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#157: Win or Learn - Breaking the All-or-Nothing Cycle With Mindset, Reflection, and Tiny Tweaks
703 Plays21 days ago
Your mindset is either working for you or against you — and in this episode, we're diving into exactly how to make it work for you.
I'm sharing one of my favourite frameworks I use with clients: the "win or learn" mindset, and how shifting your perspective can completely change your results. We'll look at some powerful examples — from a simple bus image that stopped me in my tracks, to Arnold Schwarzenegger's story compared to his brother's, to Viktor Frankl's incredible book Man's Search for Meaning — all pointing to the same truth: you can't always control what happens, but you can always control how you respond.
From there, I bring it back to health and fitness, because this is where so many women get stuck. That all-or-nothing thinking? It's the root of the Monday-to-weekend guilt cycle — and it's keeping you from the progress you deserve. Instead, I want you to start treating your health journey like a science experiment: objective, procedure, result, conclusion. No drama, no self-blame — just curiosity and data.
In this episode you'll learn how to reframe "failures" as learning opportunities, how a simple daily reflection habit can shift everything, why celebrating small wins matters more than you think, and the difference between needing to rest and wanting to quit.
This one's a mindset reset — and I think you need to hear it.
00:00 Welcome and Theme
00:37 Perspective Shapes Success
01:52 Arnold Story Lesson
03:13 Viktor Frankl Mindset
05:47 All or Nothing Trap
06:39 Diet Cycle Example
07:57 Health as Experiment
10:10 Reflect and Journal
12:24 Failing Leads Forward
14:36 Curiosity Over Criticism
16:20 Measure Backward Wins
20:46 Win or Learn Examples
23:26 Wrap Up and Coaching
Links & Resources:
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Transcript
Introduction to 'Win or Learn' Mindset
00:00:01
Speaker
Hi everyone, welcome back to another episode of the podcast. In today's episode, we are going to focus very much around mindset and perspective. In general, talking around the win or learn mindset. So
Perspective's Role in Success
00:00:17
Speaker
the win or learn mindset is something that I use with my clients on a daily and a weekly basis. And it really is just all about how your perspective shapes your success and we're going to get into this in detail in this episode and how you can practically apply this in your own life okay the first thing that I'll say is no matter what you're trying to achieve or overcome in your life whether it is health or fitness related whether it's relationships whether it is a business or a career goal or anything in life the most important thing
00:00:52
Speaker
in being successful is your mindset, your perspective and how you perceive and react to situations. If we think of examples of this in life, you know, if I think a really good example of this is, you know, there's that graphic that you see on Instagram or Facebook a bit of being like the caption it says is like perspective is everything.
Illustrations of Perspective
00:01:16
Speaker
And there's a picture of two people on a bus. and they're on either sides of the bus and one person is looking out at the beautiful sunset and the dolphins jumping in the sea or whatever the beautiful scenery and the other person is staring against the cliff edge wall and the inside of the bus and I think the caption is like perspective is everything and I just think that's such a valuable such a powerful picture and image as to how important the
00:01:42
Speaker
our perception of whatever is going on in our lives no matter how difficult how we react and respond to it is the most important thing another example there is I think it's really good is Arnold Schwarzenegger and his story and I don't know if any of you watched his documentary I think was Netflix well worth a watch it's really really inspiring but he came from really difficult background And he had a brother and himself and his brother grew up in the same household in the same circumstances. And i think how they both ended up was very different because of of how they chose to react and respond to the trauma that they went through, through the different things that happened in their lives, in their young lives. Obviously, Arnold, we all know that Arnold went on to win all these bodybuilding competitions.
00:02:30
Speaker
Hollywood, politics, and has just gone from strength to strength. And a lot of it has come down to his self-belief, his unwillingness to give up, not to be a victim. And to his perspective has been absolutely everything for him achieving his goals. Whereas his brother ended up with a lot of mental health issues and alcohol, substance abuse issues.
