Ep #80: Finding Your Why (How to Stay Motivated)

Welcome to The Not Your Average Runner Podcast. If you’re a woman who is midlife and plus sized and you want to start running but don’t know how, or if it’s even possible, you’re in the right place. Using proven strategies and real-life experience, certified running and life coach Jill Angie shares how you can learn to run in the body you have right now.

Hey rebels, you are listening to episode number 80 of The Not Your Average Runner Podcast. I’m your host, Jill Angie, and today we’re talking all about creating new habits. And when I say habits, I mean anything from creating a running habit to the habit of getting up earlier or whatever it is.

And this is actually something we’ve been working on all month in Run Your Best Life and it’s kind of fun to watch what everybody’s creating for themselves. And honestly, I’m a little obsessed with the whole concept of creating and installing new habits. And I’m going to tell you about the habit that I’m working on this month and then we’re going to go over the whole process in today’s episode.

But first, I want to make sure that you know there’s only a few more days to sign up for the 5K course. It’s called Not Your Average 5K, it’s an eight-week online class to help you train for and finish a 5K feeling awesome and proud of yourself and I mean, I’m calling this sort of the 5K training for Couch to 2K dropouts because if you’ve ever tried a Couch to 2K program before and you got to like, week three or four and they expect you to run, I don’t know, like five minutes straight or 10 minutes straight or something and you’re like, fuck that, that’s way too hard, I’m not going to do that, well, this is the class for you.

We have a ton of beginners in this class. People that have never run before. We also have lots of folks who have done 5Ks before, weren’t happy with it, and want to kind of do it again to see if they can improve. So it sort of runs the gamut, but if you’ve never run before, if you’re brand new, even if you want to walk your 5K, this is a great class for you.

If you’ve done a few and you want to just get better, you want to improve your performance, also a great class for you because we’re going to work not just on the technical skills but also on the mindset skills. We’re going to do a lot of mental coaching around running.

Okay, so I did originally close enrollment a few weeks ago because we had a lot of people sign up really fast and I was kind of like, wow, that’s a lot of people, that’s probably enough, but now I’ve had so many people reach out and ask to be let in that we’ve decided – talked with the team and we said alright, let’s open it up just for a short time again and class is going to start on March 4th, which is, as of the time you’re hearing this podcast, about a week and a half.

So you need to jump in on it pretty much right now if you want in on this round. So you can sign up for it at notyouraverage5k.com. Just head over there, sign up, and join us because it’s going to be amazing. And right now, everybody in that class is working on consistency to get themselves ready for training to start.

So the folks that signed up early, we’re just hanging out, doing some work on consistency, and I kind of want to talk about what that means because it really ties into our habit discussion. So, consistency just means that you have a habit of doing something. Habits can be made unintentionally or intentionally. An unintentional habit is something you just sort of start doing without paying a lot of attention, and then one day that’s just how you do it.

Like biting your nails. Nobody sits down and says, okay, I’m going to schedule nail biting into my calendar from 3pm to 3:15pm today. You just sort of find yourself doing it because you’ve always done it. It’s not an intentional activity. An intentional habit is one that you decide on ahead of time and actively work to create or actively work to break too.

If you’re trying to stop biting your nails, you want to unlearn that habit, you also need to be intentional about it. You can’t just expect to say in your mind one day, I’m going to stop biting my nails, and expect it to happen. You actually need to figure out the strategies to help you relearn living your life without biting your nails. You need to decide, make a plan for how you’re going to make it happen, and then execute that plan over and over and over.

So anyway, my 5K client, they’re working on consistency right now and they’re specifically trying to install the habit of running three times per week. Not for a specific time or distance, but rather just the habit of putting on their workout clothes, putting on their shoes and so forth, and getting out the door or onto a treadmill. So just the habit of starting the workout and doing some of it.

And then of course, working through all of the bullshit excuses that come up that keep us from running. So they are building that habit now, they’re trying to install it now so that when it comes time for training to start on March 4th, my 5K folks are going to have that habit established, and then they can focus on the skills they’ll be learning in training.

So they’ve already got that first part worked on. And if you join that class now, that’s exactly what you’re going to get. We’re going to start with the habit of consistency and work on those skills first before we start training on March 4th. Now, one thing that is really important when you’re building a new habit is to be very clear on exactly what you’re trying to achieve.

