Ep #391: Coach Yourself Like You Give a Damn

Welcome to the Not Your Average Runner podcast. I’m Jill Angie, a certified running coach, and your running BFF here to help you start running. Feel confident and love the journey no matter your size. Now, if you’ve ever felt like you just weren’t meant to be a runner, think again. I believe that running is for all bodies, even yours.

This podcast is your warmup buddy, giving you tips, motivation, and the support you need to lace up and get moving. I’ve helped thousands of women become runners, and now I wanna help you. Let’s go.

Hey there runner, and welcome back to the podcast. For women who want to run strong, live loud, and stop caring what anybody else thinks about their pace, their body, or their life. Today’s episode is all about coaching yourself. Like you actually give a damn, because let’s be real, whether you have got a coach, hi, hello, I’m your coach.

Uh, a fancy training plan, or you’re just flying solo. You are the one calling the shots. You are the CEO of your running journey, and if you have been acting like a burnt out intern instead of the boss, well running is not gonna be too much fun. Fortunately, all of that changes today because we are gonna get into it.

Now, you may not realize this, but every time you lace up your shoes or skip a run or talk smack to yourself in your head. You are actually coaching yourself. You are giving yourself feedback. You are writing your own performance review. You are adjusting your strategy. That’s what’s happening. So let’s pause for a second and ask, would you ever coach somebody else the way you coach yourself?

Would you ever say, oh wow, you only did one run this week, kind of pathetic. Would you ever say, uh, you’re too fat to be a runner, or would you ever say you’re not a real runner until you do a marathon? Hell no, you wouldn’t. And also if you would, I have questions that that’s for another podcast, but I’m guessing if you were coaching somebody else, you would say things like, Hey, it’s okay.

Life got in the way. We’re just gonna pick up where we left off, or you showed up for yourself today. And that’s important. Or you might say one mile is still a mile, no matter how long it takes you to cover it, that’s how you would talk to somebody else. But we don’t always talk to ourselves that way. And why is it that we reserve all of the grace and encouragement and compassion for other people?

So frustrating. When you treat yourself like you don’t matter, like your running doesn’t count unless it checks off every box perfectly. You stop showing up, and it’s not because you’re lazy, it’s not because you’re weak. It’s because nobody thrives under a bully. Nobody shows up as their best self when they are getting bullied and be raided and yelled at.

Ask your teenagers if you’ve ever yelled at a teenager or any child for that matter, and expected that suddenly they are going to be behaving perfectly and just be all smiles and daisies and rainbows. No, that’s not how it works. When you yell at other people, when you are bull a bully to other people, they don’t show up as their best selves.

They’re scared, they’re anxious, right? So don’t do that to yourself. Here’s what people do thrive under encouragement, support, flexibility, and compassion. So if you wanna be a consistent runner, if you want running to be a long-term relationship, instead of like a toxic situationship that you ghost on every three months.

If that’s what you want, you’ve gotta stop co start coaching yourself like you give a damn. So let’s talk strategy. Here’s go four, here’s, let me start that again. Let’s talk strategy. Here are four ways to coach yourself better, because I’m not just here to yell at you lovingly and send you on your way.

I’m here to give you some practical advice. So. Number one, set a minimum baseline. We’ve talked about this before. Your minimum baseline is that bare minimum version of your running that you know you can do even when everything felt else feels hard, right? It is not about being impressive. It’s not about being.

You know, setting a pr, it is about being consistent. So if your minimum baseline is five minutes walking in place in your pajamas while you’re listening to an audio book, or maybe you’ve got the video off and you are in a work meeting that is winning, okay? If your baseline is five minutes of walking in place in your pajamas and you do that, you’re winning.

So number one, set that minimum baseline so that you have something to fall back on when life gets tough. Strategy number two, talk to yourself like a coach, not a critic. Now you do not have to fake sunshine and rainbows. You do not have to be all like, oh, everything’s perfect and you know it’s gonna be fine, right?

You don’t have to do that, but stop being an asshole to yourself. Try this. Here’s what the critic would say. The critic would say, you are so behind on that training plan. But a coach would say, all right, this week didn’t go as planned. What is one thing we can do right now? What is one thing we can do tomorrow?

How do we get this train back on the track? Right? The critic is critical. The coach is like, these are our circumstances. How can we And, and there’s no judgment, right? These are our circumstances. What are we gonna do with it? Instead of going all the way to, oh, you’re such a lazy ass. You’re so behind, right?

So be a coach, not a critic. Strategy number three, celebrate like it matters. ’cause it does, right? Did you show up today? Celebrate it. Minimum baseline. Celebrate it. Did you rest because your body needed it? Celebration. Did you pause your run to pet a dog? Double celebration runners who feel appreciated, stick with it longer, and the first person to appreciate you needs to be you.

You cannot rely on other people to give you kudos and clap for you and say they’re proud of you. You gotta be that person for yourself. So start now. Celebrate every little thing, alright? Even if it’s just you by yourself clapping in your living room, that that is reinforcing that this is a thing that is important and that you’re doing just fine.

All right. Strategy number four is. Have a plan for when life hits the fan. You like my little rhyme there? So here’s the thing, bad days are gonna happen. Your boss is gonna be a jackass, and you’ll have a hot flash right as your dog is throwing up on the rug, right? These things happen. Have a plan for those days, right?

And, and the plan might not be, I’m going to strong arm myself into finishing my training plan. It might be, okay, I’m not gonna throw the entire training plan in the in the trash. Here’s my plan B, maybe Plan B is a walk or a stretch, or just writing, not today. Satan, in your journal. Whatever it is, have a plan B for when things come up and, and you’re like, I cannot do the planned workout that I had today, but here’s what I’m going to do instead to keep myself consistent, um, to respect my body.

And again, it might be a rest day is your plan B, but like, think about it ahead of time. How are you going to react when everything goes tits up? All right. So those are your four strategies. Here’s what you need to know. You don’t have to be perfect. You don’t even have to be consistent right away. I just want you to care enough about yourself to show up even imperfectly, to treat your goals like they’re worth working for.

To talk to yourself like someone who matters because you do. So this week I want you to ask yourself, if I were coaching me, what would I say right now? And then say it. You could say it out loud, into the mirror, into the void. It doesn’t matter. Just say it and keep saying it until it starts to stick. And hey, if you want a crew that always coaches with compassion and structure and a whole lot of hype squad energy, come hang out with us in Run Your Best Life.

We have got weekly coaching calls. We have a full training plan library. We have strength training and yoga classes on demand, and we have the most supportive community of plus size runners on the internet. All right. You can go to run your best life.com to check it out, or the link is in the show notes and I would love to have you there.

Meanwhile, please coach yourself like you give a damn because you deserve nothing less. Now, I will be back next week with more tips to help you run strong, run happy, and run your way. Until next time, speak kindly to yourself and you’ve got this.

Real quick before you go, I’ve got a fun challenge for you. Take my exerciser personality quiz to find out exactly what kind of exerciser you are and how to make running feel easier and more enjoyable.

Just head over to not your average runner.com/quiz to take it and get your results. That’s not your average runner.com/quiz.