E43. Redefining Success: Trying Realistic Approaches to Health with Health Coach Heather Sayers Lehman

Have you ever wondered if your definition of success is creating a bar that you can’t clear? 🥴

Today’s episode is all about redefining success. 

Many times, we set unrealistic goals for ourselves when it comes to our wellness habits.

In this episode, I will walk through the five things that people think success is: perfection, major results, feeling effortless, weight loss, and fun. 

Then, I will discuss what success looks like and how we can view it differently. 

Success is about focusing on what you have completed rather than what you have fallen short of. 

I hope you enjoy this quick episode and you can see all small achievements as big successes in your ongoing wellness journey! 

…..

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Transcript

Defining Success in Health and Wellness

Speaker 1 0:00

Hi and welcome to the Air we Breathe . I'm your host , heather Sears-Laman . I'm a national board certified health and wellness coach , certified intuitive eating counselor and certified personal trainer . I help you get organized and consistent with healthy habits , without rules , obsession or exhaustion . The Air we Breathe a finding wellbeing that works for you is a podcast created to help you establish a trusted foundation of doable healthy habits and smart self-care skills that can endure every season and last you a lifetime . My guests and I will share ways that you can focus on your physical and mental health with purpose , flexibility and ease . This podcast may contain talk about eating disorders and disordered eating . We minimize mentions of specific behaviors and numbers , but it's still a topic nonetheless . There also could be some squares and or adult language here . Choose wisely if those are problematic for you . Thanks for joining .

Speaker 1 0:53

Today I'm doing a pretty quick episode , which sometimes , when I say pretty quick , it might not be , but I hope it's going to be . I want to talk about defining success today . Why is this important ? I think that many times we are so hard on ourselves and we're not just trying to get to the bottom of it . We're so hard on ourselves and that inner voice , that inner jerk is the one that's driving us to work at a level that might not work for us in the long run . It's not sustainable , and that really informs what we say is quote unquote successful . I wanted to chat about this a little bit because there are multiple factors driving this and there are multiple solutions so that we don't have to feel like we're not being successful . I've said it about a million times , but success begets success . So it is really important that we are feeling like we are doing well and I certainly know many of the what will we call them Kind of the metrics of success on the interwebs or by influencers or from a book that you read are really lofty and they just don't necessarily fit a lifestyle of somebody who's busy and has responsibilities and can't dedicate every day , all day , to health and fitness . People have stuff to do . So let's look at five different things that I hear people saying and I see it in the more common conversations of what means success , and many people think perfection and , like our brains know clearly we're not going to be perfect , but another part of our brain is but you really could be if you tried hard enough and like that , perfect would be the default greatest best thing that we could do , which I certainly disagree with , but that just gets held up as the thing we are trying to do all the time Is to get as close to perfection as possible .

Speaker 1 3:39

The second thing that I see a lot with goals is that it needs to have some major results . People certainly love quick results , and why wouldn't ? We're working hard and we want something to show for it . Like , I totally get it . And many things get set up in a way that we are looking for these results to validate the work that we're doing , because then if we don't have those results , what is the point of doing any of this , which there are a lot of points to having healthy behaviors .

Speaker 1 4:20

The results piece is so driven by diet culture because obviously , if we're doing this thing , it better make us thin , and that's certainly been a narrative that has always been around . Why else would we be doing it ? And I can't count how many years I lived in that . Everything revolved around . But will it make me thin ? But will it make me thin ? And certainly in coaching I hear people wanting different solutions that are going to revolve around being thin as well . So the major results piece can be a big obstacle because it leads people to quit and to do some things that might not be very effective , and they also might be doing some things that can be harmful because they are in the quick fix category . So major results , that's another one gets in the way .

Speaker 1 5:29

And this next piece I think is very interesting , but it's that it needs to feel effortless . There's some sort of magical place we're all going to get to that . It's just so easy , and I hear this a lot . I hear this especially from influencers , especially from people that I would consider completely unqualified to be giving health sustaining behavior advice period , and it goes along with this N of one theory . So basically , n of one means .

Speaker 1 6:09

This is just my personal experience . This is an anecdote . I'm telling you about me and evidence isn't necessarily backing it up , but I'm just telling you what happened to me and you should do what I did . It's usually how it works , but there is this panacea that once we're doing the thing and we keep doing the thing , we're just not even going to have to think about it at all . Like when I hear people like that stop eating sugar . I just don't even want it anymore . It just doesn't even sound good . I don't crave it , it's great . Could it be you ? I hope that is working for you . Yeah , I find a platform right here .

Speaker 1 6:58

This sort of exhaustion , when people are having to put effort towards their behaviors , that they are like this isn't what it should be . This should be easy . I don't want to think about it , I just want to do it and then I'm done and it was so easy . And I'm not saying that your health-sustaining behaviors should feel like pulling teeth , because they shouldn't . Some things are easier than others and that just varies completely by personality and preference and what you enjoy and what you don't enjoy . So I like to look at this effortless piece certainly as a story , and I don't know who started the story , but it definitely lives in the areas , especially like an MLM or something , where they're really selling something that , oh my gosh , like things are so easy . Now I can talk more about that .