00:02:55
Speaker
and they had the same upbringing. It's just really, really interesting. And that's just one example of a lot of circumstances where people who've grown up the exact same will have very, very different perceptions as to how to move forward from difficult situations. Another
Viktor Frankl and Mindset Power
00:03:11
Speaker
really powerful example of this is the book Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl.
00:03:17
Speaker
Some of you will have read it if you haven't. I highly recommend it. one of those books that every human being on this planet should read. Probably more relevant now in the political climate of the world nowadays in 2026 than ever before. For anyone who doesn't know, Viktor Frankl, he was detained in a Nazi concentration camp during World War Two and he lost everything. you know His wife and his children died in the camps. He survived.
00:03:46
Speaker
And he saw the absolute unimaginable people dying around him, everything. And in this book, Man's Search for Meaning, he talks about his experience in the concentration camps, but not just of the misery and the suffering and the death and the unspeakable evils that happened. But he talked about what went on in his mind and how his perception on how he can react to these situations. So he was like, they could take everything from me.
00:04:16
Speaker
They can take everyone I love. They can take my clothes. They can take my belongings. They can take my teeth. They can take everything, but they cannot take how I choose to respond.
00:04:27
Speaker
And then he went on and he built a whole psychology a form, a school of psychology on because he was a psychologist. But my point is, you read the book. it's It's not a very long book. And he helped so many people.
00:04:43
Speaker
overcome serious trauma by, i think, logotherapy is what he calls it. And now obviously, you know, mental health science has come on a lot since those days. But my point with this book that I think every human being should read is just how much power we actually have within.
00:05:02
Speaker
and you know we're not talking about extreme situations like we're talking about our diet our exercise our health so our limiting beliefs our struggles are going to be probably for most of us they'll be minute in comparison but every everyone's struggles are big to them and are important to them and no matter how big or small your problems may be how you react to them is everything. And that's what you'll get from that book. And it actually just kind of puts things in perspective for you as well. So highly recommend Non-Search for Meaning and the apologies for the brutal book review.
00:05:38
Speaker
But read it for yourself and apologies for any inaccuracies I've given there. But my point is your mindset matters. And
Overcoming Black-and-White Thinking
00:05:47
Speaker
when we approach tasks that are challenging, we often carry this like very black and white, all or nothing mindset.
00:05:55
Speaker
And we're not even aware that we're doing it half the time. And it's not that we're being stupid or weak or anything like that. Our brains are protecting us. Our brain's main job is to keep us safe.
00:06:08
Speaker
So when something is challenging, something is difficult, something's out of the ordinary, our brains like, no, no, dangerous. And we need to be able to overcome the initial automatic reactions.
00:06:21
Speaker
with a little bit of reflection and an intentional response. Because your perspective shapes your results. Look at Arnold. though You compare him to his brother and his perspective shaped his result in everything he did in his life so far. OK, let's bring this right back to health, to to fitness, to diet, to exercise, to strength, to all things that we talk about here. so Does this sound familiar?
00:06:52
Speaker
Monday, you weigh yourself. You feel motivated. You're ready to have the perfect week. Tip away at it all week. Everything's going well. Friday, suddenly there's a takeaway. There's extra beers. There's unexpected plans and temptations on Saturday.
00:07:07
Speaker
By Sunday, you're feeling lost, convinced you've ruined everything and you surrender to failure. Then you might stay in failure for a few days, few weeks.
00:07:18
Speaker
Or maybe you get yourself back going again Monday, weigh in, you start again, you're going to have the perfect week and that vicious cycle goes on and on. And I know some of you listening have done this for decades.
00:07:29
Speaker
This vicious cycle is a constant feeling of guilt and failure. And this is with the win or learn mindset that we do in Nourish Her Coaching. This, we break away from this all or nothing cycle that it's just destined for failure and for constant feeling of not good enough and guilt.
