The Divergent Fitness Podcast

In this episode, I discuss setting events, what they are and how being aware of and working with them can help you create lifelong healthy behavior changes.

In this episode, Emily and I discuss trauma, how it changes your body, and why a trauma-informed personal trainer is a must when you are searching for someone safe enough to walk this journey with you.

In this episode, we discuss the number one strategy for having a mindset that will facilitate sustainable and psychologically healthy behavior change.

In this episode, Mark Bransky and I discuss the current state of the fitness industry, how our relationship with fitness has evolved over time, and what it really means to be healthy in every domain of life.

In this episode, we discuss the implications of the aesthetics driven fitness industry, the alienation of larger bodied people, and the best tools to begin a fitness journey that is truly sustainable.

In this episode, I share my top three strategies for being consistent in your health behaviors for life. Teaching my clients to value consistency over intensity has been transformative in their lives.

In this episode, I make an argument for the benefits of weightlifting that have more to do with the psychological benefits versus the exaggerated societal focus of body recomposition.

In this episode, my colleague and fellow mom Angela Tam joins us for a conversation about food rules, what they are, whether or not they are helpful, and how using the model of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy can support us to move towards our values more effectively and with self-compassion.

The book I mentioned “The Dance of Anger” can be found here.

Check out @divergentfitnessca to see pictures of Cora and see her journey from two ends of the spectrum to find her way to true self-acceptance in the middle.

Click below to access Jaime and Katie’s free e-book on gym and fitness anxiety. Get Out of Your Head and Into the Gym

You can find Andrea Perone @themomlete on IG and learn more about her #RENEW program (starting Feb 21st) here.

In this episode, we learn from Morgan Shepherd about her journey to finding the right kind of fitness goals that work for her. She also shares her FEED method for working with clients as a transformational nutrition coach.

In this episode, I discuss body image with Chauntae Gold, behavior nutrition coach, and how transitioning to performance based lifting sports healed her relationship with food and exercise.

In this episode, I apply behavior chain hacking to the target behavior of meal-prepping so that it can be applied to your life easily. I also recorded this episode via video and put it on Youtube so feel free to find it there where you can view the visuals as well.

