Hello! And you are so very welcome to my latest podcast episode that has been inspired by one of you on Instagram. Um I asked you last week on my Instagram stories, what it is that you would love for me to cover in a podcast episode. And I was overwhelmed with the number one. How to get back on track when you're off track. So, so many of you said that was your main struggle.
So that's exactly what I'm going to chat with you about in today's podcast episode. How to get back on track when you have fallen off the wagon and you are feeling stuck desperate unhealthy, you've toxins floating around in your body. Maybe it's not as bad as that. Maybe you just are, you just want to get back into your healthy routine and you just haven't been really on it. This is, this episode is going to help you just structure and organize your weeks ahead and just get really in that zone where you know exactly what you want, you know why you want it and you know exactly what you have to do.
And I'm going to share with you my five step framework that's going to make this really, really simple for you. So if you're just back from your holidays, if you've been just off track, if you've been drinking too much alcohol, eating too much food, if your workouts have slipped, if you're just not feeling good. I, um, II, I have this for you. I used to be the queen of inconsistency. I, I was never inconsistent with really anything in my life. I didn't know how to be consistent. Um, I, as you know, I have been three stone overweight for a very long time and after being three stone overweight, then I was either losing weight or gaining weight. I just was never at that point where I was just consistently healthy and one of the main reasons for that was this topic.
Exactly. I was, I never, when I was off track, never knew how to get quickly back on track. It was such a big mountain to climb to get back on track. However, I know that that's absolutely garbage. Now, when you're off track, when you have a night where you eat shit or you drink too much alcohol or you miss a workout, the further away you can get from thinking you're on or off track and you're just, you just become this healthy person, the easier it becomes. Um, so I just want to give you some simple tips. If you're listening to this now and you are stuck, you're off track and you want to get back on track. So grab a pen and paper. Um and you can pause this episode as we go along.
And we're, we're going to be doing a little bit of reflection first before we go into the action setting. So you're off track, you want to get back on track. The first thing you've got to do is you've got to know what your goals are so that you actually know where you're going and what you're working towards. And that's one of the biggest thing. Um mistakes that I see people make when they are trying to get back on track that they don't actually know what their goals are. They just think they should be doing something and you know, that's the most demotivating thing possible.
I shouldn't be eating as much. I shouldn't be drinking so much. I should be doing a workout when actually being fit and healthy is, is different for everybody. And what makes me feel fit and healthy may be completely different, similar enough, but I mean, a different amount of workouts, a different nutrition style. So the first things first is to get really clear on what exactly it is that you want, not what you think society wants for you or what you think you should want. What do you actually want? What do you actually want? Do you want to get fitter? Do you want to be healthier? Would you love to lose some weight? Would you love to get stronger? Write out your goal and be super clear and make sure it is a happy goal and one that you actually want to achieve.
And then next off, I would encourage you to write out all the reasons why your goals are important to you and you want to always dig a little bit deeper into your first answer. So if you want to lose weight, for example, your first answer might be to feel better in your clothes. However, I want you to ask yourself, why is it that you want to feel better in your clothes? Like for example, for me, when I feel bad in my clothes, it affects every single thing in my day. Like I, I feel bad. My confidence takes a hit, it affects how I show up at work.
My self esteem can take a little bit of a knock. I don't feel good about myself. I don't feel that I am portraying the person I feel, which is a fit and healthy person. Um And when, when my clothes get tight, I feel that my action steps aren't in line with where I want them to be. I absolutely adore, feeling, feeling fit and healthy. I love feeling good in my clothes. I love feeling confident. I love wearing clothes and feeling good in them. And I love to be a good role model. II, I love, I love that part. I love to help people feel fit and healthy and I love to lead with that. So it's really important when you're setting out your goals that you're, you're writing out all the deep reasons why your goals are important to you training for an event like a wedding coming up or something like that. It's, it's only going to get you so far as you may have noticed that you'll lose weight or you'll get fit for the period of time before the event.
However, if your why hasn't been strong enough, if it's just been for the event, you know, I've done it so many times, you just pile all the way back on and you don't think you will. But if you look back now, did you, so getting really clear on your why is super, super important? Um So next up, one of the really good things that you want to do is to write out your specific why your goals are important to you. And then we're going to focus on the action steps that are in line with that goal. So for example, and we're going to use my five step framework here. This is the five step framework that I have shared with you on my free resource. You can go to jessicacooke.ie/unleash.
