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#84 - Building a strong why
1.1k Plays1 year ago
In today’s episode, I chat about how our mindset plays a crucial role in achieving health and fitness goals.
I share some personal challenges I’ve faced along the way and highlight why self-reflection and journaling are powerful tools for breaking through subconscious barriers.
I also explore how uncovering your deeper motivations can transform how you approach long-term habit changes and ultimately drive you toward success.
I also offer some practical exercises to help you uncover your own 'why' and share stories from my journey to encourage you to take control of yours.
Key Questions Discussed in This Episode:
- How does your mindset shape your ability to reach your health and fitness goals?
- Can journaling really help you discover what’s holding you back?
- Why is having a strong 'why' so essential for lasting change?
- What practical exercises can help you dig deeper and uncover your true motivation?
- How can you take control of your personal journey and create lasting success?
If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, leave a review, and share it with friends who might benefit. For more health tips and updates, follow me on Instagram and TikTok @katehamiltonhealth.
Music by LiQWYD Free download: hypeddit.com/link/xxtopb [http://hypeddit.com/link/xxtopb] Promoted by FreeMusicPromo [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCbycji-eySnM3WD8mbxPUSQ] / @freemusicpromo1
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Transcript
Introduction and Personal Challenges
00:00:09
Speaker
Hello everyone and welcome back to another episode of the Kate Hamilton Health podcast. So today is going to be a solo one. You're stuck listening to my mad thoughts for a few minutes. It won't be as long as the interview ones I would imagine, but you never know. And you also might have to put up with my slightly stuffed up sound that I've got going on. I've been fighting a dose for a couple of weeks now, had a bit of a flu and it's still not gone. So regardless of how much sleep I get, no matter how many vitamins I take,
00:00:36
Speaker
and how well I eat. But anyway, we will get there. I think everybody seems to be catching things lately.
Mindset vs. Knowledge in Success
00:00:42
Speaker
But anyway, today's episode, I want to discuss a mindset based topic. Now, I really, really believe, like firmly believe in what most of my coaching is based around, that We can all learn everything that we need to learn about diet and nutrition and exercise, but it's actually mindset. That's where success is. That's where longevity is. It's where sustainability, when it comes to your habit change, when it comes to your habits, when it comes to you reaching your goals, mindset needs to be looked at. You can read as many books as you like, but if you can't read yourself,
00:01:25
Speaker
then you're never going to learn anything. I think that's actually a really lovely quote. It's not me. I actually read that in Stephen Bartlett's book and I just thought it's so true. We can want to change or we can want to be the person who does something. We can want to be a healthy body weight. We can want to be fit. We we can want to be the person that runs a marathon. But what's actually happening is we're wanting to want to be that person. But there's often barriers in place in our subconscious mind that can prevent us getting to where we actually want to go.
Overcoming Subconscious Barriers
00:02:00
Speaker
And we need to dig deep
00:02:04
Speaker
into these subconscious behaviours to be able to actually make the change, to understand what's stopping us, why are we getting in our own way, why can't we make these new habits stick, why can we know absolutely everything and just not make it work. Now it's not as simple as that, it's it's a hell of a lot more complicated and a lot of it can be down to lifestyle factors, stress, busyness, jobs, responsibilities and I get that as well, you know, and there's only a certain amount of adjustments and changes we can make when we've got people depending on us. But I think the first place to start looking is within. So if you are currently you know struggling to reach your goals, there's two things that need to happen. The first thing that needs to happen is you need to be very clear on what you want. If you don't know what you want,
00:02:52
Speaker
then you're never going to get there. So you have to be crystal clear, I want to lose a few pounds and be healthy. Like that's not specific enough. You need to be specific. So you need to know what you want and you need to know why you want it. And as much as I firmly believe that everybody can benefit from going to see a therapist and working on themselves and having that objective person there who's qualified to work with people through their limiting
Journaling as a Tool for Growth
00:03:20
Speaker
beliefs.
00:03:20
Speaker
so that they can succeed. I understand that that is not possible for most. It is an expensive investment. The good thing is it doesn't need to be going to therapy. It's like oh I can't afford therapy, I'm never going to solve my problems. You can, you can solve your own problems.