Episode Transcript Amber Sobrio-Ritter (00:00):Hello, welcome to the Divergent Fitness Podcast. It's so exciting because today we have our very first guest. Sarah's a Behavior Analyst in New Jersey and an expert on intuitive eating. And she's joining us today to have this really interesting conversation about intuitive eating and how she's really blended the science of applied behavior analysis with intuitive eating. So Sarah, can you just start with a brief overview of what is intuitive eating and your journey to get there?Sarah Burby (00:58):Sure. So I'll try to keep this one brief. But basically intuitive eating is really the self-care framework that helps you repair your relationship with food, helps you repair your relationship with movement and it's helping you unlearn a lot of unhelpful things that you've learned probably for a really long time, from a very young age about food, about body image, all of that kind of thing. So it's really trying to unlearn a lot of unhelpful things that you might have learned in the past, through this self-care framework. And I found intuitive eating accidentally because I am someone that struggled a lot years and years ago with body image issues and having very rigid eating patterns and never feeling like I looked good enough or I was doing anything that was good enough. And really, I credit a lot to intuitive eating to helping me just really make a huge shift in my behaviors and not just eating but how I live my life. So I'm just very grateful for that and that's where I first learned about intuitive eating.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (02:04):Yeah. So I've heard you talk a little bit about body neutrality. So what is body neutrality?Sarah Burby (02:11):Yeah, so it's basically having an understanding of, you're not necessarily going to love your body every single day. And I think that's something that we're told, I don't know, either through societies or diet culture, that once you get to X amount of weight or you build this amount of muscle, then you're just going to wake up in the morning and love yourself, love the way you look every single day. And that's just not realistic,. We're all human beings and we're going to have some days that we might wake up and we just feel icky or we feel blah and that's normal and it's okay to feel like that. But there's a difference in having a bad day and having a bad body image day versus talking unkindly to yourself. And that's where the difference is, is you don't have to love how you look or how you feel every single day but you also don't need to break yourself, you also don't need to hate yourself, you also don't need to shame yourself. And that's really the whole concept behind body neutrality.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (03:04):Right. Yeah. This reminds me of when I was on a body building program and I got super lean and honestly just found new things to talk negatively to myself about. I mean, it was just like, "Check that box." Of now I can see my abs but now my stomach skin after having children looks this way or this is another thing, it almost feels like a wheel that you just get stuck on.Sarah Burby (03:29):Exactly. And I think that's a great point because a lot of times we will say exactly we want to tone our arms or we want to have the perfect thighs or the perfect booty but then we never stop there. It's this vicious, never ending cycle and we're never going to, unless we accept our body and we learn to accept our genetic blueprint, we're always going to find something. And our bodies are constantly changing literally every single day, what we look like today is going to be very different than what we looked at five years ago and that's going to be very different than how we look five years from now. So if we're constantly obsessing about how we look in certain body parts, it's just setting ourselves up for failure.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (04:07):Why do you think we do this? Why do you think we have in our minds, "Okay, I want to access whatever." What do we think we're going to access by having the perfect butt or the perfect abs? And is it really about those abs or that butt or is it about something different?Sarah Burby (04:25):I think it's about something different and I think it starts, unfortunately, at a very young age from society and from what's modeled for us. I'm sure a lot of us and a lot of your listeners can relate to this growing up, people that you looked up to are probably constantly dieting or maybe your friends are constantly trying to look a certain way. And that behavior was modeled for us at a very young age. And if you look on any social media or TV or magazine, what is highlighted and what is deemed to be successful is having this, "Perfect body image," that's probably edited and touched and it's very unrealistic. Or you look on social media and you have this person that has a very strong physique or maybe looks a certain way and that person's like, "Oh well, I just exercised 20 minutes a day and eat this food."Sarah Burby (05:17):And you're like, "Okay, that's definitely not the truth." But that's what's portrayed and that's what's seen to be as realistic. So I think a lot of it is from, again, what we see and what's modeled for us and shapes our behavior now in what we're trying to get. But again, what we talked about is, it's chasing this never ending... It's just a never ending race because we're never happy no matter what we try to do or what we try to change, we're never satisfied with how we look.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (05:44):Right. And I think there are people that can eat, generally, whatever they want and exercise 20 minutes a day and look a certain way but they are not talking about potentially just genetics, this their body type. Maybe they've been athletes for their whole life and so they've just built this physique over time and now they don't have to do much to maintain it. Muscle building is really hard but maintenance of muscle mass is pretty easy.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (06:10):Surgery, people are not talking about that, like, "Yeah, this is how my butt looks from all these squats." And it's like, "What kind of squats are you doing, girlfriend? Because that's not easy to get that kind of size." So maybe people aren't being as forthcoming about the other factors. And so everyone thinks if I just worked harder, if I was just more disciplined, if I just had what it takes, I could look like that. And I think you and I have talked a little bit just about genes and your genetic blueprint and how you are helping people embrace what that means for them. Do you want to talk a little bit about that?Sarah Burby (06:51):Yeah, totally. And I think that's a really important concept to understand is that you can have 20 different women in one room and all 20 of those women could eat the exact same way, all 20 of those women could exercise the exact same exercise routine. And the reality is everybody is going to look a little bit different because that's just how our bodies are, our bodies aren't programmed to be exactly the same. And I think if we understand that and that's not something that's glamorous or something that's talked about a lot. And again, in social media or however it's portrayed, it's not talked about that everybody's body is different and everyone can move the same way or eat the same way and their bodies just are going to look different, that's just the way it is.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (07:37):Right. I think that what they're selling is this specific body and that most people when they can't access that, like abs are not generally accessible to most people, I mean, period. And if they are accessible, it's going to require potentially a lot of unhealthy, really damaging behaviors to get there. And so, it's so toxic, we are holding ourselves to a standard that not only isn't accessible but also is dangerous potentially. Do you ever have clients who are trying to recover from just some disordered eating or?Sarah Burby (08:20):Yeah. So I would say 90% of the clients that I'm working with are recovered from either restricting eating, some sort of restricting and then binge eating and this exact same thing. It's like they are trying to strive for this unrealistic expectation. And I think a lot of that comes, again, from what's being reinforced. So accidentally, I think a lot of times those unhelpful or really unhealthy behaviors are reinforced accidentally through friends, through coworkers. So for example, I talk a lot about how someone might lose 10 pounds and then they get a lot of compliments like, "Oh Sarah, you lost weight, you look great." Or, "Oh, Sarah, I really noticed your arms are getting really toned." And that can be really harmful and that's why I say, I don't ever want anyone to comment about my body because you don't know what behaviors that person had to engage in to get to that point.Sarah Burby (09:27):So you're assuming that they engaged in maybe healthy exercise, maybe they modified some food choices or things like that. But you also don't know if they were going to the gym for three hours a day and eating 1000 calories. So I think that a very dangerous thing to do is to comment on how other people look and specifically weight loss and/or weight gain because you really have no idea what you could be accidentally reinforcing. And I talked to a lot of people, who there be their unhealthy behavior was reinforced by friends, by coworkers and that's why they continued to do it. And they felt like, "Well, now everyone was telling me how great I look or all this stuff and now what happens if I gain five pounds again, are they going to think differently of me?" And they're afraid to stop engaging in these unhealthy behaviors.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (10:19):Right. That's so true, it's like letting people know. I think when a larger bodied person engages in behavior to lose a bunch of weight and they get all that reinforcement, it just confirms that they weren't good enough. Like, "Oh, now I've met someone's criteria for acceptance." And even though you're finally accessing all the things that you thought you wanted this whole time, it's like this really painful realization. When I've seen people talk about this like, "Wow, I really wasn't good enough for people and now I am."Amber Sobrio-Ritter (10:50):And then like you said, there's this fear of, "What happens when I'm not again?" And there's one podcast episode that I did on self-acceptance and the difference between self-esteem and self-acceptance and it's similar. Self-esteem is when I'm doing well, I'm like, "Wow, Amber, you're amazing. You're doing all these great things." But what happens when I'm not? And so you're riding this roller coaster. Whereas self-acceptance is, I value myself as a person and it stays stable. I'm doing well, I'm not, I'm doing well, I'm not, it doesn't rely on performance or success or whatever. It's like this real, constant place that you can go for self-love.Sarah Burby (11:35):Totally. Yes. And I love that analogy, I think that's perfect.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (11:38):It's a hard thing to cultivate in yourself and I also think it's hard because people around us don't usually model that behavior.Sarah Burby (11:45):Exactly.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (11:45):I mean, it's tricky, even as a parent I'm thinking, "Good job, you did so good on this thing." And yes, there's this really interesting conversation around reinforcing your child's behavior because they engaged in something or they did really well on a test or something. And how does that inadvertently send some message that reinforcement is only available when you meet these expectations.Sarah Burby (12:09):Yes. Yep. Exactly.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (12:12):That's a hard one. Okay, how do I reinforce? So I guess probably what you would say is don't reinforce based on performance, reinforce based on kindness and other attributes. How do you help clients see other things that are valuable about themselves outside of what society values?Sarah Burby (12:33):Yeah. So I do it a couple of different ways. So usually one of the first questions that I'll ask clients is, can you name five people that you really admire that in life, for whatever reason, you look up to you admire, they're a role model? Think of a couple of those people and then write down every single quality about that person that you admire. So whether you admire their kindness, you admire their determination, whatever quality that you admire about that. So then they'll make a list and I say, "So where on that list did you comment or did you admire something about their physical appearance?" And every single time I do this exercise, and I've done it probably 50 times, the answer is always, never. That's not on that list.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (13:17):No. "She has a nice ass." That's such a weird thing to... "That's why I admire her."Sarah Burby (13:22):Yeah. Exactly. So that's one way that I do it. But I also ask them to think about how other people would describe them. So how would your children describe you or how would your loved ones describe you? Or if someone's at your funeral and they're talking about you and all your accomplishments, how would they describe you? And again, on that list, it's never anything about physical appearance, ever. That's not how people would describe you or that's what they love about you. So doing those two exercises really is a good beginning, I think. And then we can dive in a bit deeper depending on whatever else that they have going on but I find both of those things to be pretty helpful.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (14:05):Why do you think we overestimate people's care about that? Do you know what I'm saying? Why do we think it's such a big deal? And then like you said, you do this exercise with people and nobody cares about that. Why do we think that they do?Sarah Burby (14:23):I mean, Amber, that's a great question. And I don't know the answer to that, I think it's probably a combination of things. I think it probably is a combination of what we see and what we absorb and what we perceive as being the best in terms of what we look like. Or again, seeing all these filtered, airbrushed, edited photos and on top of that we're seeing supermodels or famous athletes or I don't know, seeing that and feeling like we're inadequate if we don't look like they do is probably a big part of it. And again, maybe just depending on what was reinforced growing up, maybe growing up your parents did reinforce if you looked thinner or your friends did reinforce that and then it's really hard to unlearn that or undo that relationship, especially on your own without the help of a coach. It's really hard to work through all that stuff by yourself, I think.