00:07:46
Speaker
Because there's nothing, nothing more soul destroying than constantly failing and constantly feeling more hopeless that you can't do anything about it.
Lifestyle Changes as Experiments
00:07:56
Speaker
But here's the truth.
00:07:57
Speaker
A weight loss journey or a healthy lifestyle journey is an experiment. And it should be viewed as an experiment. when you think about it every experiment has an objective.
00:08:08
Speaker
So that's your goal. what are you what's What are you here for? what Why are you on this journey? What is your goal? Your objective. Every experiment has a procedure.
00:08:19
Speaker
Anyone who's done science in school will remember this. every Every experiment has a procedure. Trying different activities, trying different exercises, trying different gym classes, trying different meals, trying different foods, trying different combinations of and routines.
00:08:34
Speaker
All of those things are procedures, okay? And every experiment has a result. This worked. This didn't work. I liked it. I didn't like it.
00:08:46
Speaker
And every experiment has a conclusion. Why did or why did or didn't it work? And what have we learned? So the problem is for most of us, what we do is some of us like we have a we have a kind of vague objective of what we want, but we're really not very specific on what it is that we actually want. So the objective can be weak to begin with. So first of all get yourself a strong objective. And if you've been listening to me before, you've heard me talk about your why and how important it is to get a strong why.
00:09:19
Speaker
Your procedure. Okay. So what happens usually for us in our procedures, we try different things. If we don't like them or it doesn't work, we're like, oh, that doesn't work. I give up. Instead of, or, you know, or we feel guilty or feel stupid because it didn't work for us. Instead of being curious and being like, all right, that procedure didn't work, but maybe a different procedure would work. And the reason why we don't do that is because we don't do the result or the conclusion. We might So consciously be like, oh, I don't like that or that didn't work or this worked. But really just being like, OK, I tried to eat with that structure that I planned for it for today and I didn't like it. It didn't work properly because I was starving by dinner or I didn't have enough calories by the evening time or whatever it is. I didn't have enough time to eat that lunch that I wanted to prepare to prepare the lunch that I wanted to eat. Did it work? Did it not work? I liked it. I didn't like it. That's your result.
00:10:10
Speaker
And the part that none of us tend to do is the conclusion. we don't reflect. Why did it or didn't it work? Why didn't I like it?
00:10:21
Speaker
Or why did I, like, what was it that I liked about it? Actually, you know looking at us what how the day has gone and why... Were certain things good and certain things not good? Why did you like certain things and not other things? And this is where the journaling work is so important. What have you learned? Because you can't change what you're not aware of. And in order to be aware of something, you need to reflect. And...
00:10:45
Speaker
And instead of constantly, you know, the definition of madness is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. It's like banging your head off a brick wall, like reflecting on why something didn't work. Then teeny tiny tweaks to change like a little bit of, oh, maybe I need to have a little bit more protein in my breakfast. Maybe I need to squeeze in a little bit of a walk on my lunch instead of trying to do it in the evening time. Maybe I only need to go to the gym twice a week instead of trying to go four times a week.
00:11:13
Speaker
Little tweaks. can add up to huge differences over time. But we tend to give up on ourselves because we don't actually reflect. We don't get to that conclusion part of an experiment. And we need to instead of being judgemental to ourselves and being like, why are you so stupid? Why are you so weak? Why have you no willpower? Why can't you do this?
00:11:34
Speaker
Instead of being judgemental, be curious. Why didn't that work? Why didn't I like that? What can I do different? What have I learned that I can take forward and do different next time? That is so powerful and it changes everything.
00:11:49
Speaker
And like I said, this is where your journal matters. So quite often people are like, oh, with journaling, I don't know. id heard I heard was supposed to do journaling, but I don't know what to do. Your journaling is just reflecting on your day.
00:12:02
Speaker
Your journaling is knowing what it is that you want. So if we're talking health and fitness here, what it is that you want from your health and fitness journey, what is your specific goal? And why is it your goal?