Now, if I say hey, I’m working on consistency, that’s really vague. It means different things to different people. Some people it might mean run once a week, some people it might mean run seven times a week. So when I say to myself consistency means to me that I’m running three times a week, that’s very, very specific.

So, when you’re trying to start out to build a new habit, make sure you define exactly what that habit looks like. Then, the next step is to take a look at everything that is involved in creating that habit. So going for a run, for example, consists of a lot of activities beforehand and some afterwards that also need to be included or that run won’t happen.

So I’m going to give you an example from my own life, from the habit that I’m trying to install. So, recently I read a book called The 5AM Club, which I think is by Robin Sharma, and I got the idea to read that from Corinne Crabtree at the Losing 100 Pounds Podcast, which is amazing. If you don’t listen to that podcast, you should.

But she read that book and really liked it and I thought, I’m going to check that out. So the book is about the value of getting up at 5am to work on your personal development. And I actually love, love, love the early hours of the morning. I love the quiet and the solitude and just that feeling of like, being awake before anybody else is awake.

But I used to get up that early when I had a desk job to go to every day. I’ve gotten out of the habit of rising at five because now my life is different and my work hours are different. So I actually want to start getting up at 5am again and journaling and reading and doing all that work on myself from five to six in the morning before Andy gets up. I want to have that solitude again that like, peacefulness, that amazing feeling that I have at that time of day.

And I decided at the beginning of February that this would be my habit. I’ve done it exactly one time and it was because I had to get up to catch the 6:30am train to New York City. Otherwise, I’ve missed it every single time. And here’s what I realized this morning at 6:15 when I was still in bed is that the habit of getting up at 5am every morning is actually a collection of smaller habits, smaller supporting habits that lead to that final result.

So for me, those habits are going to bed by 10pm, leaving my phone in the kitchen, not by my bedside, setting my alarm the night before, because believe it or not, I actually haven’t set my alarm at all this month and now I’m wondering like, hmm, I wonder why I don’t get up at 5am. Well, duh. You have to set your alarm for 5am.

Also, setting up the coffee maker the night before. That’s one of my excuses when I wake up in the morning, I think, I don’t want to have to get up and fill the coffee maker. I could just set it up the night before. Not hitting the snooze and getting up the first time the alarm goes off, that’s another habit that I need to get into if I want this 5am thing to work.

Getting into the habit of not checking social media or email in bed in the morning, because a lot of times what I do is the alarm goes off and I pick up my iPad and I start looking at it. I start scrolling through Instagram or whatever, the next thing I know it’s like half an hour later. So that’s a habit that I need to uninstall.

And then I need to get in the habit of remembering all of my excuses, like knowing them ahead of time and then also being prepared with what I’m going to say back to myself when my brain wants to stay in bed. So those are all a bunch of other habits that really need to be created if I want to make 5am like, an easy thing for me.

And I really – I haven’t done any of those things routinely this month except leaving my phone in the kitchen. That’s the one thing I do do but it doesn’t stop me from social media in the morning because my iPad is next to my bed because I use my iPad to read my Kindle books. So before I can expect myself to get up at 5am every morning, I need to work on making all of that other stuff part of my habit.

And once I realized that, I’m like, oh okay, so where can I start with that? So for me, I’m going to start with figuring out how I’m going to get myself into bed every night at 10pm, making that a habit, and then the other habit I’m going to work on is not hitting the snooze button. So setting the alarm and then just getting up when the alarm goes off.

And here’s the thing; I’m going to fuck it up. I’m going to fail, I’m probably going to fail repeatedly. But that’s part of this process is being willing to suck at something until you get really good at it. So, first step is define exactly what the habit is that you’re trying to create. Be very specific with measurable things, and then brainstorm all of the supporting habits that you need to also establish to make sure that you are successful.

So that’s like, setting the intention for the habit there. Now, the next thing that we need to talk about is discomfort. So, when you’re installing a new habit or uninstalling an old one, or breaking an old one, there is a period of discomfort. It could be physical, it could be mental, it could be emotional, could be all three. And if you think about getting up at 5am, if you’re not used to it, that very first time, it’s awful. Maybe even the 10th time it’s awful.