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (15:22):Right. Well, essentially you're like a fish swimming in the water, you can't see the water, you're in it. And a coach can look at you and say, "Hey, do you not notice that you're swimming in all of this toxic mindset?" And make you aware in a way that you can't because their objective, they can see it from a different perspective and really enlighten you from the outside because it's too hard, it's internalized and it's just such a part of our culture growing up that it can be so subtle.Sarah Burby (15:56):Totally. And I also don't think people realize how much time they actually spend being unkind to themselves or hating themselves, for lack of better words. So something else that I like to do, and I can't remember the name of the website but I'll message you when I think of it, maybe you can put it in the notes or put it on your accounts. But there's a website where you can basically create a pie chart. So you can ask clients, "Can you name your top five values or the top five things that are most important to you? "And they might say, "My family, my job, my health." Whatever it is that you value.Sarah Burby (16:33):And if you put that in a pie chart and you look at all the time and mental energy that you're spending on your physical appearance and your health, that's going to be 70%, 80%, 90% of that pie chart. And when you see that visual, I think it can be really helpful to say, "Listen, you're spending all this time on this one value and then you're not having any other time to spend with the value of your family or your friends or work and it's all consuming over you." So I think a lot of times they don't... And then it's like an aha moment like, "Oh my gosh, I didn't even realize I was so consumed by these unhelpful thoughts."Amber Sobrio-Ritter (17:09):Right. Exactly. So that goes a little bit into acceptance and commitment therapy, which is really interesting and I definitely want to pivot there. Really quickly, I want to share an exercise that I do with my kids about just trying to make them aware of that water that we're swimming in, where if we see an advertisement of a famous soccer player who's chiseled and he's holding a deodorant stick. I talk to the boys about, "What do you think that this advertisement is trying to tell us?" This is how you're supposed to look if you're a soccer player. This is how you're supposed to look if you want to be successful. This is the kind of product you use. This is what a man looks like. And so to offset that, well, I think first of all, it helps just for kids to know advertising is meant to make you feel like you have a deficit, the purpose of making you feel like you have a deficit is to sell you something that will bridge the gap between who you are and who you want to be.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (18:01):So just knowing that and knowing that it's not a truth, it's a marketing tactic, is already really helpful. And then we talk about, "Do you really have to? You play soccer and you don't look like that person. You are really successful. Or let's look at other soccer players, look at all the body diversity within the sport of soccer." And it looks like there's a lot of different ways you can show up and there're all kinds of different men and different bodies. And look at really strong men, their bodies are going to look different from somebody who's a horseback rider or whatever.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (18:38):So it's just letting them see that there's a lot of ways to be and they're all acceptable, they're all valid and these are just human bodies. And the point of advertising is not to feed you a truth, it's the opposite of that. And so just letting kids know a lot of what they're seeing is false. It's still hard because when the boys are still getting that messaging from their peers and that's hard to offset. But I think even just providing one other perspective, just one, allows them to be like, "My mom doesn't see it that way." It creates just a little crack in that shell that it's like, they don't have to fully buy into it.Sarah Burby (19:23):Yeah. And I think that's so important and so wonderful that you do that with your boys. And I think that's a great message for other moms to start doing because, like you said, it's not taught, no one really thinks to teach it the way that you're teaching it that way. And I think the more exposure you give to them, to that thought process, eventually they can start looking ads and add themselves and without you, they're prompting them to say, "What do you think this is about?"Amber Sobrio-Ritter (19:48):Exactly.Sarah Burby (19:49):They'll be able do that on their own and be able to not get so all consumed in that culture. So I think that's a wonderful skill for them to develop and it's super important.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (19:56):Right. Well, the most painful thing about being a parent is that kids don't do what you say, they do what you do. So it's very important to work on yourself. People who have kids, if they're recovering from some of this, should come to you or else they are going to accidentally, inadvertently pass this on. When you have children, you don't just pass them all the goodness, you pass them everything. All your fears, all your anxieties, all your insecurities, now your kids get it or they inherit it. And if they don't do the work on themselves, they are giving their kids all kinds of inheritance that they don't want them to have. They're going to hear you saying to yourself, even in a quietest voice, "Ugh," when you look at yourself in the mirror. Or just a facial expression you give to yourself or, "Don't take pictures of me," when you're at the beach. Kids pick up on that.Sarah Burby (20:47):Yeah. Totally. And I will tell you during an initial intake, when we talk about their motivation and their whys and their values, that is one of the most common reasons that women to come to me is exactly what you just said, is they said, "I fear that what my behavior is now affecting my daughter or it's now affecting my son. I can tell that they're now picking up on things that I do and I want to help myself to help myself but also to help my children so they don't have to go through what I'm going through." Which I think is really important and really powerful and it shows how committed they are to their children and wanting to create this better opportunity and this better lifestyle for them so they don't have to be absorbed in all of that.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (21:28):I mean, it's so responsible because a lot of the time when my child's having a problem, I want to hire an outside person to come, "Hey, fix my child, they're having a problem." It's harder to look at yourself and say, "Was there something that I did?"Sarah Burby (21:43):Yeah. Exactly.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (21:43):That is a painful conversation that you have to have with yourself like, "Did I cause this problem?" Or, "Did I do something?" Is there something that I can be doing to address this problem on my end?" And a lot of the time, there's something you can do, even if it's little, to be helping your child be more successful.Sarah Burby (22:01):Yeah. Totally.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (22:03):So, okay. Let's talk about acceptance and commitment therapy. What is that?Sarah Burby (22:07):Yeah. So basically it sounds like this big fancy process but it's basically composed of six core processes and they all work together. There's diffusion, there's acceptance, there's committed action, there're values and all of these six things work interchangeably to increase your psychological flexibility. So basically to increase your thought processes. We use it a lot in coaching, specifically that acceptance and that diffusion piece, because oftentimes those unhelpful thoughts that you have about yourself, the way that you look, it's a lot of our own verbal behavior telling us that we're not good enough or we can't do this until we reach this weight or we can't apply for this job until we reach this weight.Sarah Burby (22:57):So with diffusion, we try to separate ourselves from those unhelpful thoughts and understand that you can have a thought but it doesn't necessarily mean that thought is true, it's not true until it then dictates your behavior. So we look a lot about how we can reframe our thoughts, how we can detach ourselves from those unhelpful thoughts. And that helps a lot with again, our verbal behavior and changing. That's one of the first steps in changing your whole mindset about yourself.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (23:26):So before we move on to another part of that, I want you to share with me, what's your favorite diffusion technique that you use for yourself?Sarah Burby (23:35):For myself is definitely singing an unhelpful thought to a silly song.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (23:40):Okay. Yes.Sarah Burby (23:41):Always take a Taylor Swift song and I always add that unhelpful thought to the jingle of a Taylor Swift song and it makes me laugh every single time.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (23:49):Yes, that's my favorite. I would probably say singing or talking in a funny voice. I was talking with a colleague once and having a hard time and she was like, "Come on, use your diffusion." And I was like, "I suck at everything." Or, "I suck at everything." You can't help but then feel separated from that thought and it shifts you [inaudible 00:24:12] that you can now see it like, "Okay, you can come at it from another angle and use language that's more helpful."Sarah Burby (24:21):Yes. Totally.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (24:23):So here's a tricky thing that I run into with my clients is that a lot of people think unhelpful language or negative self-talk is actually effective. They think, if I'm nice to myself, I'm going to be a slug, I'm not going to do anything. If I beat myself up enough, that's when I'm like "Fine, I'll do it." And they actually go and they do the thing that they've been beating themselves up about. What are your thoughts on that? Do your clients also have that same belief about themselves?Sarah Burby (24:52):Yes. Totally. And they use that unhelpful thought as almost this motivation in some way and it's like, "If I'm really unkind to myself, then I'll just get up and do whatever I want to do or make this change."Amber Sobrio-Ritter (25:05):Yes. And they make their internal head so aversive and then escaping from that is reinforcing. It's like a negative reinforcement sort of protocol essentially, where it's like, "This is so uncomfortable being inside my head, that then I'm going to do this thing." But what ends up then happening?Sarah Burby (25:28):Yes. I mean, it's just so harmful in the long run. I mean, think about it, who wants to spend their whole life engaging in negative reinforcement? Just engaging behaviors because you want to get out of your own unhelpful thoughts. And it's usually not effective in the long term, usually that's a really effective strategy for a couple days, a couple weeks. But eventually you're just going to have so many unhelpful thoughts that you just don't want to do anything. So maybe that motivation, it'll motivate you for a little bit but eventually it's going to have the opposite effect and it's going to be stopping you from things that you really value.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (26:02):Right. So what ends up happening is, let's say, I tell myself, "I can't follow through on anything, I'm bad at everything and I'm ugly and worthless." Why is negative self-talk so mean? I don't know. But usually that's where our brains go is like, "I don't deserve to breathe air." It's just so excessive. And so let's say I'm like, "No." Because there's a part of you that's like, "No, that's not true." That's the part that wants to fight against that, that wants to escape from that. "I'm going to show you, I'm going to engage in this behavior." And then you do but what happens usually with a lot of my clients is they want to go from where they are now to perfection tomorrow.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (26:43):Because they want that voice to be so quiet that they like, "Look, I'm doing everything I'm supposed to do, I'm meeting all the expectations. Voice, you can't say anything to me anymore." But it's hard to maintain that, it's hard to sustain that kind of activity over time. So then when they do fall off, they're believing that voice. That's the most sad thing when I work with clients is that they usually believe all of that stuff about themselves. They thought, "Yeah, I'm bad at it. I can't do anything, I can't follow through, I can't whatever." They think that's a truth because that voice is like, "See, you didn't do it." And that is one-Sarah Burby (27:20):Yeah. I think sometimes it could also be this self-fulfilling prophesy. So they can tell themselves, "I'm never going to be able to follow through on anything. I'll start it but I'm never going to be able to follow through." And then if they don't follow through, it's like, "See, I knew I wouldn't be able to do it."Amber Sobrio-Ritter (27:34):Right.Sarah Burby (27:34):It's like you're setting yourself up for this failure basically.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (27:39):Right. Exactly. And I wonder when they're creating goals, and I'd love to hear your thoughts on this a little bit, but creating goals that make it impossible for you to be successful or make it really challenging or having a really strong focus on outcome goals. How do you help your clients create goals? That you're pretty sure they're going to be 100% successful? I mean, really close. When we're creating goals with kiddos with autism, we're thinking, "I really want it to be just above your level of challenge." So I want to put something that's going to maybe stretch you a little bit but I'm pretty sure you're going to be successful so that we don't reinforce those beliefs you have about yourself, you can see yourself winning. How do you work with clients to create goals and how do you try to create goals that shift the focus from an aesthetic perspective to a different perspective?Sarah Burby (28:31):Yeah. So I can approach that. The way we create goals is typically, always referring back to, okay, what is a big, long term goal? What do you want to get most out of the coaching session? And then we'll break that down into smaller steps during each individual coaching session. And usually what I always do at the end of coaching sessions is when we recap and we set the goal for the next week, I assess confidence level. So I say, "Okay, on a scale of 1 to 10, how confident are you that you can reach this goal?" And clients are honest, they'll say, "I feel like I'm at a six." Or, "I feel like I'm at a nine." And then they say, "Oh, I feel like I'm at a six." One thing I like to do is like, "Okay, what modification or what change can we make so that you feel like you're at a 9 or 10 for next week?"Sarah Burby (29:13):And that opens up a whole nother conversation of, "Well, this barrier might come to place or this might happen." And we can say, "Okay, maybe do we need to look at the goal and modify it a little bit having these considerations?" So that could be really helpful but if you're using a role method to see where the client's at and if maybe we can then modify the goal. But that's different than me saying, "Nope, I think that goal is kind of a stretch. Maybe we should step it back a little bit." It puts the autonomy back in the client and they can self-reflect and say, "Oh, because I have these barriers, maybe it is better if I just set this goal." And we're working towards that together versus me telling them like "That goal's terrible, you're never going to accomplish it."Amber Sobrio-Ritter (29:51):Right. Yes. Give me some examples of goals that you would use that are not aesthetic based, that you highlight for clients to try and shift that perspective?Sarah Burby (30:04):Sure. So I'm trying to think of what goals we just worked on now. So I have clients that want to work on reducing certain behaviors. So a lot of clients want to reduce body checking behavior. So looking in the mirror and either then going off on five minute tangents about all the things that they hate about themselves or constantly pinching parts of their bodies that they don't like, so maybe their stomach or their arms or things like that. But what we'll do is take a baseline and say, "Okay, how many times a day do you engage in this body checking behavior?" And then one of our goals might be, "Okay, what replacement behavior can we engage in to body checking? And let's set a goal to reduce that baseline, if it was happening 60 times a day. What's a reasonable baseline that we can engage in and you can take that on for next week?" So that's one non- aesthetic goal that we look at but the behavior that we want to reduce that will help us with our ultimate end goal.