00:12:13
Speaker
And then every day reflecting on your habits, being like, what went well? What didn't go well? Why? And what can I do different next time? Because the problem is we don't try and fail enough at things. And we definitely don't ask ourselves why. But this comes to me as I'm talking. and Michael Jordan, you know, he talks about like, you know all the winning shots he's had throughout his career.
00:12:36
Speaker
But he talks about the amount of shots he missed. Which is hell of a lot more than the winning shots that he has taken in his basketball career. The only... definite way for success is to fail enough times. And let me ask you this. If you knew that you had to fail a hundred times before you reach your goal, how excited would you be every time you failed? You'd be one step closer to getting there But that's actually what's happening. Like everyone has a number, a number of times that they need to fall down, pick themselves up, fall down, pick themselves up, reflect, learn from it before they get to where they want to go.
00:13:12
Speaker
And you don't know what your number is. But every time you fail, you are curious about it. You learn from it. You move forward. You're getting closer. Even when you don't feel like it, you need to be willing to try things out, reflect on them and move forward accordingly. And doing that just in your head isn't enough because our head is filled with enough things. We need it only needs to take five minutes every evening. Just do it in bed with your journal every evening.
00:13:38
Speaker
It's such a lovely way to to tie off the day as well, to finish up the day. Another thing on that failure point, I think anyone, any of you who have raised kids or have been around a toddler in the family or family or friends, kids or anything like that, if you've seen a toddler learning how to walk, they get up, they try, they fall down.
00:13:57
Speaker
They don't have to They fall down the first time, say, no, can't do that. I'm such a failure. I just won't walk anymore. They keep trying. They keep trying to pick them. They get better each time they stumble, they fall, they cry, but they get there.
00:14:12
Speaker
And there's never, you know, there's never been a toddler who just gave up trying to learn how to walk. It's, you know, we are born to grow. We are born to evolve. It's what we're here for. We're here to contribute. We're here to grow.
00:14:28
Speaker
In order to contribute, we need to grow. We need to evolve. And we have to We have to remember that the only thing holding us back is our brains that are test telling us that we can't that inner voice being like, you can't do that.
00:14:42
Speaker
Why are you so stupid? Why are you so weak? Why why
Reflecting on Personal Growth
00:14:45
Speaker
are you such a failure? at That inner voice, just because you think something doesn't make it true. And I know I talk about this all the time. The book, Someone Should Have Told Us, Somebody Should Have Told Us by Jack Pransky, that whole concept of just because you think something doesn't mean it's true. It's true.
00:15:02
Speaker
changed the game for me, like really, really did. And it's so true that inner voice can quite often be holding us back. But the great thing is we can actually change that inner voice to be our inner coach as well.
00:15:13
Speaker
And we just need to catch ourselves like we don't want to judge ourselves for judging ourselves either. When you notice yourself being mean to yourself, just stop and be like, right. Instead of being critical, I'm going to be curious. So always curiosity over criticism.
00:15:28
Speaker
And because there's always a reason for everything, anything that's holding you back, any obstacle. And if you can learn to become this problem solver, this little scientist, it's just figuring out your little science experiment of yourself, your life, your hopes, your dreams, your health, your fitness, your goals. And you're just a little scientist figuring it out. We all are.
00:15:46
Speaker
So this experiment model of constantly trying, testing, reflecting and moving forward breaks the vicious cycle of the all or nothing thinking and diet mentality. So trying something, we're testing it, we're reflecting on it, we're moving forward.
00:15:59
Speaker
And it won't, this is not about perfection. It's rarely got to be perfect, but it never actually needs to be. And um remember as well to be kind to yourself. It's not always about being like better and better and better every day. We have ups and downs. This is your life. Life is filled with ups and downs. Some days will be better than others. Some weeks will be better than others. And that's all right. But it's really important to always remember your starting point. So if we're using with weight loss journey as an example, think about when you started your weight loss journey.