You’re tired, cranky, you just want to turn the alarm off and go back to sleep. It is not even slightly comfortable to get out of bed. Change requires discomfort and your current habit, which might be getting up at 6am or 7am really in my case, provides with you comfort. It feels comfortable to do it that way.

So to install the new habit, you have to be willing to be uncomfortable as many times as it takes for that new wake up time to become ingrained. And your brain and body will fight you the entire way. They do not want you to evolve out of your comfort zone. Change requires discomfort and your brain does not like that.

Your brain likes routine, your brain likes things that work smoothly and automatically. It likes things that are comfortable. You have to be willing to deny your brain the reward of that instant comfort long enough for the new habit to start establishing itself. And like I said before, you have to be willing to fail and fuck things up along the way.

Perfectionism has zero place in creating new habits. Perfectionism, expecting yourself to be perfect the first time or that you have to do it 100 times in a row no matter what, perfectionism like that is just an excuse to quit on yourself.

So, once your habit is installed, it’s not usually a big deal to maintain it. You might fall off the wagon here and there and you might have to re-establish it. That’s the way life works, but once it’s installed, you’ll know oh, I feel so good when I keep doing this, that’s going to pull you forward. But in the interim period, you need a compelling reason to keep pulling you forward through the fuck ups and the failures and all the discomfort.

So you need this compelling reason. I like to call it your why. Find your why. So this is something that you want more than you want the comfort of staying the same. It’s an evolution. You’re just like, I want to be that person more than I want to be the person I am right now. And honestly, having a compelling reason is one of the strongest indicators of success. It’s the strongest indicator of your commitment to making it happen.

And you can draw on this reason every time you feel the desire to quit. Even if you’re thinking, I just want to quit today – if you listened to my podcast on how to stop quitting, if you have a little quit and you’re like, I just want to skip it today, you can draw on your compelling reason at that time.

So for example, like when the alarm goes off and you just want to stay in bed and you can ask yourself, why am I doing this again? Why do I want to get up at 5am? And in my case, it’s because I want to carve out the time and really dedicate my brain. I like the way I feel at five o clock in the morning. I like doing my work at five o clock in the morning, that’s my compelling reason. If that reason is strong enough, which for me I think it is, as long as I get the rest of the habits in place, you’ll get up and go.

Now, when you have a compelling reason, you don’t need to worry about whether someone else thinks you’re crazy or about how hard it’s going to be or getting rejected or whatever it is. You’re all in no matter what. You’re 100% committed.

And let’s talk about what 100% commitment means. So here’s an example. Let’s say you told me that you were going to train for a marathon and I asked you, hey, how committed are you? And you say, I’m 100% committed, I am all in for this. And I say, that’s awesome, so if you’re 100% committed, if you’re all in, are you going to give me $10,000 if you don’t do it? And most people are like, hell no.

And the reason is because they’re not actually 100% committed. They’re like, $10,000 is a lot of money. What if I fail? I’m like, but you just said you’re 100% committed? What they mean is I’m 100% committed as long as it’s not too hard. Commitment is knowing you’re going to finish that marathon no matter what.

When you’re fully committed to something, you remove all the other options. You don’t worry about saying I’m going to give you 10 grand if I don’t finish because you’re like, not finishing is not a possibility in my mind. So you’re like, I don’t need to come up with $10,000, I’m not going to need it. I’m finishing that race.

You have to know why you want something before you can be fully committed. That’s the compelling reason. So a compelling reason is something that is fun, it’s intriguing, it’s exciting, it’s kind of juicy. It’s something you think like, hey, I really want this and I’m willing to do whatever I need to do to get it.

And that reason can be anything. It can be a collection of reasons. As long as it is meaningful to you and it’s something that you want more than you want that comfort of staying the same. You want the evolution of whatever you’re trying to establish more than you want the comfort of being who you are right now.

And you need this because it can be really hard to do the work to change. I’m going to talk about a client. We just coached on this today in the Run Your Best Life group. So she has set the Disney Dopey Challenge as her goal for 2020, which is amazing. And for those of you who don’t know what that is, it’s a little craycray.