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (30:58):Right. And I know you've mentioned also goals like being able to run around with grandkids, being able to get on a ride at Six Flags, things that make their lives more accessible, like movement, how can we increase your movement in a way that you love, that it's not going to feel punishing and it's not attached to some specific aesthetic outcome?Sarah Burby (31:23):Totally. And yeah, I should have mentioned that earlier. So one of the first things that I talk about with clients is if I have a potential client come to me and say, "My main goal was weight loss, that's all I care about." So in my coaching sessions, we don't ever focus on weight loss, we don't look at the scale, we don't focus on the number on the scale ever. However, I also wouldn't dismiss that client and say, "Oh, weight loss isn't my thing, go find another coach." But I will have that conversation and say, "What do you value about weight loss?" Or, "What is important to you about losing weight?"Sarah Burby (31:55):I mean, I feel like any coach should ask that question anyway because if someone says they want to lose weight, we don't just stop there. We need to know what they value about losing weight. And like we said, it's usually something like, "Well, I want to be able to walk around my neighborhood without getting tired." Or, "I want to be able to walk my dog or play with my grandchildren or run a 5K." So we can work on those goals without having to ever step on a scale. We can work on walking for five minutes or walking for 10 minutes or if they say they want to increase the number of vegetables they eat, sure, we can work on how can we increase more fruits or more vegetables without ever having a look at the scale, the scale doesn't matter. You can still work on those goals.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (32:36):Right. Exactly. And you're still making progress in a way that's valuable and making progress on the scale doesn't necessarily equate to health. If I lost weight, I might be no more able to run a 5K than I was before. Weight loss doesn't automatically equal health. And I think you've talked about that before, sometimes in your life when you've been your leanest, you were the least healthy because of anxiety or being really busy in your life or just having too much going on and the way your body was coping with that was weight loss. But people see that and what do they think?Sarah Burby (33:13):Yeah. Exactly.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (33:14):They're like, "Wow, you look so good." And you're like, "I'm really struggling."Sarah Burby (33:18):Yeah. I even think back to most recently, I was supposed to get married in May 2020 and we all know it's when COVID first came around, everything was shut down. And my wedding was obviously postponed and we postponed it to that August thinking, "Oh, there's no way the pandemic's going to be around in August." Jokes on us. So August came around and we decided to have the wedding anyway, we had a small wedding with 10 people there. And I remember posting pictures on Facebook and I was really skinny at that point, I don't even know what my weight was but I can tell you, it was probably 10 pounds less than I weigh now. And it wasn't because I was eating super healthy, I was filled with stress and anxiety that I physically couldn't let myself eat. I was constantly thinking about the virus and the wedding and all these other things and people were like, "Oh, you look so great, you look so skinny, you look so beautiful." And I'm like, "Well, you're basically just reinforcing the fact that I was chronically anxious for the last four months."Amber Sobrio-Ritter (34:20):Right. Exactly. And it almost feels like sometimes in society, it's like the means justify the end. Is that the saying or? No, the end justifies the means, yes. People don't care how you got there, as long as you got there. And you're like, "Dude, I had to kill myself to get there." And they're like, "But you look good." And you're like, "There's a cost here that matters."Sarah Burby (34:45):Right. Exactly. And what is your quality of life? We think about health, we think about physical health or we think about nutrition. When people think about health, I feel like they think about exercise and what they consume. But health is so much broader than that, when you look at the Wellness Wheel, how is your sleep? How is your stress? How is your occupational health? There're so many different pieces of health and wellness and we have kept our focus on just those two things but ignore everything else. I would argue that if you're chronically stressed but your BMI is normal, in the normal range, you're not healthy. But we don't look at it that way and it's like such a scary way to analyze our health.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (35:26):Right. I mean, how are your relationships? I mean, that's such a big piece of your wellbeing and yet when I was at my leanest, I was like a starving animal and probably it was like living with a starving animal for my kids and my partner at the time, it was just probably scary. I remember the kids would come up and ask me for a bite of whatever I was eating and I was like, "I already weighed it." They just stopped asking, "Don't ask mom for a bite, she weighed it." And I needed to get every gram of that meal in and I was probably scary. So yeah, you just think, what was that? We'd go out to ice cream and I'd just sit and watch them eat ice cream.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (36:08):It was so sad, I think back and I just think it was just a sad way to live. And I was meeting all of these fitness goals but sometimes you have to do the wrong thing to know what's the right thing for you. You have to go through that. But yes, I agree with you, it's not a measure of health at all and it's certainly not sustainable.Sarah Burby (36:30):Right.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (36:31):What are the biggest criticisms of intuitive eating and what would be your response? What if people think, "Oh yeah, well, that doesn't work because I'll intuitively eat a dozen donuts." Or what if somebody really needs to lose weight to be within a healthy range and they're thinking, well, this is not going to work for them. What's your response to those main criticisms?Sarah Burby (36:53):Yeah. The main thing that I hear is always, "Intuitive eating is super irresponsible to promote as a coach because it doesn't have any regard for nutrition." And that's just so not true. I think what people do is honestly, Google intuitive eating, read the first article that pops up, take five minutes to read that article and then truly believe that they're an expert on intuitive eating. And that's just dangerous for so many reasons. A little bit of knowledge is a very dangerous thing. Because when you actually learn about the 10 principles and you see how they all flow together, sure, if you truly wanted to eat five cupcakes then have at it but you're probably not going to feel great after. If you're in tune with your body and you recognize hunger and fullness cues and you recognize how food tastes, my guess is if you're eating, by the third cupcake, my guess is it's not going to taste very good still.Sarah Burby (37:47):After you eat that third cupcake, you're going to be pretty uncomfortable. You're not going to want to do that again because you're probably not going to feel very well. So by all means you could but it's very unlikely that you're going to. So I think that gets lost in translation a lot when people are looking at what intuitive eating actually is. And there's also a whole bunch of research when you look at wanting to restrict certain foods. So if you tell yourself, "Well, I'm going to eat healthy and I'm not going to eat ice cream or cookies or chocolate." When you're in that deprived state, you're going to want that food even more. So with intuitive eating, when you can have access to ice cream, and I can't tell you how many treat, "Foods," I have in my house because it's no different than having a carrot or a piece of chicken or whatever. When I'm in the mood for ice cream, I have a scoop of ice cream and I'm satisfied and I move on with my day, it's not a big deal.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (38:40):Right. Well, the other thing it does is when you do fall off the wagon, if you have a restricting mindset, you do fall off the wagon. My thought is, "Listen, I'm going to get my sins worth here. So I'm going to have five cookies instead of one because I've already messed up." So I am going to push myself so much farther until I do feel sick because I'm like, "Tomorrow, these aren't available to me anymore so I'm going to get them all in today. Today's messed up and then start fresh tomorrow."Sarah Burby (39:08):Yeah.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (39:08):And that's creating this restrict and binge cycle that just feeds into itself. And this is what we're fighting, I mean, there're thousands of coaching programs out there that are just so based on restriction and do you get results? Yes. And do you gain the weight back almost immediately and then also have all of these negative views of yourself because of it? Also, yes.Sarah Burby (39:28):Exactly. And that's never talked about is I don't doubt that certain diets work, I know that they work but they're not sustainable long term. And what really disappoints me or upsets me is that no one talks about those clients afterwards, no one talks about their mental health afterwards and that's a big piece to ignore. And like you said, that Last Supper mentality of, "I have to eat everything today." Or exercising for repentance is a big one. It's like, "Well, I'm going to eat a slice of pizza but tomorrow I'm going to do a hip workout and lift." That's so unhealthy and so unhelpful. But that's what it creates when we restrict these certain foods, it creates these patterns of repeated unhelpful behavior.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (40:10):Right. Exactly. So really quickly, can you just talk a little bit about your services and how people can find you and the things that you have coming up for yourself?Sarah Burby (40:22):Sure. Yeah. So I offer one to one coaching and very small group coaching, two to three in groups of coaching. And my packages are typically either three months or six months. I'm most active on social media so my social media handle is Smallchanges_coaching. So I try to post a lot of just little tips and tricks on intuitive eating on that website. And I also have a bunch of webinars coming out, some of them are tailored more towards behavior analysts but I also have some free webinars just on intuitive eating in general. If anyone wants to learn more about each of those 10 principles in more detail, you can figure out how to get access to that. And yeah, I think that's pretty much it.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (41:04):Yes. And I will put all of your stuff, like your handle and ways to find you, I will put it in the show notes.Sarah Burby (41:12):Perfect.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (41:12):The really amazing thing about Sarah is that she's a Behavior Analyst just like me and so everything is really coming through that perspective of looking at behavior as data and being able to support people in a way that's sustainable over time and really systematic. Focused on systematically building good habits in a way that will be life changing. You can know that after you're done working with someone, you've set them up to be better and healthier and more psychologically well. You didn't just get them a quick 10 pound loss and it's like, "Hey, go live the rest of your life, I have no idea how you're doing." But it's like, "Listen, I have helped shape your life and generations to come because now you are not passing this on." I mean, the value of what you're providing, you can't even put a number on it because of the reach. It's just going to keep reaching through the generations of kids that don't have to grow up believing that they're insufficient because they're larger bodied or because they don't fit some societal norm.Sarah Burby (42:16):Totally. And I that's what I always forget to mention too. It's like, that's exactly what I said. I'm giving you the tools and the resources for you to have for the rest of your life. I always joke that after these three months are over, I want to keep in touch and I want to talk to you but I also know if we never talk again, you'll be set. So these tools are not just to use in the moment over the next three months, over the next six months, they truly are things that once are mastered, you can apply and generalize to every other setting in your life. So it's not a quick thing and it's not just this cookie-cutter plan, it is totally individualized and the point of this coaching is to give you those resources that you have forever.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (42:53):Right. It's a mindset shift. And like you said, they can take it from this current domain of food, they can apply this to work, they can apply this to parenting, all the techniques that you're teaching them will generalize into their lives in all of the other ways. And so again, the reach is just hard to even quantify what that looks like.Sarah Burby (43:14):Yes. Totally.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (43:15):It's so wonderful talking to you, Sarah. It's a really great having this conversation and I'm super excited to see behavior analysts doing such cool things and for us to be on the same page mindset-wise. And I really appreciate you being here.Sarah Burby (43:28):Yeah. Thanks for having me on, Amber. I always love to chat with you, it's so good and I really appreciate being able to be on this podcast. Thank you.Amber Sobrio-Ritter (43:48):Of course. Talk to you later.

