Healthy High Achiever Blog

This past week, I was talking with a number of Performance Lifestyle community members (by phone) about eating for health, higher performance and natural weight loss.

As usual, someone asked, "How do you stay so disciplined", as if it was hard to eat a better quality d.iet.

I smiled and thought to myself, this person needs to get free of the nutrient poor way of eating AND "thinking". I’m not sure what keeps a person stuck more, nutrient poor eating, or thinking.

How we eat is a major influencer on how we think, because how we think about food, is largely based on the results we experience.
When you eat nutrient poor, you are going to think poorly about food.

Case in point:

I eat a nutrient rich di.et. That means, I eat a diet comprised of foods that give my body all of the nutrients it needs to maintain health and perform at a high level.

That also means I don’t eat much at all of those foods that fill my body up with stuff it doesn’t need, or want at this point.

Clear and simple…

What’s not so clear, are the reasons why eating the "nutrient rich" way requires virtually no discipline, meanwhile millions of people struggle to eat better and resort to eating less in order to shed the inevitable - excess pounds.

Here’s the reason why…

You will have little to no drive to eat those advertised-popular, addictive, drug-like foods that load your body up with stuff it doesn’t need, but at one point truly desired…

…you know the stuff that you’ll find abundant in nutrient poor foods - artificial sugar, saturated fat, caffeine and various other stimulants and waste products that found a way into your meal…

when…

…your body gets used to eating real clean, food. You know the foods that contain vitamins, minerals, water, fiber, real food carbohydrate, health - promoting protein, essentials fat, phytochemicals etc

… food without that crap that screws up your system.

At one point I truly desired the pseudo and junk foods that contained all that stuff, even though my intention was to eat better. That is probably your experience too.

Like you, I had been trained to eat those foods, my body craved them, especially when I stopped for a short period of time and experienced withdrawal.

My body "tolerated" them, but ultimately did not need or want them. It let me know this in no uncertain terms as I slowly stopped eating them and periodically tried to eat them again.

As timed passed and my body got clean because I was eating real food in ever tastier ways, my body would not let me eat unsuccessfully with unwanted consequences…

… my body wanted health and success, and so does yours.

It took time to get free of those foods, but at some point what I once resisted "give up" - (nutrient poor thinking) I simply "eliminated" - (nutrient rich thinking) for the primary reason that started this message…

… NOT because I am that disciplined and NOT because I gave up anything. I always maintain(ed) that I can/could eat anything I want.  

Sure, I can stay focused like the best of them, but the truth is, when it comes to food, and addiction to stimulants that make you
feel high, (at least at first), I am just like everybody else - prone to addiction.

Oh the stories I could tell!

Besides the fact that I love the way I eat, look, feel and perform eating NutrientRich; the reason I appear so disciplined, is…

PAIN AVOIDANCE!

I feel like such shit when I eat poor quality food, that it just isn’t worth it.

Go to www.NutrientRich.com to see a video where I talk about this on Comcast.

It’s about time this becomes one of the topics of conversation. I am not alone.

I hear the same thing from just about everyone I talk to that cleans up their diet. They too are not that disciplined. Like me, they just aren’t in pain and feeling like crap.

Once you start eating nutrient rich foods, it eventually becomes very hard to go back to eating nutrient poor…

… your desire changes.

My next post will be about eating the way you desire… it’s the only way to eat successfully.

In the meantime, if you want to start eating NutrientRich, the only way to eat for health, higher performance and natural weight loss driven by desire, then go to www.NutrientRich.com. Get The Lifestyle Starter Kit.

Here’s the direct link.

Get ready to discover more delicious foods, meals and menu’s than you could ever imagine, and learn how to eat successfully.

Manage Your Energy, Like a Pro!

JAM

John Allen Mollenhauer "JAM",
Lifestyle Performance Trainer, Coach

In a Performance Lifestyle…. "flexibly" that’s how!

I was working out this morning, if you want to call it that, challenging myself in the park at the end of the street where I live.

I started off with 1000 jump ropes, in my driveway, then walked to the park, did lunges for about 1/10 of the track, then walked more, then did 50 pushups, then walked more than a set of 12 pull ups then walked home took a shower and went to work.

In the process of I planned my day. It was great! oh, and yes, I paid attention to nature somewhat and wiggled my toes through the glass… yes I was present and didn’t let my life slip by.