00:03:37
Speaker
with a pen and paper, journaling. It doesn't even have to be a pen and paper. I think it helps. I think there's something therapeutic about you know and putting pen to paper to get to the bottom of your thoughts and your beliefs, but it can be done on a laptop. It can be done on a phone. It can be done through voice note.
00:03:53
Speaker
You can record yourself. It doesn't matter. Whatever way you learn best is probably the way it's going to work best for you. But in this context, I'm going to talk about journaling in a pen to paper sense, but you can adapt it. I'll say just say it at the start. You can adapt it to what suits you. Even if you're like, Oh God, the thought of journaling, how is journaling actually going to help me reach my goals? You will be absolutely mind-bogglingly surprised at how much of a difference that it makes and it really gets to those underlying beliefs and that's what we want. We want to move past those barriers that stop us or that they keep us going around in circles so that we can stop going around in circles, push forward and actually get there. So I've put together a few notes for myself that I'm going to talk through just so I don't waffle too much.
00:04:41
Speaker
Okay, so no matter what you're trying to achieve, or overcome in life, whether it is a fat loss, health, fitness, personal goal, whatever it is, the most important thing in being successful is your mindset, your perspective, how you perceive situations, and how you react to situations.
Personal Responsibility and Perspective Shift
00:04:59
Speaker
A lot of us go around through life, just reacting to everything, oh, the economy is shit, and the government is shit, and know this person did this to me and that, but you know, I'm not taking any responsibility. It's like,
00:05:10
Speaker
you may be in a really shit situation, whether it's health wise, fitness wise, financially, whatever. But the first step here is taking 100% responsibility for your life from this moment onwards and be like, okay, can't change everything, but I can change my perspective. And I can change what I'm going to do about it. I'm going to stop reacting to things that are happening to me. And I'm going to start putting things in place to make things happen for me.
00:05:37
Speaker
And it is like absolutely life changing. And this is what I did with my life. I was that person who was a victim to my own anxiety, to my own negative thoughts and beliefs, my limiting beliefs, my lack of self-confidence, and kept myself trapped in a life and never had any money and never could do any of the things that I wanted to do or I was too afraid to do things. And then suddenly something switched to me. It didn't suddenly switch. I started journaling. I started self-reflecting. I had done some therapy as well. And I started really digging deep, like what do I want? What is stopping me getting what I want? And another thing as well is, and I've probably spoken on this already, is just because you think something doesn't mean it's true. So just because if you think I'm not strong enough to do that, or I'm not smart enough to do that, or I'm not fit enough to do that, just because you think it doesn't mean it's true. The only thoughts that have power are the ones that you give power to.
00:06:37
Speaker
You don't have to give power to those thoughts. You can be like, oh, ah interesting, I think that. Why do I think that? Pent paper. And off you go and see what comes up.
00:06:49
Speaker
And you might be really, really surprised. You might put pen to paper and not be able to write anything at first. And then suddenly it just starts coming. And you're like, wow, I didn't know I taught that. And it's amazing as you start, and it might take weeks, months, it doesn't matter. As you start working through these thoughts, you'd be surprised what comes up. So in relation to fat loss anyway, mindset work is such a huge part of the journey. Nothing changes if nothing changes. So if you've never done this before, just be open to it. Get a notebook or a journal, get a pen,
00:07:19
Speaker
um and keep this journal close to hand at your desk and work if that's where you get the most headspace time. Like I keep mine in my bedside locker because you know like I'll read before I go to bed and sometimes something will come to me and I'll be like oh I need to write that down. And I actually have another notebook then at my work desk so I've got a two separate journal so if something comes to me during the day i'm not gonna go all the way upstairs to do that like you know we want to take away all those barriers like i could go all the way upstairs and i'll get more steps in but you know i don't let's be fair so just take away those barriers have your notebook and pen close by wherever it needs to be most of us know how to achieve what we want you know just work hard just stick to your calories just start exercising
00:07:55
Speaker
but we still can't seem to get there. This isn't a problem of knowing how to do something, it's a symptom of not having a strong why. So I've talked a little bit around journaling in general but I'm going to focus in on this why, this the concept of having a strong why now.
