Podcast Transcription: Why The “Pause-Button Mentality” Is Sabotaging Your Weight Loss Efforts with Ted Ryce  

Ted Ryce: Today I’m super excited to share with you this episode that’s all about how to stay on track with your health and nutrition, even when your life gets busy.

And if this is your first time listening to the show, what I want to tell you is that this show, Legendary Life, is all about upgrading your mind and your body. So, if you’re looking to make a breakthrough in your health and level up your life, you’re in the right place. And make sure you click that subscribe button, wherever you listen to podcast so that every time one of my episodes goes live, you’ll be the first to know.

So, let’s talk about who this episode is for. This episode is for anyone who feels like when they’re motivated, when things are too busy at work, when it comes around to the end of the year, or maybe before an event like a wedding or something like that, it’s easy for you to get on track and stay in shape, because you have something to shoot for, you’ve got something that is a motivator.

However, when you don’t have that, you fall off track with both your workouts and your nutrition, but especially your nutrition, because a lot of people are able to stay on track with their workouts. But with their nutrition, that’s the thing that people have the most problem with. So if you’re one of those people, I’m going to tell you how to stop falling off the fitness wagon and how to stay on it for good, even if you’ve never been able to do that in the past.

And I know that’s a strong claim to make, but I do it all the time, my clients do it all the time, you can do it. So, before we get into what the problem is, what you need to do differently, I want to ask you this: do you feel like you’re able to stay on track with your health and fitness, when you have the motivation to do it, but as soon as you “aren’t motivated”, then it’s really hard to stay on track with it?

Or do you feel like if you’re in a period where everyone’s behaving in your life in your family, when work isn’t too busy, when the kids are doing what they’re supposed to be doing, it’s kind of easy to stay on track. But as soon as things get a little bit stressful, a little bit busy, you fall right off. In fact, your nutrition is the first thing to go. And for many people, it’s both their nutrition and then the workout comes next. Does that sound like you?

And lastly, do you feel like no matter what you do, you just can’t stay on track with your workouts and nutrition, so, you’ve got this situation where you’re always on the wagon, off the wagon on the wagon, off the wagon and being on the wagon, being on that fitness wagon it really has to do with your life being perfect. And not just your life, it has to do with you being able to do the exercise, hit the gym, eat the way you want.

In other words, you do it the way you want. You have an idea about what it should look like when you’re eating well, what it should look like in your life when you’re exercising properly. And if you can’t do that thing, then it really messes with you, right? So, here’s the real problem: the real problem is not that your life needs to be better or less busy, or that your boss needs to give you a break, or that your business needs to get handled.

The real problem here is that you’ve got the “pause button” mentality, you have the ‘all or nothing mentality”, this is something that I see all the time. But here’s the issue, this will stop you from ever getting it handle. I mean, there’s so many problems out, there’s so much confusion about what to follow with your nutrition, what to eat. Some people say eat nothing but meat. Others say eat nothing but vegetables. Other people say carbs make you fat. Other people say, you know what, low-fat diets work better than high-fat diet.

There are so many things out there, but this, my friend, is the big issue that I see with the majority of people; they can’t be flexible with their approach to health and fitness. And so once you make the shift from being an “all or nothing” person to an “always something” person, things get so much more easy. When you’re on vacation, you don’t put on a bunch of weight because you know how to enjoy yourself and eat out and enjoy the desserts, and all the things that you want to do without doing the extra stuff that you’re not even really enjoying that much, you’re more flexible person.

And even though you don’t have a gym and the gym is imperfect, you’ll still know what to do and you’ll still do it, even if you don’t have the perfect gym, the perfect setup in the amount of time that you have. And you will be the person who’s able to stay in shape, no matter what comes at you: the vacations, the social events, the holidays, the summer barbecues, it doesn’t matter what life throws at you.

Yeah, of course, maybe you put on a couple pounds here, and then take them right off. But you don’t make that, “Oh, I’ve been off both my workouts and my nutrition for weeks, because I had that one slip up, so I just said screw it, and then I put on a bunch of weight, I got out of shape.”

