35 Gallons of Snacks ⎮ How to Avoid Weight Regain When Your Mental Health Sucks

Long term weight loss is a campaign, not a single battle. We'd love for the journey to be all success and rainbows, but it usually isn't. If your mental health issues have caused your weight problem, then chances are, they will flare up at some point, putting your progress in serious jeopardy. 

Today, I'm going to share with you a way of living that helps me avoid weight regain even when I am doing poorly and going off the rails.

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Transcript

 What up coach John here, this morning. I woke up and weighed myself. I haven't weighed myself in a little while. I'm a big fan of weighing yourself regularly, especially if you're just starting out. For me, I've, I have a pretty good sense of where I'm at.

Yeah. Yeah. And my sense this morning was that I was at a very bad place, so I was like, all right, let's let's get some data. Let's let the scale tell us what,  how much mass is pulling against the Earth's gravity or against with, I don't know, whatever. Let's see how much mass we're working with here.

And.  I got on the scale and it was much, much better than what I was expecting. So I want to talk about why that was. There are things that I do, even when I'm not like really dialed in, I'm not doing even all that well, to be honest, there are ways to manage it, right? Some days we need to talk about how to succeed.

But this is a long campaign. If you have a lot of weight to lose, if you have trauma and mental health issues that are preventing you from losing that weight, there's gonna be a time, whether it's a day or a week or a month or a year, where you just can't quite make progress. And I, I would work very hard as a coach to help you not have to deal with that.

However, it does happen. So whether it's a day, a week, a month, whatever I want you to think differently about this time. This isn't just a time where we fail. Full stop. There's levels to failure, right? And there are things that you can do to  slow the slide, right?  And I've figured out quite a number of ways to balance out.

If I know that like, man, when I get into a social situation, a lot of my tools aren't as good because all the tools I developed when I was losing my big weight,  I wasn't being social. I didn't, I wasn't going places. And toward the very end, the last few months of my weight loss was the beginning of the pandemic.

 So, social situations as I'm trying to be more social for my health, my mental health, well being I find myself in more situations where I have a harder time saying no to things that I probably don't need and,  And then also having the time and energy to say yes to things that I do need, like exercise, walking, you know, cardio, things like that, things that I like and I enjoy and I benefit greatly from.

So, but for you, it could happen for any number of reasons, right? This is just how it's kind of come up for me in the last few weeks,  or  are we still in weeks? Yeah, we could say weeks,  the last month, basically. There was a bunch of birthdays and then other things and yeah. Holiday. Other just, yeah, very social times.

 So I think the first thing is to recognize what part of the day are you going to be consuming the most calories, be it in the form of food or beverage, snacks, alcohol, whatever. Remember, alcohol has calories, has quite a lot of calories. Actually it has seven calories per gram.  Of 100 percent ethanol, right? So that's going to be diluted. If you drink a gram of whiskey, you're not getting seven calories, you're getting about 40 percent of that. So really quickly, what's 40 percent of seven, everyone  basically like three.  So, you know, if you take a shot of whiskey, that's 40 grams and a lot of places 40 milliliters, which milliliter is roughly the same as a gram.

If you're not familiar with the metric system. When you're dealing with water and whiskey is basically water. And so that's going to end up being about 120 calories. There are some liquors where it's a little bit less, you know, sometimes gin or vodka is like 105, 110. Rum tends to have more sugar left over in it after the process. So that that can be higher. Basically, basically. It adds up really fast. Even if you're not, you know, totally tying one on, you know, you have a couple of drinks over an evening.

Let's say that there are mixers involved too. And just like, man, we're, we're in crazy town real quick. And it's the same thing with like the sugary coffees, right? It's the exact same thing. Except. We're doing all that stuff, adding in all the, all the added flavors and mixings , except instead of coffee, the alcohol also has calories.

Coffee doesn't really has a negligible amount of calories. So you want to just, Put on your scientist hat, right? Well, scientists don't usually wear hats. So let's go with a lab coat, you know, push your glasses up your nose, get your pocket protector situated,  and just  casually, not casually,  dispassionately,  objectively look through your lab coat.

