Ep. 83 Having Your Own Back

Hi, and welcome to the Mindful Shade Podcast. I'm Paula Parker and I'm a life and weight loss coach. So what does having your own back mean? If I say I have your back, it means I'm going to be there for you. It means I got you no matter what. So if you're in trouble, if you need help, I will be there for you, right?

I will support you, stand up for you, advocate for you. Not too long ago, we were at the playground and there was this little guy who's a bit older, And bigger than my son. And they were a little bit ways away from me. They were like on top of the playground structure where the slide is. And I was watching them and I was a little bit far off, so I couldn't hear exactly what was going on, but I could just, you know, it was like mama Spidey senses or something.

I could just tell that the energy was a little bit off. And that the way he was being with Tristan, there was something up. So I go over and. I basically said, is everything okay here in more of like a stern voice than I normally would. And the boy was like, yeah. And he just backed off and he went away.

And Tristan, the poor little guy, he's so small, right? He just looked a little bit like, I don't know, a little off. And so what am I doing in that moment is I'm just like showing him that like, you know, I've got his back, right? I'm going to be there. I'm going to be there for him. I have his back. And what I want to talk about today is like, how do you do that for yourself?

Yeah. Build that trust. So in this case, I'm going to be talking about how do you stand by your decision? How do you show up for yourself doing the kind thing for yourself? And sometimes we think the kind thing is just like eating the food in the moment because we have justification thoughts, like we deserve it, or we should be able to eat whatever we want, or we don't want to restrict ourselves, that kind of thing.

And then what we do is usually unkind. Because it's not what we have in our mind for like who we want to be and what kind of life we want to live.  So when I say stand by your decision, I'm kind of wondering even in this moment, if you've made a decision, right? Maybe you've been trying to release weight so long that you don't even have a conscious memory of making that decision.

You haven't decided, okay, this is what I'm doing. Or maybe it's the case that you're making the decision Every Sunday night. Okay. For sure. This week, day one starts tomorrow. I got to get back on track, but then you're kind of making that already knowing that it doesn't really mean anything. It doesn't have any weight.

You, you make it knowing that you're not likely to follow through and have your own back. So either way, I invite you now to use this moment. To either decide that this is something that you want for yourself, or maybe it's not right now, which I would be surprised because you're listening to this podcast, but it might be the case where you're not.

Okay. Maybe you're maintaining or whatever it is. Okay. If you're waffling back and forth, that's not going to be enough to drive real change from what you're currently doing when it comes to food. So change is hard. We know this it's compelling because we want what's on the other side, but we know it's hard.

So, make a decision and re decide if you've made one but you haven't been following through. Let's say you decide you want to release 25 pounds. So, now, you're going to have to make little decisions every day. And to release 25 pounds, You're going to need to make smaller decisions that serve you more regularly than not.

You're going to have to have your own back. So let's talk about owning that decision that you just made in real time and how to have your own back and not only when you make the so called right decision, like choosing the salad over the burger. Let's talk about how you can have your own back when you choose the burger, how you can own that decision as well.

That smaller decision.  Because that's how we truly  Have our own back. Oh my God. How many times am I going to say that?  I'll try not to say a million more times how we, it's how we build trust with ourselves when we know that even when we make mistakes, that we won't give up on ourselves. Okay. So you might be thinking, okay, well, I don't trust myself at all because often I do choose the burger and I never choose the salad. 

How do I just let myself off the hook now? Is that what I'm supposed to do? Should I start learning how to forgive myself when I do that? Or one of the things I hear oftentimes from clients, which is, you know, give myself more grace. Should I do that? Which is kind of interesting because sometimes I don't notice.

I've never heard that before until I started working with clients from the States, because in Canada, I've, I never heard that before. So it might be kind of an American thing. Give yourself grace anyways,  or you might be thinking, okay, well, maybe I just need to have more compassion with myself,  but what if none of that's true? 

What if. There's just nothing to forgive. So what if there's no reason to even need to be more compassionate with yourself because you didn't do anything wrong?  Okay. I'm just going to let that sink in for a second. And you're going to be thinking, well, how can this be true when I overate and overeating is not in alignment with what I want for myself and the kind of body I want and the life I want to live and how I'm showing up in the world.

How can I not be wrong? This can only be the case if you learn from it. So, this is where we usually miss the mark. We are usually so busy shaming ourselves or feeling bad that we don't even think, it doesn't even occur to us to learn from it. Instead, we just tell ourselves, don't do that again, ever  stay away from that food.

Don't go to this social event. We just try to restrict even more. Then what happens when you were in a similar situation, feeling a similar way, you do the same thing over and over and over again. You make the same decision. So, I think having your own back really means you learn quickly. So let's use an example.

