Hey ,

In my annual Best of You Coaching Club mentorship, I work with an amazing group of intelligent, driven and powerhouse women for 11 months, covering mindset, physique and business.

One of the very first topics and practices that we tackle is what I call "automating your physique."

What does it mean to "automate your physique" and why should you care?

Automating your physique is exactly what it sounds like--putting into place strategies and tactics that make maintaining your physique effortless, so that you can spend LESS time obsessing over it and MORE time on things you want to devote your mental energy to--like your family, your relationships, your business or career, school or personal projects, whatever.

I hear many women complain that they are thinking about their body constantly. 

And if it's not their body, it's counting their cals or macros, or watching the clock for the next time they should eat, or stressing about 'will their be enough food?' or 'when can I get to the grocery store to buy and prep my healthy food this weekend?' or 'I'm so nervous that anywhere I go won't have anything I can eat' and 'my husband always bring junk into the house--doesn't he know I have to work so hard to resist that??' etc etc.

I get it. Completely.

Our physique, our food, our "rules" around food, our workouts ("When are we going to get them in?! I really don't want to go to the gym and have to do an hour of cardio! Kill me!") can not only take over our lives, but also eat up every ounce of mental space we have available. Boo.

So, of course we feel unproductive in other areas of our lives! Of course we feel like we are just doing whatever's in front of us, never getting a leg up. Of course we feel distracted and tired and neurotic about food! THERE ARE SO MANY RULES! HOW CAN WE EVER SUCCESSFULLY IMPLEMENT THEM ALL?!!

Got it. And that's where automating your physique comes in.

There are 3 components to physique automation: nutrition, exercise and mindset.

1) NUTRITION: Picking the 1-3 things you will actually do consistently, effortlessly and let that be good enough. These are going to be the most impactful things. I call these my "Daily Nutritional Commitments." 

For me, they are: 

1. Eat protein at every meal
2. Eat one huge BAS every single day, and
3. Always keep a protein bar in my purse in case I get caught without food

That's it. The rest? I let be. And do my best, because that's really all I can do. I don't have, nor am I willing to create, the mental energy for more. Also, then I get these in, it leaves very little wiggle room for too many slip-ups because I usually feel satisfied and satiated.

2) EXERCISE: Always choose sustainable and efficient over long/something you dread. Choose shorter, more intense workouts, 30 mins or less and prioritize weight training. I do weights 4x/week. And if I do nothing else, I let that be FINE. Seriously. Also, skip the shit you dread. Why? Because if you hate it, you eventually won't be able to keep forcing yourself to do it. Hate the treadmill? Don't do it. Intervals on the elliptical or step mill instead. Done. What's next?

A brief aside, re: exercise: I travel a ton for work, so I just made up my mind (rather than stressing the hell out about it) and I just don't work out when I travel. Do I wish I could? Is it "ideal?" Of course. But I am just not willing to stress about it, bring a bazillion extra clothes with me and I also made up my mind that I will train consistently and intensely whenever I am home. Done. NEXT!

3) MINDSET: When it comes to automating your physique ... and I don't know how better to say this ... but it honestly comes down to just RELAXING more. In your head. 

I wish I had a better way to describe it, but the closest I can come is to stop living and dying by "the rules" and let 'good enough' be good enough. Because the reality is what we are doing is our best, and that's all we can do. And the alternative is beating ourselves us and wallowing in negative self-talk, acting as if we need the guilt and remorse to help us "get back on track," but I don't know about you, but I've never achieved positive changes from a negative frame of mind.

And so, how do you hone your mindset around your physique? 

I don't know exactly--I'm still working through how to verbalize this--except I can tell you that you have to actually want to. It's a choice. And you then at that point, it's a conscious effort every day. I'm a bottom line person, and as scary and tough as it is, you have to just look in the mirror and at some point just say, "You know what? I'm fine. And if I never lost another pound, I'd be okay."

Aaaaaaah! So hard! And yet ... it's just a choice, isn't it?

A choice to just be. In your skin. Do your best and let the chips fall. Find what consistent action steps you can take consistently. DON'T TRY TO DO EVERY SINGLE THING YOU THING YOU CAN AND SHOULD BE DOING. 

Nope, that's not going to work long-term. So ask, what are the 1-3 things I can see myself doing a year from now, 10 years from now, forever? They need to be sustainable, or else they can't be part of your physique automation.

Another word for automation is effortlessness. 

And when you're white-knuckling your way through strict dieting and crazy exercise routines, it's not effortless. It's inevitably unsustainable. So dial it back. Let 'good enough' be good enough. Throw yourself a bone.

I love talking about this stuff. And I know you do too :)

I am going to be tackling more of the mindset stuff behind physique automation in the future, but I've done a lot of strategizing so far re: tools and techniques to make this stuff easier. 

I'm going to be sharing many of the tools and insights I've developed in an upcoming free interview I recorded on emotional and stress eating, featured in the "Loving Food Loving Life" webinar series. I'll be speaking all about mindset, moderation and the exact tools I've used to break the emotional eating cycle. My webinar will be on THIS Tuesday April 15th at 4pm EST/1pm PST but you have to sign up (it's free!) in advance to get access, here. 

If you can't make it at 4pm ET, no stress! You can access to for 48 hours after the airing on demand :)

I hope you enjoy it :) Have a great weekend!

Ox, Jill