Momentum happens after you start.
Hi guys! Welcome to Episode 236 of the Wildly Successful Lifestyle podcast!
We all know what momentum can do for you right? When you’ve got it, and you’re on the right track there’s no denying it. And you can FEEL IT……
It’s like watching a basketball game where it looks like one team is just definitely going to win, it’s not looking good for the other team and they know something has to happen for them to turn things around and then that team that’s behind has a crazy good play and everyone goes wild and the momentum shifts and everybody knows it including the team that’s ahead…they know if they don’t stop that momentum it’s over. We’ve seen it lots of times. You create momentum and once it gets going, it’s hard to stop.
But what got that momentum going in the first place? ACTION. That’s what got it going. Someone took action that shifted the momentum.
Momentum by definition is movement, movement that gains traction. It’s the driving force or growing strength of a course of action. And that action doesn’t have to be big.
I was reading a blog and it was talking about this idea that movement doesn’t have to be big to start momentum so say for example you weren’t even considering cleaning your house when you simply start sorting the mail, which led you to clean off the counter and suddenly you’re cleaning the kitchen and you love the way that feels so it inspires you to clean the whole house. That’s a beautiful example of how a small insignificant action can turn into pretty big momentum. Had you not sorted the mail, you probably wouldn’t have cleaned the house.
We often think small actions are insignificant but if sorting the mail can lead to cleaning your entire house what can other small actions lead to? That’s my point for this episode is for us to think about the little decisions we make and how they can affect the momentum of our day, our week or maybe even our year?
I was working with a coaching client and she was telling me how her boyfriend cleaned her car for her, it had been pretty dirty, just because of that she felt inspired to clean her apartment, work out, get dressed up for dinner and do her meal prep for the week, so that one small action, not even on her part inspired her to make anything she could better which led to eating better that week because she had done her meal prep.
Now this works both directions. That seemingly harmless donut breakfast could cause you to think well I’ve already blown the day so you eat bad the rest of the day and then you don’t work out because there’s no use doing that when you’ve eaten 4000 calories, right? Not right. That momentum could be stopped in its tracks by you going to the gym anyway.
So what momentum do you have going on right now? Are you getting better? Is it you being the best version of yourself? Or is it you staying stagnant with no forward momentum or even worse backwards momentum.
This last Monday, I had a little pity party because even though I’m eating super clean and that’s my norm, I can still eat too many calories. So I got on the scale, which in all honesty I do not like doing and I didn’t like what I saw. Now to be transparent I like to stay in a certain range. One that’s a good fit for me. I hadn’t gotten on the scale for a while but we had started this habit of eating macadamia nuts, they come in that big bag from Costco…so delicious but you can overeat healthy food too. Now, the scale was a little out of the range that I want to keep, so not a good start, but I noticed my morning routine after that was off, I wasn’t resonating with the podcast I was listening to and my meditation was not good either. When I did my thought download, I realized that it was because I thought the momentum had shifted for my weight and I was going to let it go back up.
But I control that momentum. And so I made a little 20 day challenge for myself that very day once I got out of my pity party. I decided I will get on the scale every day up until we go out of town which is about 20 days or so. I am going to stay off twitter completely for the next 20 days and I’m going to do something hard that I’m hesitant to do because it’s out of my comfort zone every single day for the next 20 days. I’ve already seen a shift in my momentum. For starters we aren’t buying the massive bag of macadamia nuts again. It’s too tempting. Then I was in yoga this morning and the instructor gave us the option to do bridge or wheel, If you do yoga you know what those are, if you don’t Wheel is much much harder. I didn’t feel like doing full wheel and haven’t done it in a while, really since Covid and then I remembered my challenge and I was like well guess I’m doing wheel which is a full back bend, It wasn’t pretty and it was super challenging but I did it. And because I have not gotten on twitter all week I’ve been super productive on all the things I needed to get done.
One simple little action…of getting on the scale on a Monday morning caused all of those other actions. And remember at first getting on that scale and seeing that number messed with my head and then I let it mess with my morning routine but I’m aware enough to know that if I let that momentum continue it will gain traction. You can stop the momentum of where your life is headed if you don’t like it. You do control it. You could just be making small decisions that you think are insignificant and by themselves maybe they are but the actions that they spark create momentum. You control the trajectory of your life through your daily decisions. If you don’t like where your momentum is headed, what are you going to do about it?
I stopped my negative momentum this week by giving myself a challenge. I love a challenge so I gave myself one and it changed everything. It changes the momentum from negative to positive. Oh and by the way, the scale is just information. Without that information I might continue to buy those big bags of macadamia nuts and mindlessly eat them.
Momentum can be felt just like in that basketball game. My guess is if you’re being honest with yourself, you have an idea if your life has forward momentum, no momentum or backwards momentum.
If you have good forward momentum…keep going
If you have no momentum, you feel stuck or stagnant, take small actions to move it forward Remember, Momentum happens after you start, so you have to take SOME action to get it going….. Join a group class at the gym, Challenge yourself to stay off social media, take a class, whatever you need to do to start some forward momentum.
If you have negative momentum stop it in its tracks however you need to. Sometimes we think just because we are in the car driving, we will eventually get there, but not if you’re headed in the opposite direction of your destination. Like I did with my 20 day challenge, don’t let it get too far, Turn it around now, you can do it.
My challenge to you this week is to decide where you are. Is the momentum of your life headed in the right direction? Maybe you’re stagnant with no momentum, or worse maybe your momentum is headed in the opposite direction of where you want to be. That’s a good thing to know. You control the trajectory of your life, it’s never too late and you’re never too old to turn things around.
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I love you guys I’ll talk to you in a few days.
