It’s All In Your Head: a Mindset Makeover for Lasting Change

It’s All In Your Head: a Mindset Makeover for Lasting Change

It’s All in Your Head 

Mindset Makeover

Love this question! 

The JillFit blog has been around for almost 4 years now and contains 500+ blogs, so luckily for me, it’s been really fun to watch the content change over the years as my own journey has shifted. I started out as a figure competitor and fitness model, engaging in solely physique pursuits for years. It was an amazing experience, seeing the body transform, but no matter how lean I got or how many tearsheets I collected, I never felt at ease or happy in my body.  

Dieting constantly was misery, and when you are in that mental space, you cannot see out of it. I spent many years berating myself for not being perfect with my eating, and then disgusted with myself for being what I perceived to be “weak” or “undisciplined” or frankly, just not good enough. My mindset was just always: leaner, more muscle, less sugar, more cardio, be better, stronger, thinner, etc AND THEN you can relax and be happy.  

And so, I thought it was the diet and the exercise that mattered most. If I just found “the best meal plan” and did the best workouts consistently, then of course I’d get the body of my dreams and finally like myself!  

Welp, it doesn’t work that way because information does not equal transformation, and just because I had “the diet” and “the workouts” didn’t mean I’d be able to do them perfectly or consistently. 

Implementation is everything. For the most part, people know WHAT to do, they just can’t do it. And not because they are lazy gluttons who “don’t want it enough,” but because we are human and willpower is exhaustible. Plus, we have many focuses: kids, partners, jobs, home life, school, whatever, and the only people who can get and stay super lean are those who focus on it exclusively, like pro competitors and models who are getting paid to look that way. And even they struggle and the pool of those individuals is very small anyway. So for the average multi-tasking woman to compare herself to that is frankly absurd. And yet we all do it, and it doesn’t serve us. 

The final piece for me came when I realized that hating yourself into positive change is impossible. Guilt, shame, remorse and self-digust are terrible motivators.  

Who’s healthier: the person who’s 12% body fat but hates themselves and is completely body-obsessed? Or the woman who is 25% body fat but loves who she is, wakes up excited to workout and eat healthy and doesn’t waste a million hours stressing that she’s not good enough according to some arbitrary number? I’d say the second woman every single time.

Mindset is everything. I kind of sort of hate the word “mindset” because it feels really overused, but also somewhat esoteric. What I really mean by “mindset” is actually PERSPECTIVE. I’ve known women sitting at 10% body fat who are painfully insecure and I’ve also known overweight women who wake up every day killing life and loving every inch of their body. Perception is everything. You literally create your reality in every second with how you choose to see the world, how you see others and how you see yourself.  

In general, when I talk about mindset, it’s to contrast two specific models:

1. The Victim Mindset and 
2. The Empowered Mindset. 

When we play the victim, we feel like life is out to get us. We say, “Why is this so hard??” and “How come so-and-so seems to do this effortlessly?” or “Why am I the one this bad stuff always happens to??”  

Can you see how these statements take our power away? They create the perfect scenario so that we get to continue being the one “done wrong” and unfairly treated. Playing the victim leaves us helpless to make a change. And it’s also a choice, by the way 🙂  

The Empowered Mindset, on the other hand, is also a mindset that we can CHOOSE, and when we do, we get to be the creators of our life. When we perceive that we get a say in how our life unfolds, we are more likely to TAKE ACTION to make it so. Even when in situations that aren’t ideal, people who choose an empowered mindset always feel like they have a choice. Is it always easy and pleasant? No, but they know that by choosing their attitude and their effort, they can change their circumstances. 

It’s that simple. 
The Empowered Mindset is about possibility and achievement. The Victim Mindset is about staying small, scared and helpless. It’s 100% your choice. 

Awesome! Yes! My 10-Week Mindset Makeover launches this week, and we’ve had over 500 women go through the program so far, and I’m pumped to have it out of retirement for the week! 🙂  

The program is for women who have exhausted all other options and are honestly ready for a huge mental overhaul. Meaning, they are sick and tired of stressing out about their physique constantly and wondering if they are ever going to be good enough/thin enough/successful enough/whatever enough. It’s a game we never win, and certainly not by “dieting harder.” 

