#MotivationMonday is dumb

This morning I posted this picture to my instagram. If you spend any time on any social media platform on any Monday then you'll #motivationmonday posts. They are usually quotes or pictures of people/animals doing extraordinary things. Their goal is to give you the extra push you need to get out there and get shit done. They are dumb.

Well the quotes and pictures aren't dumb. The idea of #motivationmonday is dumb.

Looking to social media for motivation to do something in the moment is useless. It's already clear you don't want to do it (or else you wouldn't be on social media) and even if you do muster up the will to do it, it will be lackluster.

I'm purposely saying "it" because it doesn't matter what the "it" is.

I'm not saying that motivation isn't a thing. Motivation is definitely a thing. I'm saying that if you need inspirational quotes or a cheerleader to hype you up then you're not suffering from nothing other than a lack of motivation.

#Motivationmonday might serve a purpose when you're trying to decide if you can/should make a change in your life. Once the decision has been made, you no longer need motivation, what you need is a plan. A good one.

A good plan will eliminate the need for any other motivation. It'll do so by telling you exactly what you need to do, how you need to do it and when you need to do it by. If you have all of those questions answered you won't have the opportunity/need to be actively searching for motivation.

So if you find yourself searching the hashtag "motivation monday" so you can do the damn thing, I say just forget the damn thing. For today anyway. Instead use today to come up with a plan so that you don't end up in the same place tomorrow.

Food Basics (as simple as I could)

I talk to clients a lot about food. A lot. With older clients, think 50 and up, I'm usually explaining that fat isn't bad and eating it won't cause your heart to explode. With younger clients it's telling them that carbs are not the enemy and that they couldn't survive without them. And no one eats enough protein. So I figured maybe it's time to actually explain what these things- fat, carbs, protein- are. They are macronutrients. Meaning the body requires them in large quantities. (Vitamins & minerals are considered micronutrients). The key word here is "requires". Your body must have all three and in large quantities (in terms of percentage of calories).

So you may have gone on a low carb or low fat diet and seen great results. Congrats. Why did you stop the diet then?

The answer is because you had to. Remember your body requires these macronutrients. So you either stop the diet voluntarily after some time and go back to eating normal (whatever that is for you) or your body stops the diet involuntarily. This usually comes in the form of what you probably thought was just a lapse of will-power or even unexplained sickness or orthopedic injury.

Weight loss is simply taking in less calories than you burn. In either case, voluntary or involuntary, you usually gain weight back. This happens because limiting any particular macronutrient is just a form of reducing your total calories. So when you begin to eat "normal" again your caloric intake just goes back to where it was before.

Ok, lets get into the macronutrients themselves.

• Carbohydrates (carbs): these are your starches, grains, fruits and veggies. Basically all carbs are made of glucose. Glucose is very important. Glucose is used to make ATP. ATP is the fuel that powers everything we do. Your brain and your nervous system need a ready supply of glucose to function.
  • If you don't get enough carbs (glucose), American Dietetic Association recommend 130 grams per day, your body will start to break down lean muscle mass in order to get glucose.
  • If you eat too many carbs, they get stored away as fat.
• Fat: there are saturated fats (animal fat, tropical oils) and unsaturated fats (olive oil, avocado, nuts, fish, flax, canola oil etc). Fats provide energy, make & balance hormones, make our cell walls, forms our brain/nervous system, transport vitamins and provide fatty acids our bodies can't make (omega-3 & omega-6). These are all very important.
  • When it comes to fat balance is key
    • too much saturated fat in relation to unsaturated leads to high cholesterol and cardiovascular disease among other things
    • you also have to balance the types of unsaturated fat (mono vs poly) you consume
  • Finding the right balance gets complicated quickly, seek out a qualified professional
• Protein: these are made of amino acids. Our bodies can make 12 amino acids (non-essential amino acids) and there are 8 essential acids that must be supplied from the diet. Proteins make up just about everything in our bodies when it comes to form and function.
  • Our bodies can maintain carbs and especially fat, on the other hand we lose small amounts of amino acids each day if we don't take in adequate amounts of protein in our diets. Run out of amino acids and you die.
  • No matter what protein sources you choose (animal or plant), you have to make sure you're getting complete proteins.
  • It is recommended that a healthy, sedentary 150lb adult take in about 55 g of protein (.8g of protein per kg of bodyweight) just to prevent deficiency. This would need to go up (a lot) if you're very active.

This is as simplified as I could possibly make this. It is still very complicated. You could take multiple college level courses on each of these macronutrients individually and combined and still not be able to grasp the nuance that the body uses when it comes  nutrition and metabolism.

This is why I try to keep nutrition as basic as possible with clients. Instead of trying to teach all the craziness up above, I teach how being mindful and creating healthy habits leads to lasting weight loss.

If you'd like to learn more about that just click here.

Motivation is Finite

I guess I should say self-motivation is finite. It is a limited resource that we can and very often do use up on any given day. Any time we have to do something that isn't automated, we have to figure out a motivation to do the task. Things that are important to us (meaning we're highly motivated to do them) usually get automated. For instance breathing: we are highly motivated to breathe because without it we die. So thousands of year ago some pre-historic person figured this out and worked really hard to automate his/her breathing. Then the energy that used to go to (thinking about) breathing could go chasing food or not becoming something else's food. Not exactly a scientific representation but you get the point.

So fast forward back to today and we have a lot more chances to use up our motivation than our pre-historic ancestors. You didn't log into Facebook when you got to work. Congrats. You walked past the fast food joint to the healthy salad place. Good job. You didn't lose it at Bob for asking about those TPS reports again. You're winning. You responded to Susie from accounting's email. It was a one word response but you still responded.

You've taken all those actions and hundreds more that don't even register (did you walk to the fax machine; do people still fax?). Each action takes away from the amount of  motivation available for the next thing. So on those particularly busy/hectic days it can be herculean effort to order take out, let alone go to the gym.

So what can/should you do?

1. Automate As Much As Possible- it'll take you a few generations of offspring to automate to the level of breathing but there are some things you can do in the mean time. Things you do daily, weekly, or monthly do them at the same time. Make it non-negociable.
2. Avalanche Method- in the personal finance world there's a school of thought for dealing with getting out of debt. The thought is you should pay off your credit card with the highest balance first without worrying about interest rates. This way you gain motivation from seeing the biggest balance disappear.

   This thought can be applied to your daily tasks. Figure out what your biggest tasks for the day are and do those first. This way you gain motivation and momentum to get the smaller tasks done.

These are just a couple of suggestions for how to avoid lack of motivation as a roadblock to success. Try these out and maybe you'll save yourself from telling Bob off and you'll send Susie a thoughtful response to her email.

Let me know if you have any other motivation hacks.