Your days look through a few of the days where you've consumed a lot of calories, let's say over consumed and try to notice everything you can about that.  Where were you? Who were you with? What were you eating? What were you drinking? What time of day was it? That's probably the most important thing.

for the vast majority of people, we're going to find that we didn't really over consume calories in the morning.  Often it's not even during work or at lunch. It's usually  after leaving work on the way home potentially. But then at dinner, after dinner, and then before bed,  right. And that's where a lot of socializing happens in those evening hours.

So for me my overconsumption when it happens is in the evening. And that's actually where I'm still learning how to, you know, be social and be more mindful.  but I'm well versed in knowing that like most people, when I over consume, it tends to be in the evening.

So I've already developed tools for managing that. So if I know that I'm going to be socializing, I will temper what I'm eating throughout the day. I will keep in mind like, Hey,  I'm probably going to act like an idiot tonight.  So  it's not always that bad. And a lot of times it's like, Hey, I think I'm going to.

be on my best behavior at this game night or whatever. But once I get there, I don't know how I'll feel, you know maybe I'll want to have a snack. Maybe I want to eat some chips and salsa. And it's good to have room just in case that happens. And if it doesn't you don't want to be ravenously hungry either.

So we want to find that balance between how, what are the least amount of calories I can eat earlier in the day without  You know, leaving my system,  you know, just begging, starving for food. Everybody's going to be a little bit different in how they approach this. For me, I'm  like most people I'm mostly satiated by protein then fats and then carbohydrates.

And I would say, generally speaking, my, my diet is fairly balanced, whether I'm losing weight or if I'm in a, if I'm in a  phase where I'm trying to specifically gain muscle, I'll probably end up eating more carbohydrates then as a bigger proportion within my diet. But  if I'm just living life, it's usually about  one third of my calories come from protein, one third come from fats, one third come from carbohydrates.

I just, at some point, just started kind of evenly, like, rationing it out in my mind to just have, have balance. And I learned to do that, you know, in my early twenties in my efforts to lose weight then. And that turned out to be a good instinct. Of course I've dabbled with low carb and all these other things.

I learned a lot things that do help me in situations like this. So. If I'm just going to eat normally throughout the day, I'll probably eat fairly balanced meals. However,  if I know like, Hey, I'm,  I'm really not doing well mentally. So maybe I'm having a hard time  being present. I'm dissociating. I'm having crazy thoughts.

I might just be my own friend and be realistic about the fact that I don't know what's going to happen in the evening. I don't know, because sometimes I'm able to be present and in my body and other times. You know, I'm still actively working through serious mental health issues. And they wouldn't be mental health issues.

If you could just be like,  I just choose not to,  it's going to happen where, whether I want it to or not. And while I'm actively working through those things with professional help,  kind of acting as a Guinea pig, quite frankly, for some newer therapies. That , my clinician refers to one of them as the jackhammer. And it involves electrodes on my skull passing electric currents through my brain. So far I'm liking the jackhammer. I think, I think that's gonna help me.

So while that process is playing out, I'm being proactive. I'm trying to get to where I need to be mentally so that I can live the life I wanna live so I can be the coach that I know I can be so that I can be the teacher. And, the influence that I want to be and to also be as active as I want to be as fit as I want to be all that good stuff.

So in the meantime, while I'm still kind of trying to get my shit fixed I can do a lot. To not gain weight. Right. I'll go through periods where I'm able to lose and then my brain's like,  putting the brakes on that. Here's a, here's another massive, you know, thing from childhood for you to work through.

And it's like, Oh God, okay, here we go.  It's good. I'd rather do that than just leave things simmering around in the, in the background just wrecking shit. So yeah, that's the first thing that I do to manage  the mental health stuff that I deal with, that can, that affects my decision making. Especially later in the day when, if you're not familiar with how the brain works, there is a reserve of willpower in your brain that gets topped up every night when you sleep. 

So by the end of the day, in the morning, you're going to be as full as you're going to be. For a lot of people like me,  dealing with PTSD from childhood, that reserve is just never going to be as big as people with healthier brain.  People, if you have ADHD or if you're on the autism spectrum disorder that can also leave you with a smaller tank.