And by the way, something you should know when you do this, when you have this mentality is that, let’s say you gained five or seven pounds, because you had a situation come up, maybe if you’re American, you had a few days off and you went out for the Fourth of July, you took a nice trip for a few days stayed that long weekend, and you didn’t really work out and you know you drank too much and you ate more than you should.

And then instead of getting right back on, you lingered, you stayed in that off-mode, right? You stayed in that “off the wagon” mode. And what happened is you put on a little bit more weight, then a little bit more weight, and the weight doesn’t seem too much. But a month later, what you’re not realizing is that you put on more fat than you realize, because you start losing muscle very quickly. In fact, the older you are, you lose muscle much easier. So not only—it’s worse than you think.

Now, if you just step on the scale, and you’re like, “Oh, well, I only put on seven pounds, so that’s not that big of a deal. I mean, it’s not great, but it’s not that big of a deal.” No, it’s worse than that. And so this mentality, this “all or nothing” mentality of this “press the pause button” mentality, this is something you need to crush, you need to let that part of yourself die. I know that sounds strong, but once you make that shift, this never becomes an issue again, all right?

So, what is the one thing you need to know here? This is a mindset issue. This is an approach issue. This is how you’re living your life issue. So, this is a lifestyle issue. And more specifically, like I said, a mindset issue, the way you’re approaching this. And let me tell you, I’ve been in this industry for 20 years, think about that. Now, many of you are in your 40s like I am or even 50s, and you’ve probably been in your career for 20/30 years, maybe even longer.

And what I want to tell you is you know how, like 20 years ago, you just think about how you used to—or even 10 years ago, you think about what you used to do in your career? And you just, “Oh, yeah. Oh, wow, I wish I could go back and change that.” Well, that’s how I am. And one of the things that I wish I realized was that this mindset is the thing that crushes people, it crushes their results, it has nothing to do with all the other things that we talk about, the technical details, because those are technical solutions.

What is the best workout for me? What is the right amount of protein for me to eat? Those are technical issues. This is what you would call an adaptive challenge. You can’t solve it with a technical issue. This has to be you changing your behavior, through changing the way you think about your situation, your challenges.

So, I’ve seen this happen over and over again. In fact, I’ve gone away from talking about how to optimize programs and talking about supplements and biomarkers and all the, you know, lengthening telomeres, although we’ll talk about that. But it’s really the mindset that’s crushing you, it’s really stopping you. And if I could go back and do things differently, I would have worked more on that with my clients.

And in my clients that I take on now, we work extensively with it. Now I don’t advertise it much, because everybody is just like, “Tell me how many pounds I’ll lose.” And I’m like, “You will lose 20 to 30 pounds in 12 weeks.” But this is the stuff that I don’t share, because, you know, it’s not sexy, but it’s the stuff that gets results. In this show, this is about telling the truth.

This is about telling the truth about what it really takes.

And so let me share with you how I came upon this. As I said, I’ve been in the business for 20 years. And what I noticed was that, you know, say, a third of people that I’ve worked with over the time. got great results.

And then a third of people got pretty good results, but you know, nothing too game changing, but they became healthier people. And then a third of the time, they just wouldn’t get good results at all.

And not only that, I see that with myself as a personal trainer back when I used to do that, I saw that with other people as well, with other trainers. I listened to other people talk, you heard even working with me, same things coming up over and over again. And this is one of the things that came up over and over and over again.

Everyone’s good when they can do the fitness and nutrition thing the way they want. Like, “Oh, you know, it’s just too busy for me to work out,” and I’m like, “You don’t have 10 minutes to work out?” “No, but 10-minute workout, what is a 10-minute workout?” Let me tell you is better than zero.

So, that’s the type of shift that the people who are successful, this is the shift that they make. I’ll tell you, I’m traveling right now, I don’t have a gym to go to because I’m too lazy to go to one, is the truth. There is a gym right down the street. But I like working out at my place.

Because again, that’s what works for me. Now, I’ll go to the gym to do a martial arts class easy. But I won’t go to the gym to lift some weights, lifting weights doesn’t excite me, but I know I have to do it.

So, I travel with a band system that allows me to get the type of workout that keeps my muscle strong, that keeps my body lean, that lets me look and perform the way I want. And this is the type of thing that you need to do. So, no matter what I do—I’ve been traveling all around. I don’t have ideal situations, but I make the most of it, I adapt. And that’s the type of mindset.