It takes place in January every year. It’s a 5K on Thursday, 10K on Friday, half marathon on Saturday, and a full marathon on Sunday. It is literally 48.6 miles I think, 48.6 miles over the course of four days. And if you don’t train your heart out, that race is going to feel like ass and you might not even finish it.

So in addition to the training, or as part of her training for this, she’s going to do it in 2020, my client is working really hard on developing the habit of consistency because she’s – it’s not something she’s been able to establish up until now. So I’m like, we got to work on this, girl. We got to get to work on getting you consistently running three times a week. Maybe even four times a week towards the end of the year as she starts getting closer to this race event because I don’t want her to feel awful on her long training runs and on race day.

Now, here is the thing; she doesn’t really like training. She doesn’t really like training those long training runs. She loves race day, she loves the medals, she loves the feeling of being at Disney and all the people around her and just kind of that experience, but she doesn’t like the training. Not a fan.

So what happens is she finds excuses not to train, then she’ll do a half marathon or whatever, it’ll feel like ass, she’ll beat herself up for it. She’ll feel bad and then the cycle keeps repeating itself. And I know – here’s the thing; she’s not alone. I am not picking her out of a line up here. I am calling out everybody who has this habit, and I’ve had this habit before too.

And sometimes in certain areas of my life I still have this habit. It’s like, this is the human experience. I know this sounds familiar to a lot of you. It is a very, very common thing. So we talked about it in today’s Run Your Best Life call that she actually wants the result of having run the race, of having completed the Dopey challenge, but she doesn’t want to do the work to get there. That’s the part that she’s like, I just want to go show up for the race.

But the problem is you can’t do the race without doing the work to get there and it’s a lot of work. It’s a lot of running. It’s literally hundreds and hundreds and miles of training runs. It is not for the faint of heart and it’s definitely not going to be fun if you go into it with this attitude of I hate training runs, I hate these long training runs.

Now, like I said, a lot of us have this same issue. We want the thing, but we don’t want to do the work to get the thing. But we still really want the thing, and this sets up a lot of drama in our brains because then we tell ourselves this story about there’s something wrong with me because I’m not willing to do the work even though I want to finish this challenge. Then we just get all up in our own heads. We get frustrated that we’re not the person we want to be, the person who can achieve that result. We want it to be easier, we want the finish line but not the discomfort along the way.

So, for my client to finish this race, she’s going to need to evolve into somebody who is willing to be uncomfortable and just let something be hard. And suddenly I was like, all these dick jokes came into my mind. Anyway, so to finish this race – cracking myself up here. I have the sense of humor of a 12-year-old boy, you guys, if you haven’t figured that out by now you haven’t been listening.

But anyway, for her to finish this race, she’s really going to need to evolve into a different version of herself. Someone who’s willing to be uncomfortable and just let something be not easy, let something be difficult and not make it mean anything about her. Not make it mean like – right now she’s telling herself I hate doing these training runs.

When she thinks the thought, I hate doing these training runs, she feels resistant. When she feels resistant, she stays home or she skips her run or she just like, drives right by the park on the way home, and then her result is she still hates training. She doesn’t even give herself a chance to experience it.

So, instead of spending time thinking about how much your run is going to suck, which by the way, like I just showed you, it makes it suck more, you need to work on just accepting that your body and mind might be uncomfortable while you’re training, and that’s okay. Not everything is a cakewalk in life, and because we go and do hard things, it makes us appreciate the easy things.

Through the hard thing of training, you’re going to appreciate the race a lot more. So accepting that your body and mind might be uncomfortable while you’re evolving, while you’re training, while you’re becoming this new person and remembering that you’re trading discomfort right now for pride and accomplishment and an easier race in the future.

And this is what building a habit is about. It really comes down to that. Trading discomfort right now as you establish the habit for the ease of having that all be automated and be properly trained for your race in the future. So, a compelling reason helps you accept that discomfort. Doesn’t make the discomfort go away but it helps you accept it and not resist it.

And when you have that reason, you’re cool with it being tough. You’re cool with it being difficult. I mean, it’s not like you have to be in love with it being difficult. Whatever it is, but you’re okay with it, and that’s super important. You’re okay with it because you know the end result is worth it.