And this is why  helping people on the autism spectrum, helping people with ADHD lose weight. Is very similar to how we want to help people who are processing trauma  because the symptoms, especially when it comes to behavior regulation are fairly similar. So I exercise more restraint in the morning when it's easy. It's easy for me to just hold off on eating in the morning. Sometimes if I've been, if I have been working out, I don't want to. starve my body. You know, I'm a big guy.  I go in for a big back day. That's just a lot of mass that needs to be repaired. And I want to get my body the things that needs to do that. Now my body has plenty of fuel stores. Doesn't have, you know, fat stores don't have protein. They don't have all the vitamins and minerals that you need. So I try to provide protein and some vitamins and minerals.

And if my, if I don't give my body all the fuel it needs to repair and replenish my muscles, then I can rely on my body to use fuel stores for that.  So what this translates to is probably things you've heard of before. You know, if I,  if I haven't worked out really hard the day before, I'll just not eat breakfast.

I'll just, it's like  1226 PM and I haven't eaten anything yet today. And I'm totally fine. Right. I just, I didn't work out yesterday.  I didn't even get all my steps in. Right. I just, I don't need food. I really don't. And I don't, I'm not miserable. I'm  perfectly happy to work for two or three hours before eating my first meal. 

And then on days where I have worked out and I want to provide my body some, you know, building blocks to build those muscles,  I will have a protein rich meal. Meal earlier in the day, still not necessarily like the minute I roll out of bed, but I want to try to get at least three, hopefully four protein feedings on days where I'm working out or the day after I've worked out because every time you feed your body protein, you stimulate muscle protein synthesis and, you know, more than four times in a day.

It's probably you're not getting too much more benefit, but going from two to three meals in a day is a big deal. And from three to four is significant.  So it's not so much that you have to eat the minute you roll out of bed. You just want to make sure that you're giving your body the time it needs. Somewhat evenly spaced opportunities to get that protein in and build muscle. 

And the protein also is involved in almost every process in your body.  A lot of other things that you've heard of that go on in the body. Protein is the building blocks for those things as well. So what does this look like? Like today my buddy invited me to a poker night tonight. I don't want to go to be quite honest with you. Because I don't want to be tempted. I don't, I know I'll probably be tired. It's Friday. It's the end of the week. And I don't really have weekends anyways. So I kind of just work every day to some extent.

On the weekends, I just try to take a bit more time for my kids. Which is, you know That's harder than work. A lot of the time, if you, if you have kids, no, they're lovely. So I'm undecided if I'm going to go, but I know that if I do go, I hopefully can, you know, just be chill. I'll, I'll eat a  healthy dinner beforehand. So I'm not hungry. But you know, there's going to be a bunch of people there.  Somebody might be like, Hey, you want a beer? And I might be like, yeah, I do.  It's a poker night.

Right. 

Is it even legal to play poker without Crack an open a beer. I don't know in your state. Maybe it's not illegal, but in mine it probably is. 

So the point is, you know, that beer is going to be somewhere between, I don't know, a lot of the beers you're going to run into at, like, I know at the store there's beers that are 130 calories or even like the really light beers that are like 94 calories, which  I'm not drinking that stuff. It's just water at that point,  but you know, somebody hands me an IPA, right?

Those tend to be more caloric, right? That's the kind of stuff you're going to run into at a party. Right. That's what, at least in the Northwest, that's the kind of stuff people bring toe to parties. And that's going to easily run 160 to 200 calories. So  that's not a big deal for getting about, like, whether alcohol is healthy or not.

Obviously, it's not really that great for you. 

But we're not teetotaling here. We're just being practical about calories and calories out. So, you know, if I know there's a possibility for that or for somebody to be like, Hey, here's some of this snack or whatever.  I just want to leave as many calories open unused at the end of the day as I can. And if I'm  just like, nah, I don't need that.

I'm ha I'm perfectly happy just doing my thing here. Kicking everybody's asses at poker. Which is what I intend to do tonight. 