Motivation and Personal Values
00:08:10
Speaker
If you never seem to get there, I can guarantee you it's not having a strong enough why. Not that you don't have a strong enough why, you just don't know what it is yet. Everyone has a strong enough why and you're going to figure it out.
00:08:22
Speaker
What is the reason or are the reasons that you're taking this journey in the first place? Why are you listening to this podcast? Why are you looking to lose weight? Why are you looking to get fit or why are you looking to get stronger? Whatever your goals are, what is the reason for you embarking on this journey? And take some time, like pause it now. Actually, no harm. Go get your journal in your pen if you have one or scrap a paper. Pause it.
00:08:46
Speaker
and take some time and really think about this right now. So when it comes to like my why, for example, my why has really become my beliefs and my identity at this stage. I have a lot of reasons, like one of the main reasons is, you know, health and longevity. Really, I have so much that I want to do and see in the world. And our bodies are our our vehicles. If I don't have good health, I can't do all the wonderful things that I want to do. So I see it as an important thing to look after. We only get one body.
00:09:23
Speaker
and it can so easily be taken away from us. And I think a lot of people listening will have experienced that with loved ones, you know, that people who have gotten unwell or have unfortunately passed away. And for me, my why, it doesn't come out of like a fear based thing. It's not like I'm afraid that I'm going to die. If I don't, you know, and I have to live this way or I'll die. That's not what it is. It's very much I want to have the best quality of life. I want to live for as long as I can and live well. So that needs to be a healthy lifestyle that needs to be eating well, moving my body, getting balance, you know, binding stress. Another strong way I have would be very much to set that example for my children.
00:10:04
Speaker
And for it not to be a stressful thing, I want them to see that it's okay to relax and have fun and let your hair down and that you don't have to live a rigid, stressful life where you have to say yes to absolutely everything. And, you know, I want them to see that you can be free. You can be healthy.
00:10:21
Speaker
You can be strong, you can be fit, you can in in all senses of the word and not by following rigid rules all the time. There's no point telling your children, you have to show your children and that's a really, really strong why for me as well. So they are my deep rooted wise. And then, you know, I have other wise as well. I get a great sense of fulfillment in this new career that I am now in and being ah an online coach, a health coach, fitness coach, and a mindset coach. And I really do.
00:10:51
Speaker
think it's important to walk the walk. So I will always, even if I have time, like we all have times where we don't feel like doing things and we'll have off weeks, like nothing's perfect. I don't live a perfect lifestyle. You know, I'll have ups and downs and sometimes I'll be fitter, sometimes I'll be leaner, sometimes I'll be stronger sometimes.
00:11:09
Speaker
I won't be, and that's okay, sometimes I'm going to be stressed. That's life, and you need to think as you're adapting to this lifestyle, this is going to be your life. Life has some really great times. Life has some really shit times, and life has a lot of mundane, day-to-day, ordinary, Groundhog Day kind of days.
00:11:29
Speaker
So when you're going through really good times and you're going through really bad times, particularly the really bad times in general are few and far between, you're going to go into survivor mode and get through as best you can and you will eventually come out the other side and the really good times will be causes for a celebration and
Balancing Lifestyle and Stress Management
00:11:49
Speaker
you want to have more good times than bad times. So you want to try and create opportunities to have more good times as well. And good times can be managed within a healthy lifestyle. And then there's some really good times where it's like, no, it's time to celebrate. And that's okay. But it's all that every day stuff. We want to make that that every day as positive as possible, as healthy as possible, as balanced as possible, as relaxed as possible. And we do that
00:12:13
Speaker
by living a healthy lifestyle and that brings unexpected joy and unexpected more good times and good times and your your definition of a good time changes as well. That is another why for me that I if I'm talking about this stuff on my podcast or on social media or you know with my clients, I'm going to be living it. I'm not going to be telling people to do something I'm not doing myself, so that's another strong way. Also, I just like feeling good. you know I crave it. I crave feeling good. so As I said, I'm under the weather at the minute. I'm not enjoying it. We're into week two, and I don't like being less than feeling great. I know it's not realistic. we have to Sometimes we're not going to feel great. and I know this, but I don't enjoy it, so I like to, as much as possible, feel as good as possible while I can.
