing absolutely nothing, although sometimes certainly that is the case. I mean, doing something that's not enough to move the needle, like signing up for something too soft, too vague, too unstructured. Or more often than not just waiting, right? Saying, I'm too busy. I can't do this right now. On repeat, believing that you'll start when life calms down, which it never does, and nothing changes. So what actually does work, the solution, and I mean this is obviously why I've created this, is because I know that it works. This is what feels good to me. What works for me and my clients is what I've built inside muscles and mindset. It's the middle ground, it's the real life, like a realistic, flexible approach that fits into your actual life and still delivers real result So here's the part that I really want you to hear. Whatever you do to change your body, to change your life must be enough stimulus. It must be enough stimulus to create change in your body, your habits, your mindset, your routine. It must also be sustainable enough to fit into the life that you have now, you're probably, if you like your job, but if you have this job, like this is your career, you're probably gonna have it for a while. If you have these kids, you got this partner, like unless something else big is changing, you're probably gonna have them for a while. This is going to be your life for years. What you do must be sustainable enough to fit into that life. And here's the deal, it will still require change If you want to feel different, if you want to feel calmer, leaner, stronger, more confident, you will have to do things differently. It's not going to work if you're only doing things that are nice, fun or convenient, but not enough to cause change. Like I've had women ask, what if I just do, you know, can I just do like 10 squats like at my desk? It's like, cool, like that's great for like your circulation. Adding a little bit of like movement to your day, improve your focus. But if your goal is really to lose 10 or 20 pounds and change your body composition permanently, that is not enough stimulus. Just as if you were gonna the gym doing the same workout for months and years and not lifting heavy enough, it's not gonna be enough stimulus. So I'm never gonna sell you fluff. I'm not here to make you feel good and send you on your way with nothing on the show for it. I wanna give you tools that actually work, and that means that you will have to do more of some things, less of other things, and put in effort. But the key is that the effort has to fit into your life. So what does fitting into your life actually mean? Let me give you some real examples. My clients are mostly moms. Most of them work business owners, teachers, professors, shift workers, police officers, caregivers, other coaches, nurses, fitness instructors, massage therapists. They have kids, they have pets, they have partners, they have aging parents, and they still find a way, not because it's easy, but because. They stopped believing that they had no time and chose to start creating it. And this is not,"everyone has the same 24 hours in the day" conversation, we're gonna get to that because that is absolutely not true. You have to have the belief that you can create. Time, or you have to be willing to use what you've got instead of doing nothing at all. So here's what we don't do. We don't do 75 minute workouts five days a week. We don't do four hour meal preps. We don't do cold plunges at 4:00 AM We do not do macros tracked forever, if at all, or daily weigh-ins. That is not fitness fitting into your life. That's making your life revolve around fitness and nutrition, and that is not the vibe for me personally. What is the vibe? 30 to 45 minute workouts. Three to four times a week. That's what I do. That's what most of my clients do. A few staple meals, you know how to cook because yes, you will have to cook food to feed your body but you can repeat them and you can rotate them If you, you, yes, you might have to be, get used to eating the same things over and over again. That's a great mindset shift for you. What else is the vibe, quick check-ins to build accountability and self-awareness? We are as humans. When something is new to us, we, we require external accountability before we can use internal accountability. Every day, I get on a consult call and she says like, I, you know, I should be able to, I should be able to do this on my own. I wish I could, I should be able to hold myself accountable. Why? Why? Why should you? That is literally why coaching exists. Nobody does this on their own, and whether it's me or, I mean, I would not advise your best friend or your partner to be your accountability buddy, but some accountability is required. So you showing up to be held accountable is going to be required. Self-awareness is going to be required, and you are gonna have to move your body in a way that feels empowering, not punishing. Now I also want to be honest about what I don't think is realistic. A 75 or a 90 minute workout, five or six days a week. Not for most of my clients, not for me. could I? Yeah. Would that work for my family, my career, keeping up with my business long term? No. Four hours of meal prep. Maybe once a month, but no, not realistic. Tracking every macro for the rest of my life. No thank you. That's not fitting into your life. That's not fitting fitness and nutrition into your lifestyle. That's asking for your whole life to revolve around fitness, and for most of us, that is just not enjoyable or sustainable. On the flip side, change won't happen with too little effort either. You can't expect a full transformation with two minutes of effort and zero support. You need the sweet spot enough stimulus. Realistic structure and support so that you don't quit the moment things get hard. So here's the real barrier, though. We think it's time, but here's where things get real, because it's not about time. It's not about workouts, it's not about food. It is about your mindset. It is about your thoughts. I have coached dozens of women who are single moms I've coached dozens of women with multiple jobs. Women who have sold things on consignment, gotten another part-time job to invest in their coaching. Women who have gotten creative to recruit childcare, help rearranged schedules, talk to their partner, done workouts at 9:00 PM in their living room. Is that ideal? Probably not, but they questioned their beliefs and they wanted to feel a certain kind of way. They wanted to feel something and experience something in their body and role model that for their friends, their family, their kids, Than they needed it to be perfect and ideal, and they had to question their beliefs, their beliefs that were like, I'm too busy. I can't make this work right now. I don't have the discipline. I don't have the time. It's a bad time. All of these thoughts feel true. Beliefs are just thoughts that you have thought so many times that they. you think they're true. It does not mean that they're true. They are just thoughts. And that is why mindset work is such a massive part of what I do. Because if you do not believe it's possible, you will keep proving that belief right. Here's what I've seen over and over again. Most of the time it's not time holding you It's the belief that you don't get to prioritize yourself, that someone else's needs come before yours. That your kids, your