John, what is best in life?  Driving your enemies before you? Hearing the lamentations of their women? And I forget the third thing. I need to rewatch Conan the Barbarian. It's a good movie.  My first meal of the day is usually  I have, I have eggs with egg whites in it. So I get all the nutrients and eggs, which is pretty much a magical food. It's got so many amazing things in it and then adding egg whites to it, just jacks up the protein. And normally I would have that.  over toast or mini bagels or English muffins or something.

But  if I have two English muffins, that's 260 calories. I'm going to put some kind of like whipped cream cheese on it. So that's going to add maybe like 75 more calories. So if I just leave off the bread and the whipped cream cheese that goes with it, I'm looking at what's 260 plus 75, 335. 

There's 335 calories right there, and I'm getting a nice big pile of protein and fat and lots of nutrients from the eggs alone. I'm perfectly satiated after that. It's a fairly high volume meal on its own, and then that'll keep me happy. On a day where I'm eating at a normal time, like 1030, that's going to keep me happy until 130. Maybe two, two 30. And then I'll have a second meal, usually some kind of like dairy product. Usually it's really easy, just like Greek yogurt or cottage cheese. And I'll mix that with something or other. And if I want to, I usually have like with my Greek yogurt, I usually have granola and berries in it.

I might just leave off the granola. There's 150 calories that we just leave out. And I'm perfectly happy having blueberries in my, in my fake chocolate sauce. Delightful. If I have cottage cheese, I might have some tortilla chips with it. Usually I'll just leave off the tortilla chips. Maybe I'll sprinkle on a few like crumpled up pretzels just for something a little crunch.

Right? So I'm having 45 calories instead of 200 calories, right? And so this, these little deletions add up throughout the day. I'm happy. I'm just nourishing my body enough to get work done. Do my calls. Make content and then at around 5 or 6 p. m.  have a dinner. I usually have some form of lean protein, some about 200 calories of a carbohydrate, mashed potatoes, rice, whatever and a vegetable. So that usually runs me  right around just under 600 calories. If I have, you know, a salad as my vegetable and I put some dressing on it, that's going to bump it up.

Obviously in a situation where I'm trying to limit my calories, I'll just crack open a can of green beans from Costco.  That's my vegetable. It's 60 calories. And so, you know, you add that up and you're easily looking at like 1400 calories in the day, which not a lot. And I'm actually pretty happy. At the end of that day, because I've been eating nutritionally dense foods. 

that are higher in volume,  lots of protein,  a decent amount of fat.  And  oftentimes when you've eaten a reduced amount of carbohydrates kinda evens out your, your hunger signals a little bit depending on the day, depending on the person. This is part of the reason why people like to do keto and low carb diets.

They just feel less hungry on them. And on a day where I'm eating four meals instead, you know, we'd be, we'd be sitting at around, you know, 1900, 2000, calories, especially if I've been like holding off on a bit of the carbs. And you know on an average day, I probably burn depending on my activity level between 32 and 3, 500 calories.  that leaves me, at the end of the day, either potentially up to between a 1, 800 to 2, 100 calorie deficit on the days where I'm not lifting and a 1, 200 to 1, 500 calorie deficit on days where I am lifting or eating in relation to. So, that's a lot of wiggle room. In case things get squirrely at night. And that's how  I end up being perfectly happy with my meals throughout the day. If I don't eat anything at the end of the night, then great. I've had a nice big deficit and that's going to, You know, even if I, the rest of the week, I just kind of stay at maintenance, that's going to burn off,  a fraction of a pound of fat and I'll take it because the next week, who knows, maybe I'm a bit over and my body stores a bit of fat. 

And so just by doing this I've managed to not put on  500 pounds,  even though I'm struggling mentally. Yeah. Yeah. Because I'm dealing with some like core stuff that I'm trying to like complete my healing.  When you get really close to some of those core issues, your behavior is going to get a little squirrely.

It's really hard to be that close to your deepest triggers and not,  Feel the rug get pulled out from under you. You know, I call it context switching without getting too much into the neurology or the psychology of it.  Part of the reason we act in compulsive ways without really being in control of it is that our brains will switch.