Let's say it's after dinner and it's, you know, finally time for you to unwind and relax and maybe you're watching your favorite Netflix show and your brain reminds you that, you know, there's some ice cream in the freezer. And to your brain, that would be so enjoyable to have in this moment. Maybe you're feeling a bit tired, maybe it wasn't the greatest of days and you're feeling maybe disillusioned.

Thinking that you've been, you know, doing, you've been on plan, you've been restricting a lot lately and you deserve something. You deserve some pleasure. You deserve a treat every now and then, right? What could be so bad about that? So then you eat it and maybe you're putting a little extra on there, you know, few extra spoonfuls because why not?

Won't really make that much of a difference anyway.  Then you have a bad sleep. You feel groggy the next day, and oh, by the way, the scale is not budging at all. So then you're filled with regret. You're thinking about that ice cream you had and you're feeling bad about it. You're thinking, Oh my God, am I just always going to be doing this?

And you feel really frustrated with yourself.  In this scenario, you have learned nothing.  Okay, so let's define what I mean when I say learning. Learning is not simply acquiring knowledge, more information. Just because I have the information. Doesn't mean I have learned. I'm reading a book right now, and I'm bad with titles, I can't remember it.

But it is about people at a deaf school. So, in the novel they're showing you it's a girl or teenager who's deaf. She's been deaf her whole life, but she's only now learning how to use ASL, American Sign Language. So in the book, there's a lot of these signs and like what the words mean or associations and stuff.

Right. So I know just by reading the book, some of the signs for letters and even some words,  I've never done it with my own hands. I haven't learned it. You would never say, Oh wow, she read a book or she read a novel or she read, you know, Maybe a textbook on how to use sign language. She knows it. She knows how to sign.

She knows sign language. You would never say that, right? Why? Because you actually have to do it. So the faster you can learn from the times when you choose the burger, eat the ice cream, whatever it is that gets in your way to release weight, the faster you're going to see results on the scale. How does it change things when you decide you're committed to learning  Versus telling yourself not to eat something.

How does that feel different? How do you think you might approach it differently? So here are some questions just to help guide your learning process. So think of the last time you overate something,  what were the circumstances? Were you tired? Were you watching your show? Was it late at night? Were you out with friends?

What was it?  And then just ask yourself, what were you thinking? What justifications were you making? I just want it. It won't make a difference. It's the weekend. Or I deserve it. I deserve a treat. And then how were you feeling in general? So, what emotions might have created some desire for food? Maybe boredom.

Maybe dread about the next day. Or some FOMO. Everyone else is doing it. You want to do it too.  When you answer these types of questions, then you can come up with a plan For what you will do next time and then you will do it in real time and then you will learn so you're acquiring new information And then you're implementing it So you have some really good info here when I watch a show for example Or I go out with my friends my brain really likes to suggest food and to overeat Here's how it tries to convince me.

That's a good idea  I know exactly what the justification is. Here's my plan for when that happens. I often eat when I'm bored. Maybe I'm tired. Maybe I'm feeling dread or FOMO. That's really good information to have. Then I can come up with a plan. How can I deal with these emotions without food?  What would that even be like?

Am I resistant to doing that? And if so, why? So this is how you learn from your missteps about yourself, very importantly, and It gives you an idea, a stepping stone of what you can do to change and improve the situation. So if you find that, by the way, if you find that you are not doing this, but you have this information, sign up for some coaching that can really be what you need to help you make the shift.

All right,  having your own back is doing the hard thing. So, yeah, you know when you have one of those days where it's just not the greatest. So, maybe you have a bit of a headache, your to do list is nagging at you, and maybe you're just feeling a little, like, kind of rotten with everything in general.

That's when it's time to have your own back when you say, what do I really need right now?  Maybe you look at that to do list and you think you know what there's really only one thing on here That's urgent and I can really do the rest tomorrow. It's gonna be okay that laundry can wait. I really noticed a difference between My maternity leave so I took I live in Canada So we have a lot more time than maybe you have but  we I took 11 months And then this time around with my daughter, my husband is taking the maternity leave.

Or, sorry, paternity leave. So, he is off for I think about the same time. I took three months off, he's taking the remainder of the time for a year. So, one of the things that I'm really noticing is, I was much more stressed out when I was doing my leave than he is. And I think it's because I had in my mind that not only was I taking care of my son, but I also was in charge of making sure we had the meals, making sure we had groceries, making sure all the laundry was done.

All the toilets need to be cleaned. The you know, diaper genie needed to be taken out all of the time. And I've noticed it's not a criticism because he does a lot, he does a lot around the house, but I've noticed that he doesn't feel the same level of stress because he's not putting all of those things on his to do list like I did.

