Transform Your Desire into Results

You are probably at a point in your life where you desire change. I remember when I felt that way.  I had a deep desire to lose weight.  I also did not know how to do that.  I figured I would need to work out regularly but I didn’t even know what to do there and I hate going to the gym or doing anything inconvenient.  I was lost with just my desire for change.

It felt like I was stuck and frankly, alone.  I didn’t have tons of healthy people in my life to guide me. I had one friend who was inspiring me with her 5am crossfit workouts but my negative self-beliefs that I could NEVER wake up early to work out and I could NEVER work out without eating first kept me from believing that I could ever be like her.  But she kept encouraging me anyway (thank God!).

So while I had this one friend gently nudging me, I still had no idea how to start.  Have you ever felt like that? Like okay, I know this works for you but I am pretty confident it won’t work for me.  So, I turned to google for “how to lose weight.”  I was looking at all the things - and there are a million things to choose from.  I had started talking to a coach who did at home workouts - which is totally my jam. After learning about what she had to offer - I signed up and never looked back!  But here is the thing - I was scared.  It’s not like I signed up for this thing and immediately I believed in my ability to do it.  It was a process and a journey.  But there is one thing that I did do - I committed.

I committed to doing EXACTLY what the coach told me to do.  I acknowledged that my way of doing things clearly didn’t work which is why I was overweight and unable to drop the weight I wanted to.  I acknowledged that my coach had great success.  I followed the workout calendar and the meal plans pretty much exactly and I saw results.  Commitment is one of the major keys to success.  Signing up for a program doesn’t change your life.  It is the commitment to that program and it is the action you take as a result of that commitment that changes your life.  If I had signed up with that coach and then still only did one workout a week and only followed the meal plan 3 times a week it would not have worked.  When coaches and experts create these plans - they create them as a whole package that works. Very rarely does half-assing it work.

So after I committed and started to see real results (about 30 days in), I started to BELIEVE!!!  I believed in the program so much.  I believed in ME so much!  I believed for the first time ever that I was capable of doing it.  This belief catapulted more change in me.  The coach suggested reading “personal development books.”  I previously really only read books that professors told me to read or for pleasure.  I wasn’t totally sure I knew that a whole world of personal development existed - but the coach said to do it for 10-30 minutes a day so I did.  And what happened thereafter, over time, not overnight, was that my mindset really started to shift.  I believed that if I could achieve this goal of losing weight, why couldn’t I achieve any goal I wanted?  I realized, for the first time ever, that I actually had control over my life.  I actually had the ability to change my life!! 

I always sat back and watched life happen to me.  I had truly no idea that I could just make life what I wanted it to be.  After about 6 months of reading books and watching my mindset change drastically, I realized I was really unfulfilled in my job.  I wanted to learn more and have more responsibility but there just wasn’t room for that in the company.  So, while I loved my company in so many ways - I had been there 6 years - I also knew that my professional growth was stunted.  I was scared to leave.  I was scared of failure at the new place.  I was scared of leaving what I knew was “good enough” for the complete unknown.  But I did it anyway.  This was all a result of the work I had done on my mindset.  Something I refer to as grit.

The actual definition of grit according to google is “courage and resolve; strength of character.”  Working on your mindset is just like working on a muscle.  You start small and you see small changes which in turn builds your confidence, which in turn has you picking up bigger weights and seeing more changes - which builds your confidence.  You see the connection now right?  Your mindset is going to give you the grit to do things that scare you.  Your mindset is going to help you through the hardest and scariest times.  Your mindset is going to push you to new levels in your life.

I know it is hard to see the big picture right now when you are sitting in a place where you desire change but you don’t know how to make that change happen.  But that is why I wanted to outline where it started for me and where it got me. I want you to see that there is a bigger picture and while it isn’t all clear to you just yet, it will be if you take one small step at a time toward your desire.  An important reminder: this doesn’t all happen overnight, but you will start to see the subtle shifts pretty quickly.  And those small wins, those small changes, add up quickly!

So I know now you are like “great story, Marisa, but what does this mean for me?  Where do I start?”  I’m so glad you asked.

The first thing to do is acknowledge your desire.  Acknowledge where you want your life to change - whether it is your health or your career or relationships - acknowledge it.  Acknowledge that you have the power to change your circumstances as long as you have the desire.  I would even go to my last blog post about finding your why and complete the exercise described in that post so that you have a deep understanding of why you are feeling this desire.  Then do some research.  What avenues exist for you to be able to achieve what you want to achieve?  Is it a special meal plan or exercise program?  Is it a professional development or skills training program?  Is it a get out of debt program? Research and find what resonates best with you and then commit to it.  Do what they say to do.  Follow the steps as closely as you can.  Once you do this the belief and the grit will come - but the key to beginning your transformation is actually beginning.  You have to move out of just desire and into action.  The sooner you do this, the sooner your dreams come true.

You’ve got this sister <3