You'll Never "FEEL" Ready

Mel Robbin's shared this quote;

"You'll never feel ready because ready

isn't a feeling - It's a decision."

Clients and I have this conversation often when they're waiting until "next week" to "get back to their routine" or waiting until things "calm down" before they're ready to make a change. The "perfect" time to start/do something WILL NOT happen!! You will be MORE ready once you START vs when you're "waiting to be ready".

This is common in health and wellness. Here's my "favourite" (*Can you hear my eyes rolling very loudly?? 🙄) I can't tell you the number of times over the years (when my focus was more stricly in the fitness and personal training realm) that people would say to me; "Well, I'm not quite ready to hire you yet. Once I get in shape, THEN I'll come see you."

.....*insert cricket sounds*...... 😳 Pardon?!?!?

1) What does "once I get in shape" even mean to you?

How do you know you are now "in shape" and therefore "ready to hire me"?

2) What do you think my job is as a personal trainer?!

See I thought it was to help teach/coach people how they can lead healthy, active lifestyles (maybe I'm wrong?)

3) It NEVER once happened.

They were all waiting to "feel ready"

I think most of the time, people feel that's what I "want to hear" maybe? Yet the opposite is true. I want to work with people who AREN'T "in shape" (whatever "in shape" is), who DON'T know what to do or how to do it, who have lost their self-confidence in what they're capable of, who have "tried everything to create the changes they want to make"...

I was (am) here to guide, support and coach; NOT to hold hands for someone who has things figured out for themselves!

The point however is that those people were waiting until they "felt ready".

-Ready to hire someone to help coach them....

-Ready to learn more about themselves...

-Ready to help themselves...

-Ready to make a change...

But there was no actual ACTION taken or DECISION made to BE ready.

Sometimes I believe that it's not because we DON'T ACTUALLY want it, but rather we think we are "supposed to want" to change. Nothing sustainable will ever come out of that mindset. We have to remember that we don't "have to do" anything! However, it's that delicate balance of understanding THAT fact, AND nudging yourself to start with SOMETHING. In other words, making the DECISION (as Mel Robbin's said) to "be ready".

READY. SET. GO! Often we forget the "GO" part in our health and lifestyle habits/goals/endeavours

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Proof of "Readiness": My Personal Lesson that I've Never Forgotten

It was 2007. Shawna and I were recently married. I was in a recently new job that I loved. She was running and building her business out of our home. We had a nice home. Life was good. The discussion of having another child came up. My immediate thoughts were; "We can't afford it right now", "Are we really ready to be able to support another child?"... That kind of thing. Her response to me was; "We will never be 'ready'". Basically saying that regardless, our lifestyle will change with a new member of our family (financially AND otherwise). It's a big deal.

She was right of course. We decided to have a baby and the following August, our "Amber-Bear" was born. Her big sister and her mom and dad were all happy we made the DECISION TO BE READY, instead of waiting until we "felt ready". 🥰

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Waiting, Searching and Overthinking Help us get Better at THOSE Three Things

It's hard to be "Ready" when you wait "until you're ready"... gather info... overthink / overanalyze... And then repeat that cycle. Before you know it, weeks or even months have passed and you're still where you were when the first thought came to mind about creating change for yourself. The only things you've changed is that your ability to wait, gather information and overthink have all improved.

Make the DECISION and ACT on it.

Make "ready" be a thing of the past.

Take ACTION now to create momentum and change in the direction YOU want!

Try. Experiment. Adjust. Experience. Take notice of what works for YOU and what doesn't. All of these things just require you to say "I'm ready - Let's go!"