And now, here’s the other thing; I want you to remember that a solid compelling reason is also tied to how you want to feel because that’s why we do everything in life, because of how we think it’s going to make us feel. So my client wants to do the Dopey Challenge because she thinks she’s going to feel proud. So a solid compelling reason for her is going to be tied to that feeling of pride and accomplishment that she wants to feel in January of next year.

And here’s some examples of compelling reasons that my clients have used in the past. So I have clients that want to go to bed earlier and their compelling reason is I’m sick and tired of feeling tired every morning. I want to wake up in the morning and not be rushing around, I want to wake up in the morning and not have to cut people off in traffic to get to work on time. I want to go to bed earlier so that I can get up earlier, feel good in the morning, and have a better day.

When you wake up tired, you kind of have a crappy day. Like, most people don’t feel great all day long if they wake up exhausted. So a compelling reason of going to bed earlier is because you want to feel better the next day. Training for a half marathon, I have clients who want to be able to train for and finish a half marathon to feel proud of themselves, yes, and to also evolve into that person who can do hard things everywhere in their life.

So the training for a half marathon, it’s not about getting the bling. It’s about using that as a tool to evolve yourself into somebody who can do hard things. Here’s one that was mine. This is actually a really simple example, but about 10 years ago, maybe longer, I stopped drinking Diet Coke cold turkey because I recognized that the reason I was having a lot of headaches and body aches was because of the artificial sweeteners that didn’t react well with my body.

And so I had this compelling reason no matter how badly I wanted a Diet Coke, I was like, I don’t want to feel like shit anymore. Now that I know the reason I feel awful is because of this artificial sweetener, I’m done. Compelling reason. Stopped cold turkey. Now, notice that none of these that I talked about is achieving a goal for the sake of having the goal. Each of these, if there’s a goal involved, each of these habits is tied to a feeling. Emotional or physical, it’s tied to a feeling.

So while you’re listening to me right now, I want you to go ahead and think about the habit that you’re trying to install or that you want to install and why you want to do it. Does that reason get you excited? Or is it sort of meh?

Now, in the case of my client who wants to do Dopey, she’s struggling right now to find a reason that gets her excited. Like, a compelling reason to do these hard things. Like, she can’t find something that’s exciting enough and that’s why she’s struggling. So she needs a compelling reason not just to finish the race. She’s already got that reason.

The reason for her to finish the race is she wants the bling, she loves the beauty of that, she wants to feel like oh my gosh, I did this hard thing. She wants the experience of being in the park for four days and running in the park. But she does not have a compelling reason to get her through the training. Like, the desire to do the race and have the experience of the race is not strong enough yet to get her through all of the training.

So that habit of consistency that she’s trying to develop, she needs the compelling reason for that. Not for the race. Now, the compelling reason might actually be because she wants her race to go well, because she doesn’t want to feel like ass on race day or during the race challenge, or it might be because she’s like, I really badly want to become that person that can rely on myself to keep commitments.

So whatever your reason is, it needs to be juicy and exciting and really, really important to you. Somebody else’s compelling reason might be completely different. Like, I know I’ve talked to women that have – they want to lose weight and one of the things they say is, well you know, my reason to lose weight is because I want to fit into this pair of jeans that I think is really cute.

And I’m like, well, if that’s compelling enough to you, then go for it. That’s awesome. Somebody else, that might not be compelling. Somebody else might have a different reason. So it doesn’t need to be deep and meaningful. Just needs to be something juicy and exciting and important to you.

Now, if you can’t think of one off the top of your head, and oftentimes people can’t, I recommend just brainstorming for 10 minutes. Take 10 minutes, a piece of paper, write down at least 10 reasons that you can think of. Get creative, whatever comes to mind. Like I said, whether it’s silly or deep or something you just read on an Instagram meme, just write it down and then read through that list and see how you feel.

What emotions come up for you? Do you get chills when you think about it? Or do you feel kind of meh? Keep working on your list and it might take a few days. You might think, oh, this is my compelling reason and then a week later you’re like, nah, not so much. Keep working on it. Keep refining it. It doesn’t have to be done overnight. When you find it, you’ll know, it’s going to click and it’s going to be a gamechanger.