So, the big shift here is going from that “all or nothing” mentality to “always something” mentality. And again, if you fail to do this, you’ll never get this handled. You’ll always be the person that loses the same 10 or 20 pounds, then gains it back. And then when you’re motivated, you’ll start working out again, you’ll lose the weight again, then things will get busy or you’ll have to take the kids to camp or whatever it is, to their sports, whatever it is, and you’ll fall off again.

You have got to extinguish this mindset, you’ve got to get it out of your life, because if you get this wrong, again, you’ll never get in shape and stay there. Even if you get in shape, you’ll fall out of it. And you don’t even need to tell me that it’s happened to you because it happens to everybody. I’ve even gone through this myself.

So, I want to tell you a story about Rich, my client Rich. Now some of you have heard Rich’s story before, but I’m going to tell it again anyway. So Rich is a 51-year-old father of four, who owns an accounting firm in Montana. And Rich was a former athlete in college, was in phenomenal shape. I think he was squatting like 500 pounds, right? He was playing football, or strong in shape. In fact, he’s still in amazing shape.

But he had this issue where during tax season, he would be overwhelmed with all the people turning in their taxes. And I mean, I don’t even need to tell you the details is because let me ask you, I mean, do your taxes on time, do you not create any stress for your accountant? Most of us do. And if you’re a person who has that together, well, Rich, thanks you for being one of those people.

But so many people, what they do is they show up, they show up late they file late they their mess with all their receipts, they don’t know what the hell is going on, they give the wrong information. And Rich would take on all of that with his business, with his accounting firm.

And it would be at a time where he just got so overwhelmed, he felt like there was no time to take care of his health. So he’d start to revert back to his poor eating habits and he gained weight. And this happened over and over and over for 25 years, okay, 25 years! I want you to think about that.

And I also want you to think about how long you’ve been stuck in your cycle of gaining and losing weight, because the majority of people, probably anywhere from 80 to 95% of people are stuck in this cycle of gaining weight and losing it and gaining it and losing it.

So, in one way, if that’s where you’re at, completely normal, but in another way, completely normal means completely average and mediocre and stuck and not living the life that you want. The way to get the life that you want is to get this handled. Because most people are in too much debt, they don’t like their jobs, their average is nothing to shoot for, as we’re talking about American standards, it means that you’re really getting your butt kicked out there.

So that was Rich’s situation. He was stuck in this cycle for 25 years, but he decided to join my coaching program. In fact, I’m still working with Rich, although in a different capacity. And so, what we had to do was figure out how to navigate accounting season. And what do we do for workouts? How can we deal with the nutrition? What makes sense to do there?

And we figured it out by working together. And in fact, this is the first time in 25 years in 2019, when this is going on, this is the first time where I think he only gained a pound or two. And then now he’s down below where he’s ever been.

And that’s what’s possible. He’s broken the cycle, he’s ended the cycle, this negative pattern, this vicious circle that he was in for 25 years, because he got coached through it. Because he came up, we work together to figure out what needed to happen, what made sense for him to happen? Because just telling someone, “Hey, you need to try harder. You need to do more, you need to man up, you need to woman up,” that is what you call BS advice. That’s tough talk, that doesn’t actually solve problems.

And please, if anybody’s telling you that in your life that you need to just try harder need to just step up whatever it is, that’s not where you need to step up. That’s not stepping up. Trying to add more stress on to more stress is not the way to do it. And so, we work together and he was able to do this for the first time in 25 years and now he’s at an all-time low.

And just to remind you in case you haven’t heard Rich’s story before, he lost 29 pounds with me and went to doing one push up to performing 10 pull ups. Okay, that is what is possible when you have the right strategy.

Or let’s back up and say this: number one, when you get rid of the “all or nothing” mentality and You turn it into the “always something” mentality. So, whether you have two hours, one hour, 15 minutes, 5 minutes, 1 minute, you still do something with exercise.

And of course, you’re going to be eating all the time. So, you’ve got to figure out how to make those better choices. And that’s a whole another—a long conversation that took me a long time to figure out. But now I coach people to be empowered to make their choices with nutrition in a way that leads to consistent results, while still being able to eat the foods that they want to eat—occasionally, right? You can’t live off of coconut ice cream every day. I mean, that’s what I’ve been enjoying out here in Southeast Asia.