job, your to-do list are more important. Everything has to be done before you get to workout. Everyone has to be taken care of before you get to out everyone else's needs and being fed have to be addressed first. There has to be some magical, mythical moment when the stars align and then you'll start. Then you'll have time, but that moment doesn't come. If you want something different, you have to believe that you are allowed to change, that you deserve change, that your needs matter, that you get to be on the to-do list, that it is okay to ask for help, and yes, disappoint people. Yes, that is part of it, and this is exactly why we do mindset work inside Muscles because if you don't clean up the beliefs that built your current reality, nothing changes. I've been a personal trainer for 15 years. I've coached virtually online for seven years. And just in the past couple years, I really came to terms with this truth. obviously we know that whether you believe you can or you believe you can't, you're right. But I really have learned this in coaching and I see this now. For example, if I've had a new client on a consult who is highly skeptical I get why people are skeptical, you should be skeptical. The fitness and diet industry has sold you a lot of bullshit. you should be skeptical. Fair enough. And if you. Already decided that you're not going to like X, Y, and Z or X, Y, and Z is not gonna work for you. It won't. It won't. If you don't believe that working virtually online will move the Dell for you, it will not because you will show up in such a way that it will not work. You've already decided. If you've already decided you don't wanna do your workouts on an app, that's not gonna work for you. It will not if you've already decided that I, I've and I, and now I've seen it happen enough times that this is a red flag to me. You are not ready. And I've learned with love to just say, I'm not for you to that person, which as a reformed people pleaser was hard initially, but what was the result? That person who was already committed to their failure came in and I was so committed that, I mean, I was like, I was like some sort of like young girlfriend. Like, I'm gonna change him. I'm gonna be, I'm gonna change the bad boy. I'm gonna turn him around you. You can't, unless that person is coming in with an open mind. They will remain committed to it. And that has been true every single time. If you don't believe it's possible, if you believe it's not for you or you're not going to like it, you are going to prove that belief right. Now I wAnnea talk about capacity in seasons and I wAnnea be really honest about it. There are seasons where you genuinely may not have the capacity to push. So we just talked about most people most of the time have the capacity to learn, change, think, and do things differently, get creative so that they can make this work, they can fit this into their life. That's like 99% of people, okay? That's 99% of my clients, 99% of the time. And there are seasons where you genuinely may not have the capacity to push, and that's okay. You can still maintain, you can still walk, you can still drink water, you can still eat balanced meals, you can still get rest. You can still take care of yourself without going all in. But if you are already maxed out and then you are like literally already maxed out your calendar, your body capacity, you are maxed out. But as a high achiever, you're like, more, more, more, more, more. I need more. Cool. Do you have the capacity for that right now? Do you have the capacity to add 30% to what we're doing right now? Maybe. Cool. Like legitimately in your life right now, can you maintain your eight hours of quality sleep? Can we increase your workout duration slightly and frequency and intensity and do we have time for some nutrition auditing maybe great. But if no. You need to come to terms with like this just might not be, this might just have to be good enough right now. And this is not my people who are not trying and not willing to change. This is my people who are trying and are willing to change and have to cut themselves in slack in the seasons when they literally do not have more to give because if you're trying to accelerate fat loss or see major change, you need enough space in your life to support it, right? And most people have that most of the time, and some people don't have that. Some of the time. It's not about doing more, it's about clearing space for what matters. Here's the nuance that I don't hear enough coaches talk about. Sometimes you genuinely don't have the capacity to go full throttle, particularly if you are in this, to win this long term like your whole life. There are gonna be seasons where it is not appropriate or a prior, like your fitness and nutrition is not the utmost priority to be honest. Like I'm talking about women who are acutely grieving, just had a baby in the past six weeks juggling six kids and are like building a house themselves. That's not most people all of the time. Right? You have to look at the season you're in, and if your current season doesn't support a full body recomposition goal, that's okay. your work is gonna be to make peace with that and do what is of the highest priority to you in that season of life. Maybe right now, your job is to maintain where you're at. For most women I work with after the age of 35 and 40, if they would do the work to stop gaining weight, they would be. Light years ahead of where they were. If they just kept going on the trajectory they were on, it might just be eating a real meal, sleeping for more than six hours, doing a walk, doing two workouts. Those things still count. But be honest about what you're asking of yourself in this season. Do not shame yourself for not being able to do everything, but don't pretend you're doing everything either. So what do you actually need? What do you actually need to change your body and your life? Here's some things that you need, a plan that fits your life, a realistic level of effort that you can sustain long term. And this, we're gonna talk about this on the next podcast episode, is how I like to approach fitness and workouts as a practice, not a journey. You'll also need a willingness to shift your beliefs, support a structure and accountability. You will need enough stimulus to make a change, still not fluff. And that like, that's what we do in muscles and mindset, right? It's not extreme and it's not easy. It's real and it works forever. This is why I don't believe in one size fits all protocols. This is why I built muscles and mindset with flexibility and accountability because real life does not slow down and yet, and yet you still deserve to feel strong, to feel grounded, capable, and calm in your body. You don't have to earn your right to start. You just have to be willing to take one step and we'll help you take the next one. So if you are nodding along to this and thinking, yes, this is exactly what I've needed, I want to invite you to apply to come and work with us. Whether you are ready for a full transformation, one-on-one coaching, or you just want to dip your toes in, talk about it, there's a way that we can support you, even if it's just continuing to listen to this podcast, DM me on Instagram or check the show notes, on the podcast to apply. This is your permission slip to stop waiting for the perfect time and start creating a different one.