00:12:58
Speaker
so Why do you need a why? So you take the time, you think about your why, but if you haven't done it yet and you're like, why in God's name would I do that? Why do you need a why? Inspiration for when things get hard. Like things are going to get hard. Like I said, shit times happen, stressful times happen. Even the day-to-day stuff can just be really fucking annoying at times. so Things get hard. You're not always going to feel motivated.
00:13:23
Speaker
you need something. It needs to be a strong emotion. So like you can hear how heated I've got even just talking about that. like I feel really strongly about this. So that gets me up off the couch when I don't feel like it. That gets me to not make really terrible decisions on a regular basis around my nutrition. That makes me want to put good food into my body. you know That makes me want to go to the gym and Keep strong. It has to be a strong emotion. And it's different for everyone. So my wise, maybe some of them you it's like hit home with you and you're like, I feel that too. And you know take from ah from what I've said, what's relevant to you and elaborate on it for yourself, but it's different for everyone. And what gets me out of bed in the morning could be very different to what gets my best friends out of bed in the morning or my sister or you know or yourself. like it It depends on the person. Everybody is different. OK.
00:14:17
Speaker
how to find your why. So if you're like, I don't know what I want, I don't know why I would do that. It's completely understandable. If you can't intuitively think of your why, or what might inspire you to embark on this journey in the first place, so you might be like, I just feel like it's something I should do or the doctors told me or me.
00:14:33
Speaker
partners told me I need to lose weight or I know i I just I hate what I see in the in the mirror or whatever we obviously want it to be as positive as possible but you know be real with yourself it's coming from a negative place just just acknowledge that you might have even started because you feel like you should or that you don't have a choice and this is a starting point but we definitely need to make it a bit more empowering than be like I have to lose weight or I should lose weight you know I don't have a choice you know what's the alternative and but lean into the negative what happens if you don't make these changes ah You can pause this and do this while you're listening to this if you like. What does that mean for you? And this is a really good place to start. What does it mean for you if you don't make these changes? Think back to when a sacrifice you made felt more effortless than it usually does because the reason you're doing it was important enough to you.
00:15:21
Speaker
So if you're listening and you have children, this is a perfect example, you know, getting up at eight o'clock on a Saturday morning to bring your child to their football match or whatever, you do it. You really don't want to do it. I know I don't want to get up at that time in a Saturday morning, but you do it and it mightn't feel effortless, but you know, it feels doable. It feels manageable.
00:15:38
Speaker
and you do it because it's a sacrifice of of not getting your lie in. It's important enough because it'll make your child happy and it's going to help with their development. There's other situations, you know maybe helping out an elderly parent. There's lots of things. Have a think about that. Something that you usually do that feels manageable. Even though it's hard, it feels manageable, because up but its the sacrifice is important enough.
00:16:00
Speaker
knowing why you could easily cope with past difficulties can help you figure out what motivates you. Okay, so like kind of ask yourself, why does that feel okay? You'll learn a lot about yourself when you do this journaling and be like, oh, because I value looking after other people. If you learn that you're like, you know, you value looking after other people and you want to make other people happy.
00:16:22
Speaker
use that then for you and be like, okay, how would this make other people happy if I'm happy? And you know, it's it's amazing what you will come up with. Another idea is imagine how you'd like to be remembered. You're not going to be around forever. While that's not always pleasant to think about. it I feel like this is the second time I've mentioned death in this episode. I i hope you're still listening. But ask yourself how you'd like to be remembered. It's a really great way to to just discover what your driving values are. Like you don't need to dwell on it too much, but if it gives you an idea of like, I want to be remembered as someone positive who always helped out others or who always tried their best at everything and wasn't afraid.