Into an emotional context that has to do with things that happened in the past, even though those things are not happening now. But it's very real for the person experiencing it. And it's not something they can choose. It's not something they can just turn off. It's something that with skill you can get better at.

And I'm pretty darn good at this point at holding those things at bay. And dealing with them when they happen,  but it's like the best goalie in the NHL. I mean,  you're not, you're not going to stop every single slap shot. Especially when you're playing a team that is really good at slap shotting pucks into the net.

Is that the right terminology?  I haven't watched hockey in a long time,  but you get the idea. We're being practical here. We're not fronting, pretending that everything's perfect and that we have everything figured out. That's not my role. I'm not, I'm not somebody on a, in a temple with a white robe. That's not my, that's just not me. It's not my job. I'm just here to map out my experience. And extrapolate it to learn as much as I can from it based on the experiences of others and make that information digestible and useful as possible to the people who are coming behind. Then let's say you were in a social situation. I tend to keep to a rule  that also helps me limit calories.  My friend he used to be a manager at Trader Joe's and so he's still obsessed with Trader Joe's. Oh, and by the way, you know, the people at Trader Joe's, they have to wear like that managers have to wear Hawaiian shirts. I used to wear Hawaiian shirts and like other just zany stuff like that when I was a kid.

And this, this friend was like super into fashion. He'd wear suits and stuff and he'd, he'd just shake his head and be like your fashion sense is so awful. And then he worked at Trader Joe's for 10 years and I just, you know, Got such a kick out of that. Every day I'd walk in there and see him in his Hawaiian shirt. Oh God, he works at the Apple store now. It's not as fun. Anyways,  you know, I'll go over to his house for, you know social events and friends with his extended family. And one night, you know, we're, we're playing games and Someone's like, Hey, do you have any chips or something? He's like, yeah, let me see. He pulls out, I kid you not a garage storage bin  full of snacks from Trader Joe's mostly from Trader Joe's and this, this cements my belief that Trader Joe's is not a grocery store. It is a. Large bougie gas station that doesn't sell gas. Okay. That's my opinion. That's my belief. I will, I will, I will die on this hill. Also, you know, I say that to razz my friend, but he works at the Apple store now. It's kind of hard to make fun of that, which sucks. 

Like I said, I've got many problems in my life and I'm working through them.  And so, yeah, I mean, when somebody hauls out a garage, you know, 35 gallon Rubbermaid tote full of snacks, it's like I am, but a mere mortal. Okay. And Trader Joe's, they got some really good snacks. I'm not going to lie. And they make really good alcoholic beverages as well. Really good, cheap  and good. So, yeah, it's not like the last days of Rome over at game night, but.

There's definitely, you can consume some calories. That's for sure. 

So the rule I stick to in those situations where all of a sudden it's like, okay, we're kind of having a party now. I try to pick either I'm going to have a drink or a snack, not both because if I want to eat, eat, enjoy it. If I want to drink, drink, enjoy it.  Right. And if you you're kidding yourself, if you think that you drink alcohol for the flavor, right?

You're, you're enjoying the buzz. You're enjoying the, the effect that, you know, that is having on your mental state, the relaxation, the you know, makes things, makes funny things a little bit funnier, makes even dumb things a little bit funnier. Depending on your personality, you know, whatever. 

 So if we're being really practical If you're gonna do one, don't do the other. Just enjoy that thing that you're doing, right? If you're, if you're going to have a whiskey, why dilute it? with  two servings of delicious Trader Joe's snacks, right? Now you've just eaten a massively more calories, and you diluted the effect of the alcohol, 

so you're gonna get more mileage out of just picking one, and just enjoy it, you know? 

So when things do pop off all of a sudden and the game night becomes  game night or book club becomes book club, right?  Any moms out there, any ladies out there know what I'm talking about? Yeah. We know what you guys do at book club. That's very little to do with books. We know what you do. We know your secrets.

Oh yeah. I really liked the part of the book where the guy did the thing. And I was sure I'll have 16 ounces of wine, please. Thank you. In a big gulp cup. 