It’s morning like this morning that I stop and realize what a different mindset a Performance Lifestyle inspires, rather than the obsessed exercise model most people try to stick to.

Inspired by pure desire, it was a great morning! 

… and my fitness is improving. It just keeps getting better.  

Stick - with - the - program!

Since when was "living" relegated to this kind of programmatic thinking? Programs are for computers and even there they don’t run right!

Case in point:

Here you have Joe and Jane, they are living their lives in a certain way right now and the results, the consequences of their way of life, or their "lifestyles", are evident in how they look, feel and perform.

If Joe and Jane are overwhelmed, exhausted and overweight… logic would tell you that their lifestyle is not working for them and that this is likely not boding well for the achievement of their goals either. In other words, lack of energy, endurance, stamina, strength, emotional poise etc, make goal achievement hard.

So what do we do?

We put Joe and Jane on a diet or a fitness program to deal with the most obvious symptoms and engage them in the stick-to-the- program paradigm for better results enforced by well intended professionals, who themselves, simply have more successful lifestyles. They don’t need to stick with a program, they just do it because they are inspired to, educated and supported.

But this is not the mindset of most people, which is why most people fail. They are focused on relieving symptoms "overweight…" and that’s how the program was marketed. They don’t embody the whole lifestyle that the program represents and only make very small changes. Making small changes are normal and natural but this is not what the average weight loss program requires.

Lifestyle change is all about making small changes over time to adapt to changing circumstances so one can thrive. But because weight loss programs are more about getting great testimonials, you have to make big changes fast. This is not normal or natural.

Today, lifestyles are sold like widgets, like units sold from a business. So for best results one should embody the whole lifestyle and fast. Problem is, change doesn’t happen that fast, hence the focus on manipulative touch points like low carb, or creatine ingestion and the influence of big rewards, like cars and money, that give the appearance that things have changed, of success. 

Healthy High Achievers don’t think that way, and that’s why they are almost always successful.  

Here’s what you’ve got to know, a "program" is a lifestyle (albeit usually addressing fragments of a whole lifestyle) and changing a lifestyle overnight, depending on how big the change is, is not an easy thing to do.

Notice I didn’t say "lifestyle changes are hard", they are actually easy, but changing whole aspects of your lifestyle like the way you eat and your activity levels (which is what most "programs" focus on) is not easy given all the preceding influences of poor quality eating and inactivity.

"Sticking to the program" is an outdated vernacular the whole concept is like Swiss cheese. You can poke so many holes in it, it doesn’t hold up as a mindset for success. Programs are a businesses way of describing their offerings.

For consumers we have to look at our engagement as the development of a new lifestyle for a bigger purpose, and recognize that unless you are addressing and coordinating all aspects of your lifestyle as you make change, you will not experience the sustainable results you are looking for.

The average diet, weight loss or fitness program is only going to address parts fo the equation at best. This is important to know so you can set expectations accordingly.

Consider the fact that most (not all) diet and exercise programs ask you to exercising more a fatigued body, and eat less of foods that don’t really serve you to start. This is a formula for staying stuck to begin with addressing only two important, albeit only two, components of your lifestyle.

There is a crazy focus these days on getting others to stick to programs, when in reality people don’t stick to programs, they live their lives by default, all things considered. Changing a lifestyle has to be an inspired, educated and supported personal endeavor, and those changes need to be made within the capacity constraints of the individual and considerate of that persons circumstances.

Hey, I’m all for a person making big changes in a single bound if it works, but not when it doesn’t with expectations that it should. This is major flaw in our approach to improving fitness, health and well being today. Healthy High Achievers don’t think this way, it’s usually the desperate and obsessed that do and I’m not just referring to the client.

If Joe or Jane are attempting to stick to a way of life that is not their own, they will forever stay stuck. Stick with the program are the 4 dirtiest words in the fitness industry. They are part of a misguided, keep-you-stuck vernacular that is outdated and take the joy out of living. A program is simply meant to help you build some new routines in your life, but how those routines actually play out in your life will change.

Learn the language of lifestyle and things begin to change naturally, this is what Lifestyle Training is all about.

There is a time and place for a "program", but only when you are aware and set expectations accordingly. We’ll talk more about that.  

I’d like very much to read your comments.