In this episode, we discuss behavior chains and how understanding and hacking them is the difference between being successful in your goals or not.

In this episode, we discuss motivation, its definition and its significance (or lack thereof) while on a fitness journey.

In this episode, we discuss the endlessly frustrating issue of feeling like progress is slow or non-existent and how to move forward so that you don't give up.

In this episode, we discuss the behavior analytic concept of shaping, and how learning proper use of this tool can get you to finally master those New Years Resolutions.

In this episode, we discuss behavior chaining, reframing, and making fun/deliciousness a regular part of your fitness journey.

In this episode, we discuss reframing, pairing and other behavior analytic strategies which are supportive to successful behavior change.

In this episode, we discuss more strategies for aligning your environment in a way that effortlessly supports your goals.

In this episode, we discuss three strategies for both increasing and decreasing behaviors to get you started moving towards your goals in a way that is both personally valuable to you as well as effective.

Episode TranscriptHello, welcome to the Divergent Fitness podcast. My name is Amber Sobrio-Ritter, I'm your host. I am a personal trainer and behavior analyst and mom of three living in the Bay area, California. So I'm super excited to dive into our topic this week.The focus of this program is really to take behavior analysis, the science of human behavior, and apply it to some new situations that affect moms specifically, usually within the realm of fitness and help mothers to be more successful in these different domains, right?Whether it's showing up for yourself, whether it's showing up for your kids, being able to use all of the research that has been done on human behavior and modify your behavior to be more in line with your values. So the last couple weeks we have been diving into the topic of values, and then we went into goals, right?Because the way the system kind of works is that you start by looking at your values and what's really meaningful to you. You look at why those values are meaningful to you. You make sure that those are your values and that the reasons they're meaningful to you are yours alone, right? And then we create goals based on those values.But then the thing is that a lot of times we have goals that we've created and we tell ourselves, I'm going to do X, Y, and Z constantly, but it feels really hard to do it in real life, right? And that's where systems work comes in. That's where you take the work that you have done to identify what matters to you and you manifest it in real life.You learn how to take this abstract concept of values and make it real for you. And show up every day, spend some amount of time throughout your day working on things that matter to you, not just things that are imposed onto you by society, but the way to live a life that has joy and contentment and fulfillment is to spend some part of your day doing something that really matters to you. And implementation is usually where things fall apart.Because this can be really hard, especially if you are a mom and there are a lot of people's needs pulling on your time. There's the whole family system, your kids, your kids might have special needs, your kids might have... They might need extra support in some way, your partner, you might be a caregiver for an elderly parent.There are so many contingencies that we're operating under on a daily basis that it's really important to let the things that we most highly prioritize sort of rise to the surface and then let everything else fall below it. Right? If some things don't get done, that's okay.But the thing that doesn't get done, can't be you, right? The thing that doesn't get done, can't be the stuff that matters to you most. Because it just keeps happening. There's no point in time in which your kids or your partner or anybody will say, "Listen, you look stressed.Let me take over." Right? It's not to say that that never happens, but that's not going to happen consistently, a lot of the time because we're really good at just pretending like we're okay and that we're doing well, right? As mom. So how could somebody even know how to step in for us or when to step in for us. And not to mention, it's not that person's job.It's not that person's role to have to sort of mind read and figure out what we need, that's really up to us. So really I wanted to go into systems today, but I started thinking more about just values. I wanted to say more about human behavior and just kind of go into it a little bit deeper. So I want to take today to do that, and then I want to look at systems next week.So I want to start by just saying that there are two reasons that we engage in behavior. One, is to access desired stimuli, something that we want, and the other is to avoid or end and aversive stimulus, something that we don't want. Right? I can tell you a secret in order to access a million dollars, or I can tell you a secret in order to stop being tortured.And there are all of these different sort of sub-domains that fall underneath those, but those are going to be the two biggest reasons for engaging in behavior. Something desirable to you is going to look different than something desirable to me. Something desirable for you might be money or fame.And for me, something desirable might be control, right? It doesn't matter what that thing is, but basically you're trying to access that desired stimulus. And the same thing with avoiding or ending an aversive stimulus, something that's aversive to you might not be aversive to me and vice versa.So it's very individualized from person to person, but these are the two biggest reasons that humans engage in behavior. So I was thinking about this the other day and I was considering two scenarios. Okay. So let's talk about exercising. Let's use this as our scenario. So I can either exercise.I can either engage in that behavior of exercising because access a desired stimulus. That's our first example, right? So this desired stimulus might be I enjoy the feeling of exercise. I enjoy the way I feel after exercise. I feel connected to others through exercise.I feel proud of my body and I see exercise as valuable and necessary. I crave it. I don't dread it, right? In that way, I'm accessing a desired stimulus through exercise. Now, let's look at another reason that people might engage in exercise, right? And it's important to note that on the surface, it looks the same.So whether you show up because you want to access something desirable or whether you show up because you want to avoid something unpleasurable, we're both attending the same workout class, right? But it's really important why we show up and I'm going to go into that in a second.So just to move forward with this example of you're trying to avoid or end an aversive stimulus. So if I have a lot of thoughts about my body that are really negative and I have so much of my self worth and my value tied up with the way my body looks, the way it's physically presented to the world.And I exercise, I use those feelings, right? As fuel to push me toward exercise. How many of us do this? How many of us use negative self talk as fuel to get something done? If I talk badly enough to myself, if I beat myself up long enough, if I shit talk myself for long enough, eventually I'm going to get so sick of it I am going to engage in this behavior.Okay. So now let's look at how that's different. Now I'm showing up to exercise not because I find that it has intrinsic value to me or it's intrinsically rewarding, but I'm showing up because I want to avoid this aversive internal stimulus, in my brain, self-loathing, lack of self-worth.So I'm not accessing any of those things that are desirable, but I show up in order to avoid self hate essentially, right? Now let's take another example, think of connecting with your children. Now I want you to first think of it from avoiding or ending an aversive internal stimulus. Okay?So I'm thinking to myself, "Oh my gosh, I haven't spent any quality time with my kids lately. I'm a shit mom. What's wrong with me? The kids just want my time and attention." Right? These are all the thoughts that can go through your brain. All the thoughts you can have about yourself. And I think, "Okay, fine. I'll do it."I've sort of bullied myself into doing this thing because I want to avoid all of these negative thoughts I have about myself when I don't do this thing. So I want you to think about how that affects the way you show up. So if I show up because I'm trying to avoid self hate.If I show up because I'm trying to avoid self-loathing. I'm with my kids, but I'm looking at the clock and the timer, I'm waiting for it to be over. I'm resentful that it's in the way of other things that I'm doing. I feel farther away from myself when I'm engaging with the kids.Maybe I feel even, I still feel disconnected from them, but I'm still showing up so they might not perceive that. I'm present, but I'm not engaged. Now I want you to think of if you're connecting with your kids because you just enjoy your kids. Okay? Part of this is that you have to choose an activity that you enjoy doing with your kids.Okay? So this is going to make a big difference. If I'm just trying to show up and connect with my kids to avoid the adversive stimulus of being a crap mom, I'm just waiting for it to be over. I'm just waiting for it to end so I can say, "There, I'm not a crappy mom. See.See, self. I showed up. I showed up for my kids for this amount of time today and I did it." And in the other situation, I show up because I really just want to be with them. I want to spend this time with them. I lose track of time because I'm enjoying it so much. I'm sad when it's over.I crave the connection when it's absent, I'm not dreading it, I'm not focused on outcomes, I laugh easily, there's a lightness to my energy, I'm present and I'm engaged. Now an important point here is not that one person loves their kids more than the other.It's that one person, first of all, made that decision from a place of lack, from a place of deficit, from a place of not being good enough. It's hard to set a boundary when you view yourself so negatively.So let's say for me, if I view myself in a negative way, it's hard for me to think that how I like to spend my time with my kids matters. It's hard for me to say, "I don't really love this thing, but I love this thing. And I'll show up for my kids in this way."And to kind of set a little boundary there like, "I don't love playing soccer, but I love doing a board game. Let's do that." But if I'm coming from a place of, "You are not a good mom," I kind of feel like I have to show up however the kids ask. Like, "Mom, we want you to do this." And so I kind of feel like, "Oh, fine." Right?Because I don't know how, I don't even value my perspective enough, I don't even value my feelings enough to try and choose something that I enjoy. Are the kids going to have these horrible memories of mom never played soccer with us, she only did board games?Of course not. Kids just want to spend time with you. They just love being with you, right? So there's absolutely nothing wrong with picking something that you like more. But if you don't value yourself, you don't value your feelings and your perspective, it's going to be really hard for you to see through all that negative self talk long enough to even be able to identify a better solution for yourself, right?It's all or nothing. It's like, "Oh, I hate doing this activity. I'm horrible at pretend with the kids. I've always been horrible at it." That's not very growth mindset thing to say. "I'm not good at it and I haven't spent the time to get good at it," how about that? And, "I don't find it inherently enjoyable. However, I love bike rides. I love hikes.I love cuddling and talking. I love playing a game together. I like these kinds of things." Right? And so I'm able to have all of that negative self-talk come up. I recognize it's just coming from a place of wanting to help me be a better mom, because that is something that I value. I've identified that as being something that's valuable to me.So let me just take a minute and see if there's a way that I can show up in a way that I value and in a way that I enjoy. Those two things can come together. I really think it's so important to look at all of the behaviors that you're engaging in and try to figure out is this coming from a place of wanting to avoid negative self talk because I'm always beating myself up or do I really enjoy this thing.And if I don't really enjoy this thing, is there a way to do it differently so that I can enjoy this thing. It's okay to enjoy certain activities with your kids and not others. That's okay, because hi, you are human and you have preferences. That is all right. That is the same for your kids.I'm not going to ask my kids to go shopping with me. I'm not going to ask my kids to have girl talk with me. I'm not going to ask my kids to dive deep into psychological theory with me. At the same time, I'm not big into video games. So they're not going to ask me to play video games with them.But is there something that we both like? Great, then that's the best case scenario. So this is why considering our values has to come first before everything else. Because if we're choosing goals based on the values of others, on the surface, like I said, the behaviors might not look significantly different. Right?She's going to the exercise class, I'm going to the exercise class. We're both doing it, but the energy that we bring each time is profoundly different and will determine our ability to consistently show up, to engage in this behavior for the long haul.How long am I going to be able to show up consistently when the only reason I'm doing it is because I don't want to hate myself? Instead of enjoying it, instead of finding value in it, I'm just trying not to hate myself. That's not going to last. Because what's going to happen is you are trying to earn self-acceptance through your behavior.You're trying to earn it. You can't, you can't earn in. You just get it, but you're the one to give it to yourself. Nobody else can give it to you. It has to be you. So let's say you're white knuckling it. You're showing up to this exercise class. You hate this class. You just don't want to feel lazy.Maybe you have this old belief that you can't follow through on things. And you're, "I can't let that be true. I can't let that be true." So you're showing up to this exercise class that you hate. As soon as you fail in some other area of your life. And when I say fail, what I mean is be a human and not be able to sustain something.You're going to say, "Screw it. I can't even stay consistent in this other area." Or, "Obviously I messed up at work. I suck. And what's the point of even doing this exercise class anyways?" It's like it's this slash the other three tires mentality.I already messed up. Oh, well, I'll just give up. I'm not going to do anything because obviously I can't. I can't do anything well. Here's the thing, you're trying to do a lot of things that you hate. Maybe you're trying to do a lot of things that you hate perfectly, which is double whammy, because nobody can do that.So you can't sustain it because eventually you're just going to think, look, I'm never going to be able to earn self acceptance because even when I'm doing well in this area, I'm not doing well in this area. Damn. There's still something to beat myself up about, always. There's something. Yes, I'm showing up consistently to this exercise class.But now I am not spending the time with my kids that I wanted to spend with my kids. I can't do it all right. I have all these domains that are so important to me. And I think, okay, if I can just get all of these ducks in a row, if I can just do all of these things well, I'll be a quote unquote, "Good person." Right?I will be a well rounded, high achieving perfect person. And when you fail and you realize you are not going to meet your own criteria for self acceptance, you give up trying. Here's the thing, there's no criteria to meet for self acceptance. You just do it.You just say, "I accept myself." There you go. Bam. You don't have to earn it. You don't have to earn your love for yourself. You just get to have it. Oh my gosh. How amazing? Now what we've done is we've basically taken that slate, we have wiped it clean, all of the negative self talk."I'm a bad mom. I'm a bad employee. I'm a bad wife. I'm a bad whatever." Wipe it clean. I accept myself. I'm imperfect in this thing, but I'm still showing up. I'm imperfect in that thing, but I'm still showing up. This is a part of the process. This is the journey. This is life.I accept myself through all of the phases of my life, all of the shades of this color are accepted. The highs and lows, it's all accepted. Great. Now the wonderful thing about that is that once you do that, now you're free to just identify things you want to do because you love them.Now you're not doing anything because you don't want to do it, or because you don't want to have the negative feelings of not doing it. So instead of exercising, because I don't want to identify myself as lazy or worthless or ugly or fat or whatever, now I just get to move my body because it feels good and because I like it.So now I get to choose which activity do I like to do the best that's going to help me move my body. Right? Now, everything is open to you. Do whatever you love. Then you're showing up to the exercise class because you love it, because it's fun to dance around doing zumba with your friends, not because you're desperately trying to cling to this notion of, am I good enough? Am I good enough?Now you just get to do it because it's fun. Who do you thinks going to be able to sustain that longer, the person who just loves it so they want to go, they can't wait to go. When they get done with work, they're rushing there because their friends are there and they're going to dance together for an hour and get a little sweat on and feel really good.Or the person's like, "Oh my gosh, after work, I'm tired. I don't want to go. I have to go so that I don't mentally beat myself up for the rest of the night for not going." It's not going to sustain. Same thing with the kids, find something