But you can figure this out in a way so that it’s not this all or nothing mentality, because I’ll tell you something else. Another all or nothing mentality, “Oh, just cut carbs.” Which always works when you’re always cutting the carbs. Or, “Just don’t eat sugar. That’s all you’ve got to do. Just don’t eat sugar.” Okay, but what happens when I do eat sugar because I can’t freaking be perfect.

And plus, one of the best pleasures in life is eating a little bit of sugar, right? Not specifically sugar, actually. But maybe it’s a pizza, maybe you’re in love with pizza, maybe you’re into coconut ice cream like I am or key lime pie like I am, whatever it is, you can eat those things too, and still have a lean body and still be healthy, you can have those things and be leaner than the people who are trying to eat so “clean”.

That’s what happens. It’s all about these principles when it comes to training and nutrition. So instead of just being this are nothing person where you’re on a diet, “Oh, I fell off the diet. Oh, let me look around what’s another diet I can hop on to and do this all or nothing mentality?” It’s not about that. Or, “Oh, I fell off my workout. Let me see. What’s it? Oh, Insanity. Oh, the 21 Day Body Fix. Oh, look at this Instagram workout.”

Listen, if that’s where you’re at right now, that’s fine. But that is like a low level to play the game. That’s like making minimum wage, in terms of… Not to talk disparagingly about anyone making minimum wage, I worked several… I tutored math and worked in an orchid nursery for minimum wage, I know what it’s like, but I moved on from there, because it wasn’t a life that I wanted. So that’s what I’m talking about.

And what we want to do is we want to get to the point where we have the right mindset, that we’re committed to getting the results. Instead of, “Well, I just want something that’s fun, you know, oh, but I got bored with it, and I stopped doing it,” you know, kind of get rid of that. And, of course, if you’re not there, that’s fine, but you need to – or you don’t need to, but if you want better results, you need to evolve from there. That’s the truth.

And again, don’t let anybody bully you into doing something that you don’t want to do. But again, if you want better results, it’s just you have to do the things that get the results. It’s as simple as that. So always keep that in mind, always.

Now, I want to say this to you. The key here is making that mindset shift, going from the person who is on the best-selling diet or the fad diet, or the diet that Frank is on or that Susan is on, or doing intermittent fasting, or doing SoulCycle or doing the hot trendy class in the city that you live in.

Those are okay, where you’re just working your way up, when that’s all you can bring yourself to do. But when you’re at the point where you’re like: “All right, I’ve been doing this and I’m sick and tired of not getting results. Because that psycho Pilates trainer who kills me in the class, or that personal trainer, even…” Personal training doesn’t work so well either. I did it for 20 years, I know.

And I know plenty of personal trainers. My clients would be on track when they showed up and worked out with me, and then when they go on vacation for a couple months, because Miami gets too hot, they would all fall off. They’d all be in you know Europe or wherever and eating and drinking and being merry and they come back and they would be psycho about starting to train again.

And so, they were all or nothing, and that is that that mentality, it doesn’t matter if you’re a millionaire or if you’re just starting out in life and out of college or you just went bankrupt and you’re pulling everything back, get rid of that “all or nothing” mentality. I should have told my millionaire clients, I’m like, “Hey, you’ve got a million bucks in the bank, but you have a minimum wage attitude when it comes to your fitness here.” I love telling those guys that stuff. It’s a lot of fun.

Anyway, little tangent there. But what I’m trying to tell you is the key is shifting that mindset from being that all or nothing person to an always something person. And then the next thing you got to do is figure out, okay, well, what are the shifts that are…what are the strategies that I can implement here? Not, let’s learn what’s optimal, and then let’s look at my life and what I feel I can do, and then let’s work from there. Let’s get something in place that I’m super confident I can do.

And of course, lastly, which I should have said first, is you’ve got to have the commitment to do this. If you’re not committed, you will not get results, so you’ve got to get committed. And a lot of people say they’re committed until it’s time to show it with your actions. We can always say, “Oh, yeah, are you committed to your health?” “Oh, yeah, I’m committed my health. What about you?” “Oh, yeah, I’m committed to my health, too.”