So it's just very interesting how we can just be thinking about something in a different way. It's not necessarily the truth.  Let's get back on track here. One of the ways that you can have your own back is by following your protocol, even when your brain is offering up the most convincing, very valid justifications not to,  not just because it's your protocol, but because you are someone who has their own back.

So obviously, you know, there are exceptions to every rule. There are always going to be times when following your protocol is not the best thing for you. When it actually, when following your own back actually means going off your protocol. So your protocol is simply your guide, but it's not written in stone.

Sometimes it will make more sense to go off it and then make adjustments later on or the next day even. So this is different than, oh, screw it. I'm just going to eat whatever I want right now because I  That's not having your own back at all. That's not what I'm talking about. That version of you does not care about who you want to be in that weight loss goal and that vision that you have for yourself in your life.

So if you know what you're doing, when it comes to creating a protocol and you're intentional about it, in most cases, that's going to be the best way to go when you have a weight loss goal.  Oftentimes it's going to mean.  Signing yourself up for some uncomfortable feelings. My husband and I were out for dinner a little while back.

I think it was when I'm just celebrating my birthday. Yeah. And he got a cocktail and it was one of the cocktails that our server recommended. And when he's having it. I said, is it good? And he said, I really hate it.  I was like, okay, well let's send it back. It's like a 12 cocktail, right? I'm like, let's send it back.

Like don't drink something that you don't like, especially when you don't have it very often. And so he's like, yeah, yeah, I will. I will. So she comes back and I could tell you, he's like feeling a little uncomfortable about it.  And because it's like, we don't really know what their policy is. Like, Are they going to charge us for another one?

Are they going to take it off of a bill? Like, is that going to impact the server? Anyways, we don't know, but my thoughts were, well, that's not really our business. Our business is to like, let her know that we don't like it. And then whatever consequence there is, then we'll deal with that. If we have to, if he gets another one and we have to pay for it, like.

So what? I mean, it's going to be worth it, right? It's 12 bucks in the end. So anyway, it felt very uncomfortable for him to tell her, you know, I don't really like this. I want to try this other one. And it was very uncomfortable based on her response as well, because You could tell she was uncomfortable and she really didn't know what to do.

It was almost as if that is the first time in the history of the restaurant that anybody has ever said, no, I actually don't like this. Right? So the, the reason I bring this up is because, you know, no one's going to advocate for you. You really have to advocate for yourself. You have to have your own back, even when it's uncomfortable.

And then, and then you get what you want. He got a drink that he really liked. And not only that, he got to be someone who is going to advocate for themselves. And that's, I would say it's much more meaningful.  It's going to be doing things that are supportive of you also. So in general, when it comes to releasing weight, you're going to be doing things like.

Thought work, journaling, meditation, movement that feels good to you, getting enough sleep, making some social time, eating foods that nourish you both with your body and your spirit. So sometimes we have other people's backs at the expense of our own. And this gets in the way. So let's talk about it. We will prioritize other people's agendas because we just want to go along and we're trying to manage their thoughts and feelings.

So what do I mean by that? Let's talk about it.  So of course it's easier to just go along when everyone else is having a glass of wine. Oh, and by the way, you kind of wanted to in that moment, right? It's the path of least resistance.  You don't want people to think that you're no fun. You don't want people to think that you're trying to be healthy.

Like imagine that, right? Or much worse, way worse. You don't want them to think that you're trying to lose weight. That would be terrible. That would be very bad. So in trying to control their thoughts about you,  you betray yourself and you don't have your own back only because you're not willing to feel the discomfort of thinking they might be thinking those things about you.

Which most of the time, if they do think it, they're thinking it for a very fleeting moment, but more often, they're not even thinking about that. They're thinking about their choices and their bodies, not yours.  And the consequence of that is that you don't have the experience of yourself that you would like.

Meaning, you don't get to be somebody who advocates for yourself. You don't get to give yourself the opportunity to own that experience of yourself in the moment. You give that up.  So I hope that was helpful. If you are kind of into this work and you want more of this kind of stuff, please go to my website and sign up for my free resources.

You will see that you get a ton of thought work exercises, but you also will be on my email list. And I send out an email typically every Wednesday. That's my goal. Just to help support you share tips and encouragement and kind of let you know of what I'm doing right now. I'm in my own Reinvention course, which you're still welcome to sign up for.

If you want, you can find that on the website and I'm releasing 12 pounds. So I am on that journey with you and I'm sharing that experience. So if you haven't already go to mindful shape. com and sign up for that. And I'll talk to you again soon. Okay.