that you love to do together. I accept myself as a mom.Sometimes I'm a good mom. Sometimes I'm a bad mom. Here's the thing about clinging so tightly to this belief that you have to be a good mom, it keeps you from being a good mom. So for example, let's say I am with my teenager and I get fussy with him and I kind of have an attitude or I'm less patient than I want to be.If I can't recognize that in that moment, I was a quote, unquote, "Bad mom," or that I was less than what I wanted to be in that moment, how can I ever A, work to continue to try to get better at that. B, apologize to him and model that appropriate apology for falling short of both of our expectations.And C, recognize that I'm a flawed human being, just like every other human being and that this is okay and I forgive myself for that. If I can't ever see myself in the light of being an imperfect mom, I can't be a closer to perfect mom. I can't be as good as I want to be until I'm willing to recognize that sometimes I'm not as good as I want to be.It's important that I recognize that clinging so tightly to one specific identity keeps me from meeting that, keeps me from embodying that, keeps me from being that thing, right? If I'm clinging so tightly to, "I follow through, I follow through, I follow through. I'm the person who follows through," but I haven't chosen an exercise routine that I love.So really the only reason I'm showing up is so that I desperately avoid the possibility of believing I'm the kind of person that doesn't follow through, then I'm going to be the kind of person that doesn't follow through because I haven't even chosen something that I like.And by the way, what's wrong with not following through on something that you don't love? If you start to go to an exercise class, you joined a gym, you go for six months and then you stop going. Why are you beating yourself up? You didn't like it enough.That's okay. Choose something different instead of, "Oh my gosh, I can't ever stick with anything. I'm not good at anything. I don't keep my word. I waste money." It wasn't reinforcing enough. Find something you like better. Right? Find something you're doing because you love it so much that keeping you from doing it is hard.Not getting you to do it, keeping you from doing it is challenging. It's okay to stop something that you don't love. That doesn't mean that you can't follow through, doesn't mean that you lack willpower, whatever, none of that. Maybe it just means you didn't love it.And maybe that means you need to find something that you love better. But the problem is that when people stop doing something they said they were going to do, sometimes instead of being able to have the psychological flexibility to pivot to something different, you get stuck in a shame spiral of, "I knew I wasn't going to follow through.I knew I was going to sign up and not be able to do it. I knew I wasn't going to blah, blah, blah." Maybe heard that in your own brain before. Instead, what we could do is have some flexibility and some curiosity, "Yeah. I stopped running. I really felt like I dreaded it every time I went. Yeah.I just really didn't enjoy it. And that's why I stopped. Not cause I'm a piece of crap. I just didn't really like running. So I wonder what I would like better. Maybe hiking, maybe cycling, maybe weight lifting." Just some curiosity there. No judgment.Just, "I stopped that. That's okay. Let's find something I like better." You stopped it because probably the reason that you started it was to avoid internal aversive stimuli of all these negative thoughts you were having about yourself. But when you're doing something that you really love, it's a lot easier.That doesn't mean there aren't days that you don't want to go, but it's a lot easier because you're not fighting all of that dislike for the activity, plus all of this sort of self-loathing quick burning fuel that comes from just trying to do it to avoid some negative thoughts.So if you choose a goal that you don't personally enjoy, the energy is off, the consistency is negatively affected. Choosing activities from a place of self love and not self hate. Self hate can also refer to and often does refer to body image. So if I don't love weightlifting, but I do it because I read that it helps me lose fat and I really hate my body, I might be doing this thing that I really don't enjoy because again, trying to avoid all these negative thoughts about my body.I might be able to show up for a while and do it, but it's not going to last. It's been chosen from a place of my perceived lack of worth. And I've identified this is the specific way this has to look. There's so much rigidity there. You can feel the tension of it has to be this way, right? There's no curiosity, there's no lightness to it.So values may look easy on the surface, but until you not only look at your values, but really dig into why you perceive a domain has a value to you, you might be choosing goals based on the right value, but the wrong reason. So if I'm using going on a road trip as an example, right? As a metaphor, the direction that I'm going is my value, West. I'm going West. The path that I'm driving on is my goals, right?The goals take me towards the direction that I want to go. The reason why I've chosen that value is the fuel. The fuel or energy that is available to drive in that direction is going to be different if you're trying to leave a place you hated versus trying to get to a place you love.The excitement, the desire, the optimism, the happiness, the contentment, all of those accompany doing something that you love, which is different than the energy of avoiding something you don't. When your fitness or parenthood or anything journey is driven by reducing the things that you hate about yourself, there's no finish line, there's no sense of achievement or mastery.Because you are never going to reach that place. It's an illusion. It is an illusion because there will just be something new to hate about yourself. I can promise you this. Maybe you've already experienced this. When I finally got lean enough that I started to see my abs, my skin on my stomach because of kids was more visibly saggy. The texture was worse than if I have extra weight in my stomach.So then it was, "Wow. I feel just as self-conscious about my stomach." I have the same sort of intensity of loathing in the way I'm viewing my body, even though I've done this thing. When it's coming from a place of reducing the things that you hate about yourself, it's impossible to finally reach a place where you're good enough in your own eyes.Why is this the case? Because our achievement based competitive productivity obsessed culture will always find a new way to shame you and remind you of what you still lack, which spoiler alert, never ends because you are a human and you will never be perfect.So the key to starting out on this journey in a way that is both enjoyable and sustainable is to acknowledge that weight loss slash muscle gain slash making everything from scratch slash having perfect children, whatever it is, it will never fill a void that exists if the void is based on your own lack.Once you build the muscle, lose the weight, have the perfect kids, et cetera, there's always going to be some part of you or some part of your environment that isn't measuring up, that doesn't meet your expectations.And that serves as a constant thorn in your side, reminding you that you're not allowed to rest, not yet allowed to be happy, not yet worthy of the love you desire until you fix what continues to be wrong.The world of fitness that I envision teaches women how to be on a fitness journey from a place of true love and self acceptance, and to use that as fuel to push themselves forward in ways that they value.Women who want to lift weights because they love the feeling of being strong and want to care for their bodies throughout the lifespan by using resistance training to mitigate all of the negative effects of aging, like muscle loss, bone loss, risk of fracture, loss of mobility, loss of access to friends and family.Not coming from a place where women go to subscribe to patriarchal beauty standards or to rid themselves of those parts that they hate or to fill some void created by society, but which doesn't actually need to exist. The athletic toned six pack body type portrayed in the media is available to very few people.Most of it is genetics. But there are a ton of other factors as well, like access to high quality food and training, access to the right equipment, access to time to be able to train, access to the emotional and psychological bandwidth, to identify coping mechanisms other than food.A larger bodied woman working multiple jobs to make ends meet may never have abs and thus will go her whole life feeling less than. I've been working with a client now for six months who has fallen in love with weight training.And although her body continues to adapt and develop in whatever ways it needs to in order to fuel her training, the most compelling result of her work is her vibe. I know that's not very behavior analytic, and I will try to explain it here in a way that's more concrete and observable. So we work together remotely.And so I don't get to see her in person all of the time. But when I saw her in person a week ago, as compared to the first time I saw her, she was completely different. So not talking about the outside. There was the energy, the energy was light.She was smiling more. There was an easygoing happiness. She was engaging in behaviors that led me to believe she was relaxed and at home in her body and clearly more comfortable in her body, in the world. During previous meetings, she was fidgety, she appeared to be nervous, eye contact was more challenging, she presented as socially anxious in different environments.For me, to see a woman step into her own body, her own presence with power, there's nothing more rewarding than that because that woman takes it with her wherever she goes and with whomever she interacts. She brings with her to every interaction, a sense that she knows who she is and that she intends to both do no harm nor take any shit.She's a woman who's not attached to what you think of her, to what society thinks of her, because she's turned the focus inward and she understands that the first opinion she trusts and values is the one she has of herself. A woman like this cannot be tossed about by the winds of life.She cannot be swayed to break boundaries in place to protect her. If she says she loves you, you believe it, because it's true, because she radiates truth and honesty in every room. She's seen herself in good light and bad, through the hard times, through the easy times. She's arrived here at this final place with an unbreakable sense of who she is.That is what comes from choosing to engage in activities and behaviors that are fueled from a sense of self acceptance and self love. I'm sure she started her fitness journey with a sense of everything she lacked. She hired me to help her finally make it possible for her to love herself.She thought that the way that would happen was by changing her outside, but that's not it. When I asked her the other day how she was feeling about herself, she said proud, proud that she prioritized her mental health by going to the gym every day, proud that she was feeding herself with more love, more veggies, more protein.Proud that she said she was going to do something and she did it. Proud of how her strength was increasing. Proud of how capable and strong she feels in life. She's different in ways that are less quantifiable, but more profound and undeniable. I'm proud because she's learning how to be in and love a body that will change throughout the lifespan.It's so normal. And she can extend that kindness to herself despite her physical presentation. She sees health as it truly is, movement, resistance training, healthy eating treats and indulgences in moderation. She's recognized that her body was just a scapegoat for all the self care she wasn't doing, no boundaries to set aside time for working out, no taking the time to prepare a nice healthy meal for herself, no mindful eating.And then all the consequences of that, poor sleep, fatigue, sluggishness, lack of motivation. The amazing thing about being a personal trainer is that yes, women absolutely come to me in the beginning and say, one of their many goals is to lose weight. But usually, more profound than that is that they want to feel confident in their bodies. They want to feel and be more capable. They want to feel and be stronger.I don't think we perceive that there's anything wrong with our bodies until society says so, until someone tells us. Right? Until we view some kind of marketing or ad campaign that communicates to us what women are supposed to look like and how women are supposed to show up in the world.And then we use that information to tell ourselves a story about ourselves and how we're showing up in the world. I want to help women create a fitness journey that's fueled by what's meaningful to them. How much you weigh is an arbitrary number that society told you is, or isn't correct.Right? If nobody ever told you that a certain number was good or bad, you wouldn't know it. But you would know whether or not you felt capable or strong or confident, right? Let's say before scales were invented, before there was a specific body type people were trying to achieve, if you were gathering crops for dinner, you would know it if your back was achy, you would know it if you felt kind of tired and not as fit as usual.That's how you would measure. You would go inside of yourself to measure, not outside. You wouldn't look at society, you wouldn't look at the people around you to tell you if you're healthy, you would check in with yourself. How am I feeling? I'm not feeling as well lately. Okay. What do I need to do about that? These are the measures that I want women to determine their fitness journey. Can you do the things you want to do?Are all the doors open to you? Right? Can you join your friends on a hike as easily as you can join your friends for sushi? Right? I have a friend who, whenever we get together, if we're talking about going on a hike, she says, "Oh, I'll skip it. But I'll hang out with you guys later." Or, "I'll hang out with you next time you're doing something different." That's a bummer.That means that so many opportunities are unavailable to her, right? I don't want people to get fit so that they can meet some arbitrary number on the scale. I want them to get fit so they can hang out with whoever the hell they want to hang out with, whenever the hell they want to hang out with them. I want you to feel capable to do whatever you want.The goal of finish shouldn't be to make you look like, or be like someone else. It shouldn't be to get you to have a specific body type. It should be to open doors, make life bigger and more accessible, make more things possible. You can ride on rides if you want, you can go roller skating if you want.You can go zip lining, you can go swimming, snorkeling, dancing. You can play tag with your kids. You can block your grandson's soccer goal attempt. You can make love. This is fitness. Not what we've been told it is, which is sometimes losing access to all of those things that I just mentioned in pursuit of some goal. Right?I'm going to spend so much time in the gym and I'm going to eat so rigidly, I don't have time to go zip lining. I don't have time to make love. I don't have time to play with my kids. No. This is not it. It's an air ball. It was headed in the right direction, and it went way too far the other way.So when you're thinking about what you're doing, how you're spending your time in life, where's that fuel coming from? You're in the car, you're driving on the path of your goals. You're headed towards your value destination. What's the fuel you're using? Is it fuel of self hatred? Is it fuel of self-loathing?Are you trying to bully yourself into engaging in a behavior? Or is it, "I can't wait to go where I'm going. I'm so excited. I have so much happiness and optimism and hope and joy for the fun things that lie ahead."Or is it, "Just please, God, get me away from all of those negative things that I was saying to myself. I'm just driving in any direction that takes me away from those negative things." The problem is that the direction you're going, right?The path that you're on might not be right for you. You're headed towards the right value, fitness, maybe, but you're on the wrong path because you're not excited about where you're going. You haven't identified. What path do you want to take? Do you want to take the path that's by the ocean? You want to take the path that's through the forest?There're a thousand different ways to get healthy. There're a thousand different ways to be fit. If your value is fitness, identifying the path that you love, because you love yourself enough to allow yourself to engage in behaviors that you love is the only way to sustain it. Hey, Amber, I love you. So I'm going to choose activities that you like.This is a process. It takes time. So be gentle with yourself. Be so gentle and so kind. Most people aren't at risk of being too kind to themselves. You might think if I'm too gentle to myself, if I'm too kind, if I'm too accepting, I will just turn into a slug that does nothing. I think you'll find the opposite is true.I think you'll turn into a slug that does nothing in regards to things you don't like and things that you don't value. And I would take that as a win. But then what happens is when you stop doing things you hate, you have energy for things you love, and then you can move towards the things that are really fun for you.And that's how you sustain a fitness journey, by doing what you love. So go out there this week, be so kind and gentle to yourself, identify the fuel that's pushing you on your path. Is it self-loathing or self-acceptance? If it's self-loathing, work on that. There are a lot of ways to work on that.If you need some resources, reach out. I can definitely point you in the right direction. A lot of good books, a lot of good talks. So many amazing authors are speaking on this, and I can point you in a direction that will be helpful. Have a wonderful week, have a wonderful Thanksgiving. I can't wait to check in next week to talk about systems work. And take care. See you next time!