But it’s when we show with our actions, when we step up and do the work, when we invest in ourselves. That’s when we show that we’re truly committed. And so now you have two choices here, you could listen to this podcast, you can try to implement this stuff on your own. Or really three choices, because the next thing is you can just keep doing what you’ve been doing.

And unfortunately, the vast majority of people who ask for advice online, they don’t do anything different. They just look for more and more advice and more advice, another podcast, another podcast, you know, asking fitness influencers on Instagram, because I’ve been getting asked a lot of questions on Instagram lately, asking for advice. Or you can finally step up and get this handled.

And what I want to tell you is, if you’re truly committed to doing this, I want to offer for you to hop on a call with me. But this isn’t for everyone. If you’re a dabbler, if you’re a person who you’re not really a high-performance person. In other words, you’re not a person who’s worked really hard on your business or career and let your health go. If you’ve kind of let everything go in your life, you’ve got to keep listening to the podcast and implementing strategies.

But if you’re that high-performance person, and you’re an attorney or an executive, if you’re a superwoman or Superman, but you know, your health is starting to suffer because of it. And you need to step up in that area. Because eventually it’s going to cost you money to be in poor health, it’s going to cost you money at the doctor’s office, time spent at the doctor’s office timeout due to sickness, it’s going to cost you because of the brain fog you have, it’s going to cost you because you don’t feel confident in showing up to those meetings or walking into work because you’re uncomfortable with the way you look. Because of all the weight you put on or whatever other health issue.

If you’re that person, and you are ready to embrace a different approach, if you’re ready to embrace an approach that truly works, and if you are committed to handling it now. Not in six months from now, not in a year from now, not when it’s New Year’s new you now, I’m talking about right now, then I’d like to offer you, or invite you, rather, to hop on a call with me. And where you go to do that is legendarylifeprogram.com/apply. And I have to say it very slowly like that with that cadence because I’ve got too many websites. So legendarylifeprogram.com/apply is the place to apply.

And I just want to leave you with this. Sometimes people, they feel like their health is superficial, the way they look is superficial. They shouldn’t derive so much confidence from it, or they shouldn’t derive so much satisfaction from being in shape or so much depression or, or mental anguish from being out of shape.

But the truth of it is that there is no separation between your mindset in your body, right? There’s no separation between your mind and your body; your mind is your body, your body is your mind.

In fact, if you want to be super sciency and nerdy about it, your mind is what’s called an emergent property of the physiology. That’s why, let me ask you this. Whenever a cop…Let’s say you’ve had a few drinks coming back from dinner, and a cop is on your tail, would you logically say, “Oh, I’ve had a few drinks, and there’s a police officer behind me. And so, I need to make sure I’m extra driving well here so I don’t make any, you know, so I don’t get pulled over?” Or do you feel your heart starting to race?

So, the answer is your heart starts racing, right. And so, what I’m trying to connect with you here is that there’s an intimate connection between the personality, the you that shows up in the world—and I don’t mean your body and the fat and all that stuff, although that might be part of it. But here’s the real thing, the way I look at it, is that if you’re too fat, if you’ve got too much fat on your body, your physiology isn’t functioning optimally. And we know this.

And this goes way deeper than just the way we look. It’s our physiology. And it’s also what we’re teaching our children through how we use food to deal with our issues. Everyone knows how we’re showing up, because they can see it on us, they can see it on our face, they can see it in our lack of confidence when we try to make eye contact and we’re not feeling so confident.

They can see it in us when we say we’re not stressed, but we talk like this: “No, I’m not stressed!” We see it, people see it in our bodies, not just around your waist, but in your eyes, the way you talked, the way you show up, your posture. And once you get that handled, and you get confidence in this area, your whole life will change. And that’s the truth.

So again, if you’re interested and you’re committed to doing that now, go to legendarylifeprogram.com/apply.

I’m looking forward to speaking with you soon.

So have an amazing week. I hope this helped you make that shift. And don’t give up on this stuff. No matter where you’re at with your fitness. Keep pushing forward a get to the point where you can be that “always something” person and then watch how that ripples out through your life in every area.

That’s all I’ve got. Hope you enjoyed it. Speak to you next time.