00:16:31
Speaker
Your starting point is the only measure of comparison you should ever use. You should always measure backwards. So no matter how frustrated you are at the scales, no matter how bad your two or three weeks or four weeks have been lately, you know, not getting out for walks, not getting your workouts in, whatever.
00:16:50
Speaker
Think back to you when you started this journey. What things are you doing now that you used to not be able to do or you used to not do? What things do you now do?
00:17:03
Speaker
and what What things do you not do anymore that you used to do that were holding you back? Like it's really, really important. not Obviously, you know, if you've got physical progress, you can use that. You can look at a photo and be like, look how far I've come from here.
00:17:14
Speaker
You know, if you've got fitness metrics or strength metrics or measurement metrics, you can use that and be like, look how many pounds I've lost. Look how many centimeters I've lost. Look how much more weight I'm lifting. Look at how much faster I've gotten. You can use all of those. Always measure backwards. But it can also just be habits based.
00:17:34
Speaker
I used to wake up in the middle of the night to snack. on junk food and I don't do that anymore. That's a pretty damn big win. I used to never exercise at all and now I'm mad if I can't get my daily walking.
00:17:50
Speaker
Massive win because both of those things are changes in your identity. Like there's such massive habits that you have managed to change. Although things might be bumpy at the minute, you have made huge progress. And when you can look back and reflect and measure backwards at how much progress you've made,
00:18:06
Speaker
It gives you that sense of empowerment, but like I can push forward more now. And
Recognizing Wins and Learning from Failures
00:18:11
Speaker
it's really important to zoom out and look at it from a bigger picture, a bigger perspective.
00:18:16
Speaker
Like start looking at the little wins in every day as well. I treat yourself like a five year old and give yourself a pat on the back. Think about your toddler that's learning how to walk. it a Yay, well done. Good boy. Good girl. Whatever. You're cheering them on. You're not like, oh, my God, you failure. How do you not walk? Imagine saying that to a toddler. But that's what we say to ourselves. can't you just stick to your diet? Why can't you just do your your exercise?
00:18:39
Speaker
That's so unhelpful. Instead of just being like, yes, go me. I got up early. I got it done. Go me. I had a really busy day. I didn't manage to get any exercise in, but I kept my food healthy and balanced. Whatever it is.
00:18:51
Speaker
little wins every day. So when you're doing that daily reflection and you're looking at what worked or like what didn't work and you're reflecting and moving forward, also just make a little sentence in your journal. So a physical note on what was your win that day as well?
00:19:08
Speaker
Because there's always something. It can be a mindset win. It can be a habit win. It can be a measurable win. It doesn't matter. There's always something. So basically my message with all of this is there is no such thing as failure. There is only ever a win or a learning opportunity and nothing else. So this is the win or learn. and I want you to remember the progress is never linear. Successful people didn't get there in a vertical linear fashion.
00:19:36
Speaker
Life always has its ups and downs. Things are going, there's going really good times. There's going to be really bad times. And there's going be lots and lots of normal in-between times. And what we do in the normal in-between times is what's most important.
00:19:50
Speaker
Never
Nourish Her Coaching Program
00:19:51
Speaker
give up is the other thing I want to say. What separates successful people from everyone else is that they never give up. So adopt a winner's mentality, okay? So never be fully defeated. We can get knocked over.
00:20:05
Speaker
but we pick ourselves up and we go again. Another a one quote that always sticks with me, and I think it's Banksy who says it. What is the quote exactly? When you get tired, learn to rest, not quit.
00:20:19
Speaker
I think that's it. When you get tired, learn to rest, not quit. So basically, when we get tired and frustrated with things, it's so tempting to just give up. But you don't need to give up. You might just need a little bit of a break, a little rest. And that's OK, too. It's not about being win win, win, win, win all the time. It's about knowing when to take a break, knowing when to pause, knowing when to just take a little bit of a breather, knowing when to pick yourself up.