In this episode, we discuss values and strategies to identify those most meaningful, so that you can start creating goals based on what matters to you.

In the last episode, we discussed the value of desensitization processes to facilitate value oriented living related specifically to fitness goals. In this episode, we discuss the topic in relation to our role as parents and showing up in the world with the tools to support others in a way we value.

In this episode, we discuss the value of desensitization as a way of working towards our goals and how this is one of the single biggest determining factors of ability to make progress.

In this episode, we discuss the value of process goals when moving towards a desired outcome and the importance of the identification and implementation of system support when attempting to achieve a goal.

Episode TranscriptWelcome to Divergent Fitness Podcast. I'm your host, Amber Sobrio-Ritter. I'm a mom of three boys and I'm a behavior analyst, a personal trainer, and today we are going to talk about body image in kids. As adults, we have a lot of tools and emotional resources to navigate some of the toxic information we are getting about the ways our bodies are meant to be presented to the world, but kids are little and they don't have all of the information and life experience and are still struggling under these really false belief systems. So, we're going to talk about a few ways that you can provide your child with a new perspective and help them see things a little bit differently and ideally adopt a completely different mindset around body image.So kids today are dealing with really unique challenges around body image because they are growing up with computers in a way that I didn't. Right? So, I'm essentially trying to parent a child through a life that I have no experience living and so there are special considerations when we take this into account. Unsurprisingly kids who spend a lot of time on social media have a higher rate of comparing their body to others body images. And what they often do is upline comparison, which means they compare themselves to someone that they perceive as better than them.The tricky part about this is that poor body image is hugely associated with disordered eating and disordered exercise and so this can be something that, especially if they're not getting a lot of support at home, to have a different perspective or to view things differently, this can be something that can cause a lot of problems moving into their late adolescence and adulthood.Both males and females have ideas that they are conditioned to believe about how men and women are supposed to show up in the world. Men also have standards that are unattainable for most regular people and are still under the weight of this pressure of needing to be perceived in a certain way and perceiving that people will not find you desirable if you do not look like that.If you have little boys, they are also trying to fit some societal norm and they are also getting the same kinds of messaging, so being sure that you are having these conversations with them, just like you would, if you had a little girl or if you do have a little girl, making sure that you really include both of them.The other thing is that if you don't talk to your little boys about this, let's say I have little boys who don't have any body image issues, so I never talked to them about this. They don't understand and could potentially use their ignorance as a way of harming somebody else. So if we don't talk about body diversity, we don't talk about how bodies change through the lifespan, they’re getting the messaging that they're getting from their peers and from society and then they are potentially regurgitating that messaging.So, if I don't teach my kids, even if they have no body image issues, if I don't teach them about this, they can weaponize that language. They can be unkind to somebody else. They can regurgitate that to a peer because it's based on the only perspective that they ever got, which is the one that society fed them through advertising and other forms of media.So it's really important, just like with consent. You talk about consent with little boys and little girls. You talk about body image with little boys and little girls, knowing that it's not only going to benefit your child, it's going to benefit all the children that your child comes into contact with.Before I dive into these three strategies, I just want to say that if my kids say something that I perceive to be unkind, or is some sort of body shaming to either themselves or each other, or says it about somebody in the community, if I haven't had this conversation with them, I do not approach that by shaming them or by calling them unkind or by punishing them. I just recognize that I potentially either haven't at all, or haven't enough, given them this other perspective from which they can pull and they need more education and more information, potentially more strategies around having this different perspective. They need more support.As a behavior analyst, usually if you have a person who's struggling to meet some goal, you just recognize that there's not enough support in place. You don't make any judgements about that person's character or the disposition or the personality. You just recognize that the level of support that's currently being provided is insufficient. So the great news is that if you've never had this conversation with your kids before, there's a lot of really great improvement that can be made. Like they've never had this other perspective and now they're going to, which is wonderful. Or maybe you've tried to articulate this perspective, but didn't exactly know how. And if you have had this conversation with your kids before, there are always ways to improve and hopefully there will be some new ideas that you've never before implemented.The first strategy that I use is modeling. I use a lot of modeling language, which means I use the language out loud that I want my children to use out loud, and that I want them to use in their own head. The way that I talk to my kids and the way that my kids hear me talk about myself, is going to be the way they talk to themselves. That's going to be the voice inside of their head as they get older, or it's going to be part. It's going to be one big voice inside their head as they get older. I want them to hear me talking about myself, and to myself, and about other people, in a way that I would be happy for them to be mimicking that behavior. I would be happy for them to also be talking to themselves and other people in the same way.What I model is kindness towards my own body, so caring for it for reasons outside of aesthetics. So, I might talk about eating to fuel goals. I might talk about how I'm so thankful that I get to connect with them over this shared meal. I'm going to discuss like, "Oh my gosh, my body's really been craving this meal. I've been lifting a lot of weight in the gym." Or, "Oh, I just needed something sweet tonight. This is so good." You know, really talking about food in a way where I'm enjoying it for whatever reason, that doesn't have to do with body aesthetics.The paradigm that I subscribe to is that you are not going to be able to sustain some diet where you have to remove an entire food group, or food groups from your diet in order to be successful, and it creates disordered eating when your kid seeing you going to these really big extremes. So if I'm eating a salad or I say, "I have to eat a salad to be healthy." That's not entirely true because you have to eat a lot of things. Your body needs like a lot of food diversity and food density can come in lots of different kinds of foods. Salads are not the only way that our body gets what it needs. So like, "Oh, my body's really been craving this salad because I haven't had greens lately." Or some other way of discussing that so that kids don't see the only avenue towards health is this specific way. There are a lot of different paths that are going to get me towards health and teaching them to choose the one that's going to be the most reinforcing, the least punishing for them. Which one do they hate least?The other thing is that instead of using language where I say, "I have to eat a salad." Or, "I can't such and such," using language that's more positive like, "I'm not going to have any ice cream tonight because it just doesn't sound good." You know? Or, "I'm just taking a break. I've been eating a lot of sweets lately and I just kind of feel sick." Or instead of, "I have to eat a salad." "I'm excited to eat this salad. It looks so good." Or, "I can't wait to eat this." Just making those tiny little changes can help kids to see that this is something that you are choosing. It's not, I have to eat a salad. It's like, I'm choosing to eat this because I want to fuel this fitness goal, or I really want to make sure that I'm getting a higher level of vitamin D because my doctor said I was deficient.Whatever it is, kids are saying, "Oh, mom's choosing this for her body." Not, "Oh, I have to do this because I'm living under the weight of some propaganda that tells me that I have to do this." That can help kids to see it as being something it's not something to rebel against. Health is not something to rebel against. It's something that you choose, but based on your values, not based on the values of society.Another thing that I do is I make sure that, of course I do not... I model kindness towards the kids' bodies and other people's bodies, so this might seem fairly obvious, but I just never comment on the body sizes of my kids or other people. It's so irrelevant to any conversation we ever need to be having. It just doesn't come up. And if the kids do it, I just model appropriate language. Like if my child says something sort of unkind about someone that they see in public, they whisper it to me. I might just respond, "Yeah. Bodies come in all shapes and sizes and everyone's responsibility to care for their own how they think is best." Then I just change a subject and we move on. I'm letting them know body shaming is not a choice here, in this family, and also it doesn't matter that person has so many other trait and is valuable in so many other ways, that have nothing to do with the way their body's being presented right now.Another thing that I do is I place low value on the sides of the body as acceptability or worthiness criteria. I'm really discussing and elevating the value of other characteristics above physical appearance, like really highlighting, "Wow, that person is such a good dancer." Not making any comments about the body size. It's to so irrelevant to this skill that they are performing. Talking about this with my own kids, you know, who seem to of course be in a phase of their lives. I have pre-teens and then I have... Or have one child, I have one pre-teen and then I have one teenager and they're in a phase of their lives where they think that their body is the most important thing in terms of how people are going to choose. How potential romantic partners are going to choose whether or not to like, engage with them.I'm always trying to elevate all of the other characteristics that have nothing to do with their physical appearance and remind them that so much of our value, 99% of the value that we have, has to do with all the other things and that we actually live in a society that just really is imbalanced in the way that we view bodies with so much focus.Destigmatizing the word fat. So this one's tricky because being fat is something that larger body people have started to sort of retake the term and started to choose it back for themselves and really starting to own it and acknowledging like, "Yeah, I'm fat. I'm larger bodied and this is the way my body looks and it's awesome. It's doing everything that I needed to do for me."So the thing is that when the kids say, if the kids said, "You're fat." If one child teases another one, "You're fat," instead of immediately stepping in and saying, "No, you're not. No, you're not." What does that do, if I have a child say I'm fat and I immediately respond, "No, no, no, you're not. No, you're not." What I'm communicating to them is like, that's not a good thing to be. So what happens when I tell a child, "No, you're not fat," is that I'm reinforcing to them that fat is such a horrible thing to be. Being in a larger body is so unacceptable and thank God you are not that.So instead what I've done in the past, and what I would coach parents to do is that if your child says, "I'm fat," you can respond by saying, "Your body size has nothing to do with your value and your worth in this world." Then I would go through all of the different things that are meaningful to them and ask them whether or not their body size is impacting their ability to be successful in those areas.I'll get into this a little bit deeper as I get into the second and third strategies that I use, but essentially I challenge that just by saying, as long as you're meeting your goals and you're living a life in mind with your values, it appears that it doesn't really matter the way your body looks. Does our doctor have any concerns? Do we have any legitimate health concerns? Are you pre-diabetic? We're not trying to get into a situation where I want my child to be unhealthy, but I think one of the biggest lies that we've been fed is that being larger bodied immediately equates to not being healthy. And you can absolutely be larger bodied and your blood work can come back great and you can be able to do the things that are meaningful to you and you can be living an amazing life. It's important that we let kids know that's a reality.I also discuss with my kids how the body is just going to change throughout the lifespan. It's so normal that your body is going to go through different phases of development and that those phases of development are going to affect it in different ways. And so loosening the rigid criteria to present in a specific way for the whole lifespan, which is very stressful. I have to look like this for the next 80 years or a hundred years. That's not possible. Your body is going to go through lots of hormonal changes. The aging process, menopause, puberty, all