Speaker 1 8:00

But and the next one is weight loss that success is if I am losing weight , and this is certainly held up by diet culture , and this is held up by weight loss companies who more or less inform our cultural perceptions of reality around weight in our bodies . So a company . We'll just go ahead and start on Weight Watchers that it has been a scale-based program forever . And there are other companies . I worked for a company and managed a wellness vendor and they sent a scale to everybody that signed up and I didn't know that beforehand and I was like , wait , what ? Yeah , you get a scale and it's Bluetooth . So every time you get on the scale , like your coach will know , like , how your weight's doing . And I was just absolutely mortified and also asked a lot of questions is this what we're doing ? And the company was like what other metric would you have to define success ? I'll name 10 off the top of my head , but weight loss doesn't necessarily have to be one of them . Is that a side effect at times of having healthier behaviors ? Yes , certainly , some people absolutely do lose weight and they can have a weight loss with behaviors that actually stays off . So these things are absolutely possible . But when we start doing things with the intention of losing weight , it makes it much , much harder to keep going if we are not , because again nothing's happening . So what's the point of this ? And the last one is fun , but this has been really fun again .

Redefining Sustainable Success in Health

Speaker 1 10:01

I definitely see this more kind of like in the MLM community of . It always reminds me of Beachbody , because now we've got people who are wholly unqualified to be telling us what to do in the fitness realm People who love fitness , which is great , and they are focused on trying to make a profit , which 97% of them are not . Have you ever felt like the do-it-yourself approach to improving your healthy habits ends up doing nothing except making you feel overwhelmed , guilty and defeated ? Have you been struggling to find sustainable routines that work for your responsibilities , lifestyle , budget and personal preferences ? You don't need more rules , influencers or structured programs . Let me help you discover what you want , what works for you and how to maintain healthy habits during the ever-changing circumstances of your life . If you're ready to create systems that stick , head to heathersayerslaymancom , backslash health dash coaching and click let's do it . Anyway , but they really do the like . Oh my gosh , this workout is so fun , and I see it in the recipe realm , too , where people that are eating like a twigs and cardboard , but there's cottage cheese mixed in . So that's pretty good that this is really fun and I'm really excited about it . Can you be excited about cottage cheese ? Yes , I just talked to somebody who really likes cottage cheese .

Speaker 1 11:41

I get it , but I don't look at all of the healthy habits as necessarily fun and I hear this especially in the anti-diet community about movement , because I just say meaningful movement , because when I'm doing things it means something to me . It means my back won't be as stiff , it means I'll probably have more energy , I'll probably sleep better , so that is meaningful to me . But a lot of people say , like joyful movement , and for me that's just a stretch , that is . That's just not how I think about it , and some people may work out and feel joy . Again , kudos to them . I don't think that it means you're not being successful if you don't think it's fun . I don't think you should show up in tears , I don't think it should be awful , but I definitely . When I look at my time at the gym , it's cool because I have friends there . My husband and I work out together a couple of days a week . It's fun like that , but I don't think it's fun . So anyway , those are the five ways that I think really get in the way of people continuing health , sustaining behaviors , because they're waiting for those things to happen and when some of those things don't happen , it's not working , there's no point and I'm going to quit doing it . So what success actually looks like to me ? So this , for me , is redefining sustainable success Because , again , with these habits , my goal , as always , is to have people still doing them .

Speaker 1 13:28

I want people to pick up habits that they can do for a long time , not something that they can grin and bear it for 30 days , but that these are long haul habits . So , focusing on problem solving , and I feel like at times there are facets of our lives that are just ever changing . That is just the way that it is and that is how it will always be . It would be , I don't know , easier if our life was just this sort of static thing and then you know what to expect and then you can do your things . And certainly there are times in our lives where we have more control over our time and more flexibility , and sometimes we do not .

Speaker 1 14:21

That's where problem solving comes in , so we may have this obstacle that comes up , and then it's easy to throw up our hands and be like I guess I'm not going to the gym anymore and I certainly see this with myself a lot because my back's going to go out , may not be feeling well . A lot of different things can happen . I'll just go with my back , because that is my current issue , but there are a lot of things that I can do at the gym , which one is like back exercises and flexibility , so that I'm actually working on making my back better , but also there's still upper body exercise I can do , or the core exercises I can do , but in my mode of problem solving , I'm trying to figure out what I can do . This also can go for schedules of . Maybe that family has a lot of commitments and it's really eating into the time that you have for your habits . What can I do then ? Can I offload some of this responsibility ? Do I just need to cut back on my habits , because I know it's for this amount of time ? But always looking to be a problem solver because , again , I think in the everyday overwhelm of our lives , it's easy to just throw up our hands and say you know what , I just can't even deal with it . I don't want to deal with it , I don't want to work on it . But what is it I can do , and it might just be a fraction of what you're doing before , which is completely fine , but you have checked in with yourself to decide what's going to work at this time .

