The Reason You Keep Starting Over Has Nothing to Do With Discipline
You’ve tried all the supplements, exercise routines, weight loss tips, and diets. You’ve started over every time there was a new trend, you watched a new reel, or began a new year. You’ve locked yourself into rules and routines, hoping the formula will unlock solutions to your problems.
But what if discipline isn’t the problem at all? What if you’ve never built the system for your health, which is why you keep ending up in the same place?
Myth about willpower
A mental model, in simple terms, is how our brain functions with decision-making and understanding the world around us. It’s how we navigate experiences and challenges, and what usually determines our thinking about what we can and can’t do.
Mental Models usually come from your past experiences, things you’ve learned about yourself and your health. Sometimes, that can stop you from getting better.
What’s keeping you stuck?
When it comes to your willpower, there’s often language of force used to motivate yourself to do something.
The more challenging and stressful your day becomes, the more you will want to give up and have low willpower. Making lots of ‘hard decisions’ such as, not eating junk-foods, staying off your phone, very hard exercise routines, increases guilt, shame, and hopelessness, makes it feel impossible to reach your goals.
This is especially true when you trap yourself in this bubble of:
I want to exercise today. But things come up, and then you don’t get to exercise. Instead of seeing it as ‘temporary slip-up’, you see it as personal failure.
Your brain turns the script into:
I’m a failure. I will never get fit, I will always be lazy.
What happens when you shift the model?
The shift starts with you. When you decide to shift your perspective, from negative to positive, you’ve already unlocked a whole new mindset.
Mindset model by Carol Dweck comes down to two main ideas: fixed mindset and growth mindset.
Fixed mindset → you either have it or you don’t. Your either great at exercising, or you don’t exercise at all.
Growth mindset → if you fail, you try a different approach. This approach doesn’t focus on ‘having’ or ‘not having’ but rather, on what you do when you fail.
Fixed mindset speech: I will never be good at exercising
Growth mindset speech: I’m still figuring out how to exercise. I need to find the right approach.
James Clear, author of Atomic Habits, takes this phenomenon a step further.
Most people focus on the outcome: “I want to lose weight” or “I need to exercise everyday”
But these are lofty goals that only cover the surface of what you need to change
Instead, you should be thinking of the shift to a system.
“I am becoming someone who takes care of and prioritizes my body.”
“I am someone who moves my body everyday.”
The difference may not be clear to you. But when your habits become your identity, you simply do things because they are now who you are, and not a task you have to do.
One of our clients described it perfectly when she first came to us, before her HR90 journey.
I have tried many diets before, especially because my blood sugar is always high. My sugar levels would drop while on those diets, but as soon as I stopped, they would increase right back up. Now, I can't describe the happiness I feel seeing my sugar levels gradually decreasing, without being on a diet or even thinking about the numbers on the scale. I am simply following the protocol we are working on together. I love the fact that this is a lifestyle, not a diet at all, and it fits perfectly with my life and the pressure I'm under. (HR90 client, shared with permission)
What she was describing wasn't a blood sugar problem or a diet problem: it was a mental model problem, and the moment that changed, everything else did too.
Helpful Tips
Shrink the habit until it becomes stupidly easy
If you’re just starting out exercising, begin with baby steps. You can’t go from not moving at all to a 45 minute workout!
Start with adding tiny actions. Referencing James Clear (link) tiny actions that are so small, they feel silly, but when you repeat them enough, they will begin to make a huge difference in the long-term.
For example, start with a tiny movement habit. Put your gym shoes near the front door at night, with your workout equipment. Chances are, when you see them, you will want to move your body.
Catch yourself when you talk negatively
The next time you lose motivation and hear "I have no discipline", stop yourself. That's not a fact, it's a mental model running on autopilot. Replace it with a question: "What would a person who prioritizes their health do next?”
Right now. One redirect of your thoughts is worth more than ten motivational quotes on your lock-screen.
Reframe what a "bad day" means
A growth mindset, what Carol Dweck calls the belief that you can develop and improve treats setbacks as information, not identity. One bad day means something got in the way. It doesn't mean you are the problem.
Ask: "What made this hard today, and what can I adjust?"
That question keeps you in the system. The alternative: "I've ruined it", takes you out of it entirely.
Here's how you can start making that same shift today.
Our HR90 program is here for when you’re ready to build that system we emphasize so much.
Use the link below to book a FREE discovery call:
Take Care,
Sarah - PHP Team
Head of Content and Programs