of these different things, childbirth. The body is going to go through so many different things, and we have to be flexible about how we allow it to show up, as it does these hugely important things for us and help us continue to move through life.And that these changes are adaptive and healthy and that if your body didn't change, if you went to give birth to a baby and your body hadn't changed, that would be concerning. It's very healthy to have a little bit of extra weight on your body when you are birthing a baby and keeping a baby alive post-birth. Think about when you are trying to go through puberty and your body is trying to grow. This is a big process. Your body is trying to put on so much muscle or so much bone mass. It's trying to grow you by a foot over the course of two or three years. You need to put on extra weight. Your body is going to need extra energy to be able to complete that process for you. So, acknowledging that my weight absolutely has to go up in order for me to be a healthy person throughout the lifespan can help kids loosen that rigid need to have it stay the same.The second strategy that I use is that I focus on providing different perspectives to media messaging that kids are getting. So talking about body neutrality, there's a difference between body positivity and body neutrality. Body positivity is, this is my body. My ears stick out. I have stretch marks. My stomach skin looks like you blew up a balloon for a month and then deflated it and I love all of these things about me. I love them. They're beautiful. They're amazing. So you take all of the negative things that you would've said about your body and you just flip it.Body neutrality, however, which is even better is that you look at your body and you say "It's doing all the things I needed to do. It's perfectly functional and I'm so thankful that it allows me to move through this life in a way that I value." It completes all of the processes needed for me to live a rewarding life and some days I don't like it. Some days I look in the mirror and I think I'm not happy with you today. And some days I look at it and I think, wow, you're killing it and that's okay. Like, recognizing that you don't always have to love your body. That's not a criteria that you need to meet and instead, appreciating it for all of the things that it does, and knowing that your perception of it physically is going to ebb and flow and that's okay and that you don't need it to be a certain way because your focus isn't on that. Your focus isn't on how it looks. Your focus is on what it does.The other thing is that looking at media messaging. So the kids and I, and I embed this just within any little moment or opportunity with them, whether we're watching a movie or we're looking at a social media post, or there's an advertisement or a billboard out in the community and we break it down. So if it is a picture of Cristiano Ronaldo, who's a famous soccer player and he's chiseled. He has like an eight pack. He's looking so lean. He's holding a deodorant stick. This is a deodorant advertisement and the boys and I will look at it and I'll ask them a couple questions.The first is, what are they selling here? They're selling deodorant. What are they trying to tell you about the deodorant? Well, Cristiano Ronaldo uses it, so it's like potentially really cool and really good because he's good at soccer, so probably he's good at choosing deodorant. If you want to smell good, or if you want to smell like Cristiano Ronaldo, you should use it. If you use it, maybe your romantic interests will like you, the way Cristiano Ronaldo's romantic interests, I'm sure like him. Just kind of go through what are they trying to teach you about this deodorant and what it means to use this deodorant?Then the other conversation we have is what is this advertisement trying to teach you about men and how men are supposed to show up in the world? Like, okay, well, you're supposed to look like Cristiano Ronaldo. You're supposed to smell good. In order to be a soccer player, you should look like that, because he's a soccer player and that's how he looks. And really just going through all of the tiny little nuances of this advertisement. And at the end, what I really want them to understand is advertising is meant to make you see a deficit in yourself so that then the company can present to you this easily packaged solution and say, "Hey, but don't worry. Here's the solution to the thing that you don't like about yourself, that we've taught you not to like about yourself. Here's the solution is this deodorant." This is how we are filling the gap between who you now perceive yourself to be and who you want to be and the thing that fills this gap is the deodorant.So letting the kids know that advertising is usually rooted in some sort of message about your deficiency in some way, so that they can then provide to you a solution and having the kids know that like, oh, well, the whole point is this. The whole point of this is for me to feel not good enough, so then I purchase this product. Okay, so that takes a little bit of... That provides a little bit of a different perspective because now I'm not viewing it as absolute truth. I'm viewing it as, oh, someone's trying to sell a product here and I don't necessarily need to choose to believe this.The third thing that I do is values oriented goal support, so talking to kids about what's meaningful to them. If I have a child, if I had a daughter who loved to dance and she was larger bodied and maybe she comes to me and she says, "I'm fat." And I say, "Okay, that has nothing to do with your value and worth in this world, but let's have a conversation about it. Seems like that's something you want to talk about. Let's talk about all the things that are meaningful to you. Let's about all the experiences you want to have in your life."So you love to dance. Okay. Great. Is your body size impacting that? No. Seems like you're a good dancer. You're meeting your goals. You're moving up. You are making progress. Okay. Check. You want to have good friends? Do you have good friends? Yes. Okay. It doesn't seem like your body size is impacting that. Do you want to have romantic interests? Yes. Okay. Seems like you have some romantic interests. Maybe even if they're not the ones that you are interested in. You want to have some romantic interests. You do. Check. So it seems like your body size isn't impacting that. Seems like all of your hobbies, seems like school, none of these things are impacted by your body size the way you perceive they would be.Body size feels so, so important in our society that it almost feels like, wow, if I'm not thin, it's going to negatively impact literally everything in my life. But when you break it down, Hey, looks like I basically have everything I want and things are going essentially well, except for me continuing to feel like I want to be thin. I want to be thin. I want to be thin. Have we talked to your doctor and your doctor seems happy about the way that you're developing? Is your blood work okay? Great. So it seems like everything's okay. Seems like there are no concerns, so it seems like the concern is just coming from you and let's talk about why you're concerned about that. It's based on messaging that you've been getting, since you were little. It's based on false messaging. It's propaganda. It's programming that's meant for you to see it yourself as deficient so that you purchase a product.The thing I love about weightlifting specifically, and I am a weightlifter. I started when I was 35. This is something that's been super meaningful to me and really important to me in my life, so I usually try to weave it in or just sort of like naturally weave it into any topic of conversation. But weightlifting is so wonderful because it's accessible to so many body types. It's not aerobic in nature, usually depending on the kind of lifting that you're doing, so it's really accessible to people who might be slightly de-conditioned or who are larger bodied. The wonderful thing is that the diversity of bodies within weightlifting is vast, so kids can look at a bunch of female power lifters and potentially see themselves. And same with little boys, who can look at like male power lifters. Wow, those people are really strong and their larger body. Turns out you can be really successful in your sport. You can be healthy. You can be moving towards your goals and be in a larger body.It helps to present a different perspective about how bodies are allowed to show up in fitness. There's not only one way that a body that's fit is allowed to look right. It demonstrates health and strength at many sizes and the really rewarding thing for me has been to be working with my two oldest sons and it's one of the very last ways that they think I'm cool. I think even that's a stretch, but I'm hanging onto it and I take them to the gym and I think they get really excited about that sense of feeling stronger and all of the other men at the gym are so kind and encouraging and excited to see them there. I think people don't see kids very often at the gym, so they get really excited to see us already sort of working on this like healthy, balanced way of approaching the world.So let's say a child comes to you and they say, "I just want to lose weight. That's it. This is just what's important to me at this phase of my life." What they're really saying is, "Mom, I know that this might not feel true to you, but I'm in high school and this is my world right now. This is the water that I'm swimming in and it feels really meaningful to me if I can work towards this goal of becoming more lean and I just really want your support on that."What I want to do is take a magic wand and just make my child, or make that child, love themselves and say, "Why are you spending so much effort and time focusing on this goal that has so little to do with your value?" But I'm the mom, so it's hard for kids to really understand, from this big perspective, I have so many years of experience. So many years of practice working on this mindset.So what I would do is I might say, "Okay, I hear you that that's really important to you right now. I want you to know that you're so valuable outside of this. This is such a small piece of who you are and you're healthy, so I don't think this is necessary. But if this is really meaningful to you, I'll help you with this goal."The reason that it is helpful to get involved, as your child invites you, is that you can model balanced eating. You can model moderation. Because what kids do is because they don't have resources. They're not trained and actually adults do this too, honestly. They don't understand how to have moderation. It's tricky to sort of figure that out and to make sure you're eating mindfully and that you have really good body awareness.So they might say, "All right, I'm just going to cut out this major food group. I'm just never going to eat sugar." And what's going to happen is they're going to get into this binge and restrict cycle where they eat really perfectly for a week and then they go crazy on the weekends and it's super unhealthy and it gets really disordered. So what you can say is, "We're going to avoid that. Here's the research that shows that you can eat totally moderately and enjoy all the things you love and it's going to be slower, but it's going to be more sustainable and healthier."So you can choose to support them with that goal in a way that's healthy and fosters a really healthy, moderate relationship with food, while continuing to work on the mindset. I'm supporting you in this goal. Sure, I'll go on a run with you. I'll work harder to make dinners that have a lot of different kinds of nutrient density and I will also continue working with you on your mindset. I'm going to continue talking to you about how valuable you are and how amazing you are outside of this small criteria and how your body is very normal and how there are no concerns and how you're living a life in line with your values. I'm going to continue to work on the mindset while I support you, with the goal so that you don't hurt yourself, trying to white knuckle it through this weight loss. I want to support you in a way that's just super moderate and healthy and that's the way to really support your kids, to make some sustainable behavior change over time, in a way that's really gentle and loving towards themselves.So as a last plug for weightlifting, I will say that for a lot of reasons, it's been really meaningful to be weightlifting. Not only to be able to share it with my kids, but also to be able to model for them like a mom working towards a goal. I paid all these years for them to be in soccer and for them to be in art class and coding classes and all these different things. But during none of that time, was I taking a class to learn how to do anything new. It's like you start to siphon all of your resources as an adult, if you have kids, just towards your kids. Save any of that for yourself, right? I want to master a skill. I want to move. I want to make progress towards some desired goal. I want to keep evolving and growing as I age.I think the really exciting thing is that I've been able to model for them how exciting it is to move towards a goal, the kind of discipline and dedication it takes, how you push through when it's challenging, and then I can share that with them when we go to the gym together on the weekends and we're lifting together. It just really feels like a super special way to bond and I would love for more moms to have this skill of knowing how to lift weights and then be able to share it with their kids, for all of the reasons that I've shared. It being a really body healthy, body positive sport, that is accessible to a lot of kids.So there are some strategies that I use to talk to my kids about body image. Let me know what you think. If you implement any of these strategies, if you have extra questions or comments, I'd love to discuss these kinds of things, so feel free to reach out and take care and I'll see you next time.

In this episode, we discuss the value of fitness and how systems work can make the path of least resistance be the path that also leads you toward your goals.