And it's the five step framework I always use with my clients. It keeps it really simple that your action steps when you're focusing on your fitness and your health are in five steps. Um My pm's five step framework. Pam's P A HMS and your action steps are around the P part, your physical fitness, so your physical movement, what would that look like for you? How would that look like for you if you want to be fit and healthy, you want to feel really good, lose weight, feel good in your clothes. What would an ideal situation look like for you? And if you don't know, um, and you'd love to become fit and healthier and you're listening to this and you're a woman over 43 30 minute workouts of strength training three times a week with a couple of walks. You'd be absolutely 10 out of 10. You'll be building lean muscle, you'll be, um, burning fat at rest, which will promote fat loss. You'll feel better in your clothes. It also um is terrific for preventing and managing osteoporosis. You get physically strong. It's amazing and only takes 90 minutes a week, 3, 30 minutes slots. And my coaching program is full at the minute, but you can go to jessicacooke.ie/coaching if you would like to get on the waitlist.
So you want to write out your action steps? Um How many workouts that you're going to get done in a week realistically and don't overshoot it and aim for too much. I would always prefer to slightly go under the amount that I think I can do. So if you think you can just about manage three workouts, I would say aim for 23 is a bonus. If you want to do four, I would say aim for 34 is a bonus. Um And then adding in a couple of action steps around fresh air and getting a few walks in. The a part to my five step framework is the accountability and support in my coaching program.
We do weekly check ins which are really important and um also um my clients send me their weekly habits checklist every week. If you're listening to this and you're not a client, it's really, really good to find an accountability support network in a community of women. We have an amazing community of women in our group um which is really important because it's really inspiring and motivating for us when we're having bad days and we can see other people posting about their wins or, or even somebody having a bad week is a really solid reminder that it doesn't always just happen to you that everybody has tough weeks and bad weeks. Um So making sure you have some form of accountability within your action steps if your goal is to do with fitness and weight loss and getting healthier.
And then on to the h part, hydration always really important and a really, really terrific win two liters of water every day is going to help you feel really good and really hydrated. The end part of Pam's mental health. What are you going to do every week to help you reduce stress, reduce anxiety and to feel good? Remember that when you are working towards weight loss, if you get super fixated on nutrition, it's never going to work, you have to unveil and discover the reasons why you're overeating, why you're over weight. And for a lot of women, it's stress and anxiety, doing too much, feeling overwhelmed, hormonal changes.
We have a long list. So it is putting in place little easy to follow action steps that will take care of your mental health throughout the week. For example, like reading a good fiction book, taking 10 minutes throughout the day, somewhere, sitting in silence, sitting in the garden with a cup of tea. Um, listening to the birds, little mini action steps, journaling and then on to the s part of Pam's self care. Your nutritional action steps, what nutritional action steps are going to get you feeling fitter and healthier. What unhealthy action steps that you're doing? Now, what unhealthy habits are you doing?
Now, would you love to get rid of? And I would start there. I would always start with the unhealthy habits that you're doing rather than fixating on trying to be healthier on your healthy action. Steps on your nutrition and your self care also takes into account your bedtime and your morning routine. So, in an ideal world, they're all the steps I would, I would touch upon when I was formulating a fitness and health plan to get back on track. However, sometimes when you, when you're trying to get back on track, the biggest mental block can be that it just feels like too much.
So if you, if your struggle is that it all just feels too much and you feel overwhelmed. So you're doing nothing, then I would just focus on getting the workouts in every single thing good will come to you. If you focus on the workouts, if you decide to work out for 10 minutes, let's just say 10 minutes, three times a week for the, for the next week instead of zero, which you're doing now. And remember, we always say to ourselves, well, what would be the point of 10 minutes, but you're doing zero at the minute. So that's amazing. And in my beginners program, within my thrive coaching program, I have everybody do a week where they do just 10 minute workouts in the first week and nearly all of my clients say to me at the beginning.
Oh my God. That 10 minutes, I really, really felt that the next day in my body which proves like 10 minutes is excellent. You're building up the habit of exercise, you still feel it in your body. Um, it's still really terrific for your muscles. And then when you've got that those three slots of exercise built into your week, then you can go to the 30 minute workouts. You've built up the habit, your body is getting used to the exercise and the workouts. Um, and you haven't absolutely destroyed your body and felt like so bad. Um, and have this horrible muscle soreness that you've eased yourself back into it gently.