00:17:02
Speaker
to try things that were difficult or, you know, whatever it is. And one thing that's for sure, you're not going to be like, I want to be remembered as Kate, a size 10 who weighed 140 pounds.
00:17:12
Speaker
Like no one gives a shit. you know Like let's get to the the root, your actual values. What's actually important? And then it'll be like, when you get to a healthy weight or you know to the fitness level you're looking to get to, what does that mean for your life?
Uncovering Deep Motivations
00:17:25
Speaker
Because going around feeling the exact same as you do now, but just looking and weighing slightly differently is not going to fulfill you. Okay, another powerful and relatively simple way you can uncover your why is to use the five whys exercise. ah So this involves asking yourself a basic question several times to and uncover deeper motivations. Basically, you're asking yourself why five times. I'll give an example of it. If your goal is to lose 50 pounds, the five-wise exercise might look like this. I want to lose 50 pounds. so like You literally write this in your in your journal. Why? Because I want to get fit.
00:18:04
Speaker
Why? Because I find it hard to walk uphill at the minute and I don't like it. Why? Because I'm worried about my health. Why? Because I want to be around for as long as possible and have the best quality of life. Why? Because I want to be around for my children and also travel the world and have lots of new experiences when I've raised them. Like when you think about that's gone from I want to lose 50 pounds to I want to travel the world. And it's amazing. That's what will come up.
00:18:31
Speaker
your values will come up. So I would suggest doing all of these exercises that I have mentioned and then into those five y's and you'll be shocked at what will come up. I'd love people to message me on Instagram or Facebook or whatever and tell me what they come up with. I love hearing feedback on these things for people who are listening to the podcast. You might come up with one definite deep why or you might end up with a list of whys. Either will be perfect. It doesn't matter. sos like There's no wrong way right or wrong way of doing this. It might just be like a bullet point list. You might end up writing in a fecking essay. It might be a sentence. It doesn't matter. and and Another thing is your why will likely change
00:19:07
Speaker
a bit over time and that's also okay so you know your why when you start out it's always something to to look over to revise and it's okay if it does change keep your journal close by whenever things get tough and go back and read your why or even better write it or draw it out and stick it somewhere you'll see it every day back at the wardrobe door stick it on your fridge or whatever you want to keep it at the forefront until that seeps into your subconscious mind that this is so important. This is my why. This is my identity.
00:19:39
Speaker
You need to be seeing this every single day. Okay, so just to summarize, I suppose, you shouldn't be frustrated if you don't immediately come up with values and incentives that motivate you to change your habits. It takes time, but this is where I come back to the importance of journaling. Your step one is get a journal, get a pen, get an open mind, put pen to paper. Go back over some of the ideas I've put in here and just start journaling. Start coming up with those values and incentives. It might take time and that's okay. The process takes time.
00:20:10
Speaker
But this is your number one journaling exercise until you can feel it strongly. So it's not just a case of it's a list that you're running through and you're not really taking in. You want to feel this, like this needs to be so important to you and do take it seriously.
00:20:25
Speaker
If you've tried all the diets and nothing has worked, this could be the changing factor for you to now make progress. That's how important it is, okay? It could be the one thing that's missing. That's like preventing you from making that breakthrough and reaching your goals. So I would love to hear how you get on, so please do message me.
00:20:47
Speaker
on Instagram, on Facebook, wherever, and let me know how you get on with that. It has been life changing for me. I do this work with my clients and it has been life changing for them also. So it's definitely, definitely a worthwhile activity.
00:21:03
Speaker
So happy journaling and thank you so much for listening to the podcast. As always, I really, really do appreciate it every single one of you. And as I always say, if you like this episode, please do share it on your stories, tag me or share it in your WhatsApp groups or with your friends or anyone who you think would enjoy it and and spread the words, the more, the better. And if you're not subscribed to the podcast, we just check and see that you are and following the podcast so that you are updated with new episodes.
00:21:32
Speaker
And also last thing, if you do like this episode or any of the episodes, please do leave a review or a comment. All of these little things help to grow the podcast and I really appreciate it. And I will talk to you all on the next episode.