00:20:45
Speaker
That's OK. So I'm going to give some examples of wins and learning opportunities so you can kind of put this a little bit more into perspective to your own journey. OK, so like I said, wins can be measurable things like the amount of pounds that you've lost, the amount of kilometers you're able to run, the weight you're able to lift, the amount of centimeters you've lost, anything like that you can.
00:21:06
Speaker
But please don't just look at those. There's so many other wins. Big and small. So I'll give you some examples. I meal planned all my meals for this week. I ate vegetables with my lunch and dinner today. I hit 8000 steps today. I finally hit seven hours sleep.
00:21:22
Speaker
I managed to reduce my chocolate intake to the evenings. I did my weekly workout today. I went shopping and got all my ingredients for the week. I drank two litres of water today.
00:21:35
Speaker
So these are just examples. Like you can obviously come up with your own, like at whatever feels like a win for you. But do you see how big or small it can be? It doesn't have to be huge. Learning opportunities then is, you know, when something doesn't go according to your to plan, ask yourself, what can I learn from this? So I didn't plan my meals for today and ended up buying food and work. Instead of being like, oh, I'm such a failure.
00:21:57
Speaker
I ruined it. ruined the diet. So instead saying, what can I learn from this tonight? I'll sit down and plan out my day for tomorrow. There you go. Now you have a plan to move forward from it.
00:22:10
Speaker
Another one. I went for my walk after work and I didn't get to eat until 8 p.m. So you're trying to squeeze everything in. You got out for your walk. You didn't eat till 8 p.m. Instead of being like, oh, this doesn't work. This is too hard.
00:22:22
Speaker
It could be like, all right, do I need to restructure things here a little bit? I'll get up early tomorrow and I'll do a walk in the morning instead. And then I can come home and cook and eat in the evening. Do you see the difference in that? It's just a tweak that needs to be made. What can I learn from this? What can I change moving forward?
00:22:38
Speaker
I had toast for my breakfast and I was starving by 11. i This is too hard. My diet, I'm starving. Like this doesn't work for me. Instead of being like, all right, OK, maybe toast for breakfast or being like like, I can't have toast for breakfast. or This is too restrictive. I can't do this.
00:22:56
Speaker
Instead of being like, OK, I can still have my toast for breakfast, but tomorrow I'll include a bit of protein on the side. Maybe I'll have some Greek yogurt. or a protein yogurt on the side, or I'm going have a couple of eggs on top of the toast and or even some nice like turkey rashers or something like that with my toast. Tomorrow I'm going to put a bit of protein with my toast.
00:23:17
Speaker
Instead of this doesn't work for me. So the difference, you see how little they are and they don't need to be massive because over time it really, really adds up. So I just want to say mindset is absolutely everything. So please do take the time to take it seriously. Do that daily reflection. It will change your life.
00:23:36
Speaker
And please, please remember you either win or you learn. hope you found that helpful thank you so much for listening to another one of my rambles if you've made it this far i appreciate you very very much and thank you so much for listening as always if you enjoyed the episode please do share it with your friends in your whatsapp groups and you on your stories tag me if you're putting it on your stories and if you're not subscribed to the podcast please do hit the subscribe button it makes such a difference in growing the podcast and If you are interested in more of this mindset shift behind habit change, we do a lot of this in Nourish Her Coaching. These episodes that I'm doing are very much part of my coaching curriculum and which are the building blocks to lasting habit change. So if you're like, you know what, I want to know more about this. I want more support than just try to do this on my own.
00:24:33
Speaker
and I want to do it in a supportive community, then go to the show notes and click the link, which will give you all of the info on my coaching business, which is called Nourish Her Coaching. And we take clients in once a month. so there'll be information there on when the next intake is.
00:24:51
Speaker
So thank so much. And I will see you on the next episode.