So, if you struggle to get back on track, and this has been one of the main reasons that has stopped me from, of getting back on track sooner. And I still have to watch myself. I can do it with work and, and other things in my life that I, I think of the task ahead as too big and it makes me freeze. It's just like an old default, um, habit, behavioral habit that I, that I still have to just watch out for it. Um, that I need to when I see something that it's too big ahead of me. How can you break it down into small little chunks or what's the one thing that you can do that will bring you forward and when it comes to your fitness and health, that one thing if you make that workouts, let me just remind you that when you work out, you are much more inclined to make better food choices. You're much more inclined to drink water.
You're much more inclined to go to bed earlier and feel more naturally tired late at night. You're going to get a huge endorphin hit those, excuse me, those feel good, hormones are going to come out. The second you work out, you're going to get mental health results. The second you work out like literally five minutes into your workout, you're going to be like, yeah. Yeah, I feel so good. Now, I've been coaching women for over 14 years now. I hear this day in, day out, day in and day out that the second somebody gets into their workout. Ok. Not the second, maybe about 4 to 5 minutes into their workout. They always start to feel really, really good, really, really good. And they always say to me, I don't know why I put it off for so long and it's so true. Once you take that little bit of action in the right direction. You're going to feel much better.
So from that springboard of feeling much better, you can start to focus on the other action steps that I spoke about in the five step framework. PMS, you can focus on action steps for your physical fitness, your accountability and support your hydration, your mental health and your self care. When you've got the workout piece in place, if I was to say to you, OK, I want you to get back on track and I want you to focus on healthy eating all day today. That is a great action step. And at the end of the day, you're gonna feel much more in control. However, you're not going to have had that endorphin buzz that is going to make you feel like super woman, but you are going to get that from the workouts. So if you just said, well, look, I'm going to focus on the nutrition down the line, I'm gonna get there and I'm going to focus on everything else.
The bedtime routine, morning routine down the line. I'm so busy right now. I don't have the mental capacity to think of anything else. I'm just going to carve out and figure out where I can find 3 10 minute slots in my day. Now, normally, if for women that are, that are feeling this overwhelmed and busy, that's best done in the morning. However, I know some of you can't. So you, you have to do night time. That's absolutely fine. If you can do it in the morning time just to get it done and for it not to just be another action step. That's, that's just like stuck with you for the rest of the day. Try and get it done in the morning time as much as you can and only do 10 minutes.
Get a set of weights, get a mat and do 10 minutes of a good solid workout and build up a sweat. And from there, I promise you all the good stuff will come. You'll make better food choices. You'll start to get a bed to get to bed a little bit earlier. And that is how you get back and track, sit down, write out your goals, write out why your goal is important to you. Write out really simple action steps. Those action steps are going to touch off your mental health, your nutrition, your bedtime morning routine, your hydration, your accountability and support and your physical movement. If that sounds like too much, write out a plan for just your physical movement and if it's a Thursday or a Friday, I totally get that.
Your plan will start on Monday. If you're listening to this and it's a Tuesday, you have time to get two workouts in this week, 2, 10 minute workouts this week, which means by the time you get to the end of the week, you'll be feeling already back on track. It's all about putting 1 ft in front of the other. It's all about letting go of some of the action steps that overwhelm you and allowing yourself to ebb and flow just like the tides. When you're feeling overwhelmed, when you're feeling really busy, your action steps will become less and you'll be doing your non-negotiable action steps when you're feeling a little bit better and you have more time, then you can have more action steps. It's all about keeping things super simple and staying as consistent as you can. If you get into a lovely flow of doing 3 30 minute workouts every week, and something happens out of your control rather than dropping your workouts, go back down to 3, 10 minute workouts.
So you just still have this wonderful consistency in your life. And even though you're down to 10 minute workouts, you're doing workouts and you're still keeping that time you have for yourself at that time of your day to do your workouts. So the more you go through life, the less off and on, you become, the less losing weight, gaining weight, you become, you are consistent and consistency means doing what you plan to do. 70 80 to 80% of the time. And we're taught and most people think that being consistent is doing what you said you were going to do 100% of the time. But that's perfectionism and perfectionism doesn't exist and it can wreck mental health. So remember that consistency is about getting to where you want to be 70 to 80% of the time.
If you've written out that you want to do three workouts every week, doing that 70 to 80% of the time is consistency. So you'll have months where one of your weeks you'll do 21 of your weeks, you may do three another week, you'll do zero. You're still working out, you're still consistent. So make sure that you're not hard on yourself. Well, I hope you enjoyed this podcast episode on How to Get back on track. Um, it's been absolutely wonderful to chat to you and as always, I appreciate you so, so much for tuning in. Have a wonderful afternoon and all my love.