The 10 week educational program takes the participants through 5 modules including intro to mental awareness, beating your inner victim, active acceptance and how to talk to yourself more effectively for physique change plus boosting body esteem, how to choose your attitude in every moment for success and putting it all together into a doable long-term strategy for physical and mental change. 

It combines the latest in positive and change psychology, with some of the new age personal development insights plus some unique takes on the fitness industry as it relates to body esteem and self-confidence. 
JillFit’s motto is “You can have a cookie and still like yourself after,” and this program is all about teaching you how to interact with your environment, other people and most importantly–yourself–to become the best version of you. 

I’m not going to lie–this program is not for someone who wants to merely dabble. This is a hardcore mindset change program. I’ll often be asking you to take 10 minutes out of your day and complete some exercises to get at the core of you, your beliefs and the places you are stuck. 

The program is 100% educational in nature, but it involves the participant doing the work. I want each woman to know themselves better than ever at the end, and truthfully, that’s going to take some time, introspection and the desire to unearth some potentially hard and scary truths about themselves. Each email takes a couple minutes to read, and then some exercises can take 5 minutes, while others will take more.  

Obviously, the more you put into the program, the more you get out of it. I’ve had plenty go through the program and learn a ton without doing any of the exercises, but ideally, the program is best for those who want to make real, sustainable change and stop wasting time looking anywhere outside themselves. 

This program is 100% about the individual. And of course I share plenty of embarrassing, open and super vulnerable stories from my own past so that everyone knows they’re not alone 🙂

The biggest and best outcome is a complete mindset shift away from The Victim Mindset to an empowered one. 

I love getting emails from participants afterward saying that they’ve completely taken control of their life, their body, their career, their relationships, whatever. Ultimately, this program is about creating a life you love and feeling like you have a say in how it all plays out.  

The program can get emotional for people, and I’ve had women write and say they got back in touch with an estranged loved one or the program saved their marriage or they made a complete career change. It’s been amazing to see. 

My personal goal? For each woman to appreciate who they are in the world, 100% and show up authentically and powerfully, as a result of going through this education 🙂

Yep, I agree totally, Jen. Mindset change is so difficult! 

Usually, focusing on diet and exercise is easier because it’s clinical. You’re either compliant or you’re not. And when you’re not, it’s easy to point the finger: “My coach is the worst!” or more common: “I’m the worst! I can’t even follow this freaking diet for a week!”  

Negative self-talk is the biggest waste of time and energy, yet it’s it’s also the most effortless thing on earth–we all do it, and then wonder why we’re not getting results. This is humanity’s natural default state–to blame others or ourselves, which is really just one big distraction when it comes to outcomes. Blaming and complaining is a crutch. And it’s also not a solution. Emotions are important, but action is what moves us. 

Mindset work is tough because it requires us go beyond the human default state. It requires we TAKE 100% RESPONSIBILITY for everything in our lives. Our thoughts and actions, the situations we find ourselves in, even if they were a result of someone else’s actions. Doesn’t matter, because regardless of whose “fault” something is, the bottom line is that we can never wait on others to change in order to be happy or accomplished. We have to do the leg work ourselves. 

The key with mindset work is ownership. And ownership takes courage and looking inward. Shining the spotlight on those not-so-useful parts of ourselves like the feelings of not-good-enough and the real reasons why we need to get thinner. This is hard, and sometimes painful. We have to give up the story that we’ve been done wrong or that life has “happened” to us. 

Mindset work requires taking 100% responsibility in every moment. And though it can be scary and uncomfortable, the alternative to doing this work is staying small, scared, insecure and never feeling like you have a say in your life. And I don’t know about you, but the latter sounds a lot worse! 🙂

Thank you so much, Jen, for having me! Your readers are the best! Honored to be taking up space on your blog today!  

Xoxo

10-Week Mindset Makeover