And obviously the same, you know, we, we still want to use our tools. Like you, you don't want to get trashed to the point where you're like Lucy taco, man. Like that's not, that's not what we're talking about. We're still, we're, we're talking about being somewhat kind to yourself, trying not to go into full asshole mode.

And on the days where you moderate using these kinds of rules or frameworks that's going to. make the days where it pops off or where your behavior gets really squirrely, less impactful in the long run.  And so this is how I got on the scale and I was six pounds less than what I thought. And I thought I was going to be , about 10 pounds more than I usually like to hang out at, and it was only four pounds more. So even though in my mind, I haven't been doing good lately, I've been working out enough. I've been walking enough. I'm, I feel like I'm, I'm exhausted by all the social situations. And that kind of makes, it makes your willpower, Less available in those situations. You know what I'm saying?  And yeah, there's,  there's a different conversation to be had about, okay, what do you do when you're on plan? And you're like, let's, I'm trying to get shit done. I'm trying to get weight off. I'm trying to build muscle. I'm trying to like, I'm taking these things seriously. How you manage those situations.

You don't have to give it, you don't have to socialize. You don't have to say, all right. When.  Tom busts out the garage sized tote of snacks. You don't have to say, sure, crack one open. You don't have to say you don't have to do those things. You don't have to at all. And at some point you're either going to be going to need to become a monk or a nun  or some sort of hybrid to manage.

 The amount of socializing you do so that you can just stay focused and stay on your plan.   The party can be over for a little bit,  you don't have to socialize every week, every month. If you go a month without going to book club because you know, you have a hard time dealing with that, that's fine.

Right. But that's a conversation for another day. A good conversation we'll have about when you really need to stay dialed in. What do you do? This is just living life. This is just.  Not becoming 430 pounds again, right? This is just keeping, keeping the wheels on the, the train to trains have wheels. They have wheels, not tires. 

I don't know. Trains have tires. Did I just invent train tires? Trademarked copyrighted patented. Nobody take my idea. If you could put tires on the train, they could, they wouldn't have to stay on the rails. They could drive wherever they want. And I think I'm describing the world's longest semi truck,  which sounds pretty sweet. It sounds like something out of Mad Max. And of course, no, this would be a terrible idea for many reasons.

And I'm not being serious.  What I am being serious about is.  You trying to make  easy, smart decisions that set you up for success in those evening hours where your willpower is spent for the day. You like last night I had to go to my kid's school concert and because my girls are in two different grades, like I had to sit there for the entire school's like eight different grades of awful singing.

Awful xylophone playing awful. Oh, when they bring out the violins, kill me now. 

I'm just kidding. The kids are delightful, but it was very long. It was like two and a half hours and I didn't really, wasn't really in the mood for it. My girls are getting older. So I'm like, yeah, I've done this before. It's cute. They sing ukulele. Okay. I get it. Like  my kids are cute all the time. Like I don't necessarily need to  anyways, that's my own personal issues. 

But so I, my buddy invited me over to game night last night and I'm  brain dead.  I was, I was zapped  and so. I was tired, but I was like, you know what? I'm going to go over. I'm going to be social because I'm trying to just say yes to these things instead of no, because usually I can find a way to say no.  And I went over, I had a delightful time. We laughed like crazy. You know, when you get that one, Old friend who's like kind of gone off into like a super religious lifestyle. And then you get them over and you start playing cards against humanity. And all of a sudden they're saying things that the priest might not be too happy with.

And you know, everybody lightens up. It's good. Good old time. Just like the old days. It's fantastic. I enjoyed myself. I consumed calories. And I stayed for two or three hours,  had a good time,  11 o'clock rolled around. I'm like, I'm done. Okay. Gone. See ya. And went home.  So and even though, because I wasn't, I wasn't planning on this game night, I just normally eat this way  so that if any random thing comes up,  it's fine.