Now, the final piece is once you’ve got that compelling reason, you need to use it every single time your brain argues with you about your new habit. So for me, when my alarm goes off in the morning, my brain is going to give me all the reasons I should stay in bed for another hour and I’m going to have to have that conversation about why we want to get up right then instead of sleeping.

Your compelling reason to do a half marathon so you can feel proud and believe in yourself is going to fly right out the window at 5am when that alarm goes off for your morning training run. You need to be prepared for that. It’s not a matter of if it happens but when. So I want you to do another brainstorm, make a list of at least 10 excuses that you’re going to come up with every time you try to install your habit and your brain argues.

Come up with 10 excuses and then 10 rebuttals for every single one. And your rebuttal could just simply be like, hey, I know it’s cold outside but we want this thing, we want to run a half marathon more than we want an extra 15 minutes of sleep or to stay warm for an extra 15 minutes. Whatever it is, 10 excuses, 10 rebuttals, and then when it happens, when it happens, not if, when your brain argues with you, instead of being pissed off, you just say thank you brain for being amazing and working exactly as designed and then reply with your rebuttals.

Doesn’t need to be any drama. There’s nothing wrong with you if this happens. It means your brain is working properly. Yay for that. And then you know, you’re just going to practice that over and over and over again. You’re going to fuck it up a lot. It’s awesome. Keep going. Every time you fuck it up, you’re going to learn a little bit. You’re going to fail forward.

And finally, here’s the thing I want to leave you with. A lot of times we lose track of our compelling reason. Along the way we get tied up in the drama. So I want you to ask yourself right now what will happen if you do not install this habit into your life, whatever it is. Be really clear on the consequences. If I’m talking to you a year from now and you haven’t installed whatever this habit is, what are the consequences? And look at that and you might find your compelling reason right there.

It might just be because I don’t want that to happen. When you think about taxes, a lot of people say oh, I don’t love doing my taxes but I don’t like the consequence of going to jail. That’s a really compelling reason. So the compelling reason for doing your taxes is not because it’s fun. You’re never going to talk yourself into that, right? Just be really clear like, I don’t want to go to jail so therefore I do my taxes.

So sometimes consequences of not establishing a habit can be a compelling reason as well, so I want you to be really clear on that. Okay my rebellious friends, that is it for today. I really hope this podcast was helpful to you. If it was, feel free to drop us a line, support@notyouraveragerunner.com.

And remember, if you want to run a 5K this May, and if you want to start right now working on consistency, the habit of consistency, please consider joining us in the 5K course that’s starting up on March 4th. If you sign up now a few weeks ahead of time or a couple weeks ahead of time, we can get you started working on consistency.

But even if you don’t, we’re going to do a whole ton of work on it in the class. It’s eight weeks of amazing. I want you to just go to notyouraverage5k.com right now. Just go do it. In fact, if you haven’t done it, I’m confused because it’s amazing. It’s an awesome class.

So training begins March 4th. You’re going to want to join early so you can get to know everybody. There are some really fun women in that class. They’re having a lot of fun. You’re going to want to connect with them, want to get yourself prepped. I’m going to be announcing the training plan really, really soon, so you definitely want to be in at least a few days early so you can see the training plan.

And just go there right now and join. In fact, even if you’re out running on a trail right now, I want you to stop, pause your Garmin, and just click on over to notyouraverage5k.com. Sign up for the class and you can continue running being like oh good, I took care of that.

Now, if you’re listening to this after March 4th and you want to take the class, you’re a little bit out of luck right now but you can still go to the site, get yourself on the waitlist for the next session because we will be running it again later on in the year. I don’t know exactly when but if you’re listening to this after March 4th, go ahead to notyouraverage5k.com, get yourself on the waitlist for the summer session and we’ll see you then.

Alright my friends, that is it for this week. Everything I mentioned in this episode can be found in the show notes at notyouraveragerunner.com/80. 80 fucking episodes, can you believe it? So good. Alright, I will talk to you soon.

Thanks for listening to this episode of The Not Your Average Runner Podcast. If you liked what you heard and want more, head over to www.notyouraveragerunner.com to download your free one-week jumpstart plan and get started running today.