Speaker 1 16:00

The second thing that you can absolutely do is meeting a percentage of a goal . Personally , I'm not a big goal setter . Some people dig it , some people really like it , and they might be doing something like a race . I want to do a couch to 5K and I want to do it in this period of time . Something might come up again Maybe I've sprained my ankle , or maybe my asthma is really bad . Or soccer season Now we're going into finals , so this is taking a lot longer . I thought we'd be done by now , so maybe I don't actually get to do my 5K race . And then maybe this couch to 5K program I spread out even more and take it slow . But I'm still working on the things and I'm still moving forward and I'm still either walking or jogging what I said I wanted to do .

Speaker 1 16:54

And it could be something like where you've decided that you want to make your lunches more often and then you said , okay , five days a week , absolutely , I'm gonna bring my lunch to work and life happens and just got in the way and you're doing three days a week , which is great . So meeting a percentage of that goal is still a success , and I definitely see the disappointment that some people have of like , oh , I only did it three days , but you did it three days . So we have to again address that inner jerk voice to say , no , I get credit for this , I'm getting credit . So , finding a lower intensity level . So maybe we have gotten a little optimistic with starting out and it could be that we have decided that we've read the artist's way and we're gonna do our morning pages where we're journaling I think it's three pages and at some point you're like I can't do this . Either I don't have this much to say or I don't have this much time , or I feel more stressed trying to get these three pages . But then your intensity level is like , okay , I'm just gonna knock it down to one page .

Speaker 1 18:13

And this also goes for , obviously , like exercise , where you are saying like , okay , I'm gonna do this and I'm gonna do this at this level . I wanna make sure on the elliptical , I'm always reaching this number , or you're following your heart rate and it needs to be at this number . It can be lower , it doesn't have to reach that to make it a success . And again , I think looking at what you are doing versus what you're not doing is really helpful here , so pivoting to a different goal . Sometimes we definitely need to punt and we may have said to ourselves like , okay , I'm going to go into the gym and I'm going to do these back exercises , I'm gonna do this four days a week and , for whatever reason , I just can't get to the gym or my back is hurting too much trying to do these exercises and I just need to find a pool and get into the pool and do some aquatic therapy to de-weight my back . Overall , I'm still working on my back , but I'm having to find a totally different way to do it .

Speaker 1 19:22

And again , if I'm talking about bringing my lunch to work , maybe that I just say you know what ? I'm going to try a meal delivery service . Or I'm gonna work with my pal at work and we're gonna switch off back and forth and see if , when I bring lunch , I bring two lunches and then the next day she'll bring two lunches and we do it like that . So we really can find different goals and make sure that we're not beating ourselves up about it . Because , also , it might be that you've decided I really want to bring more , bring my homemade lunches to work , but then calamity strikes and something's happening at home and you're like you know what ? The best thing I could do for myself is to try to do deep breathing a couple times a day . That's it . That's all I've got . I've got it . I'm just gonna dump this lunch goal for now and then work on my stress and making sure that I'm taking care of myself emotionally .

Speaker 1 20:26

So pivoting . There's nothing wrong with it , and sometimes we have different bandwidth abilities and it is good to recognize that and appreciate that . Maybe this isn't it right now Trying something new . I think many times we try what we have done for a long time . We try things that worked like , oh , when I was in college , I did this and well , heather , you're not in college , so I don't think that's going to work .

Speaker 1 20:57

But doing something completely new , I think can be exciting . It can be a little bit nerve-wracking , but I feel like there are times where you try things and you try them over and over and it just doesn't work . It's just not working for you and instead of beating yourself up , is there something new that I can try ? I think that all of these pieces do require contemplation and some self-awareness and critical thinking , which are all bandwidth pieces which can be hard to come by at different times . So I totally get that .

Speaker 1 21:43

I absolutely think if you are having a hard time or you feel like you're just not measuring up , can I look at problem solving , meeting a percentage of the goal , finding a lower intensity level , pivoting to a different goal or just trying something new . What does that feel like ? What does that look like for me ? Because , especially if you're finding yourself in a place where you're beating yourself up for not doing enough , not doing it right , how can I redefine what sustainable success means to me ? All these details are in the show notes and , of course , journaling is an excellent thing to do when you are trying to work on these and trying to come up with solutions .

Speaker 1 22:28

So you can always find my journaling guide at heathersearslaymancom backslashjournal . That's in the show notes as well . I hope this helps , because I really want you to think positively about yourself and give yourself kudos and really practice being that friend to yourself that we all wish we had . Alright , we'll see you next time . Thanks so much for listening today . Do you know what would be really fun If you popped over to my Instagram at heathersearslaymancom and dropped me a DM and let me know what topics you want me to cover Something bugging you , something holding you up . Please just let me know and I will tweak some content and get an episode out just for you . As always , please follow the show or you can leave a five star review on Apple or Spotify . That would be fun too . See you in the next episode .