So I was in, I don't know, was I in a calorie deficit yesterday?  Hmm. Probably. I probably hit maintenance.  So that's great. That's great. And that's why over the past month of all these social things, I gained four pounds, which is, I mean,  he said, I'm a really big guy. So that's actually a really small amount of weight. It's negligible. So I hope you've enjoyed this talk. This is practical, this is unvarnished. This is the reality of being a human being in this day and age. And  when you, if you need to live like a monk for certain periods of time, great, hopefully we don't have to go that to that extreme. But if you're just trying to live life and, you know,  learn to enjoy things more and you're still figuring out what that balance looks like,  these are some things you can do to set yourself up for, if not success,  maintaining the status quo. 

Which if you've historically  gained weight, like a mofo, then maintaining the status quo is success.  That's much, much, much improved from how your brain and how your behavior has worked in the past. And you're getting there without being totally without having everything figured out yet, right? I'm there right now, and I'm quite frankly, going through  really tough time. 

And so it's, All the more impressive to myself that, yeah, man, good job. Yeah. You're not killing it right now. You're not, you're not losing weight. Like you probably want to  according to your desires and values but you're not gaining   and you're maintaining, you know, a certain amount of well being, you know, you're maintaining a certain amount of movement and  making better nutritional choices during the day because of this, because I'm trying to, like, leave room in my back pocket for the end of the day. 

And so what it does, honestly, is when it is time to,  flip the switch. I'm going to drop some weight. And \, I'm going to, really dial in. Well, guess what? It doesn't feel any different except at the end of the day, I'm going to say no to a social engagement when I don't feel I have the willpower to abstain.  And then just go to bed, you know, try to get my sleep. Sleep's really important. If you're trying to burn fat, lose weight,  build muscle. And so really it's it's that, that can feel like a big change for me cause I'm more of a night person. So putting myself to bed at a reasonable hour  is still a challenge and it's a big shift for me. However,  that's the only shift really, how I eat the rest of the day. It doesn't change. And so. This is just a look into a fairly messy life right now that is managing the mess while I'm doing some major renovations, right? We're keeping it under we're keeping it, we're keeping the wheels on, we're keeping the tires on the train and hopefully as soon as possible, I'll be in the place mentally where  things in my mind can be a little simpler. I won't be dealing with such gnarly, heavy lifting, and I can take all that energy and focus and apply it to my fitness goals.  And I can't wait. I can't wait for that because I've been wanting to do that for a long time.

Sometimes the healing process doesn't work on our timeline. But I've learned to be patient, to keep a gentle pressure. You know, it's like, lean, lean against the wall.  Because if, if the wall starts to crumble a little bit, if you're leaning on it, it's going to start to push it.  So we don't have to beat our heads against it.

Sometimes we just keep a gentle pressure on our goals.  So when the opportunity does arise and things aren't working. In a more efficient way, in a way that's more advantageous to your well being, then that kind of starts to happen on its own. And part of the way you set that up is by learning to maintain life reasonably well when things are messy. If you found this helpful, if you'd like more advice on how to lose weight Even though even when your mind might be dealing with some severe wounds and unhealed trauma issues if you would like to learn how to make your life better before you totally get healed, if you want to learn how to make smarter, easier decisions in your life and weight loss in your mental health journey, in your work relationships, this all factors in.

I would highly advise you to reach out to me about coaching or you can dive straight into my free community, lose weight with John. There's going to be a link  in the description show notes, wherever you're watching this  or listening to it. Lose weight with John is an awesome community for support. You can ask questions. I have some free courses in there to help you start to shift the way you think about. The way you've been taught wrongly,  sorry, about weight loss and the mental game, like you really need to get in there and  let me  pick apart a lot of the BS that you've been handed so that you can really focus on exactly what you need to focus on and kind of forget the rest so that you can succeed and so that you can start moving forward.

Toward your desires and your, you know, expressing your authentic self. And sometimes I do free coaching sessions in there. Yeah, so it's a really cool community and that's a good place to, it's a good jumping off point for moving into coaching later on. If. You are picking up what I'm putting down in the free group. So I highly advise that you take advantage of that. If you're watching on YouTube, I'd really appreciate a comment and a like and a subscribe and a check for 5, 000 mailed to well, the address is down below. Let me know if you have any questions that I can answer in future content, future longer form videos, podcasts, et cetera. And thank you for watching or listening. I'll talk to you soon.