FREE yourself from all or nothing health thinking

“Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face” - Mike Tyson

Developing a robust plan for improving our health doesn’t guarantee that good health will happen. Life has a tendency of getting in the way on a regular basis. We operate within a chaotic world and looking after our health can at times be squeezed out to the side by conflicting priorities.

“Intention doesn’t always lead to action”

Just because we have a plan and intend to do something, doesn't mean that we will actually do it. It definitely doesn't mean that we will get it done in the way that we have pictured. 

Last week I had a gym workout that I wanted to do between dropping the kids off at Nana’s place and heading off to a meeting. I had the workout mapped out in my mind and figured it would take about 50 minutes. But as anyone who has been associated with little kids will realise, things often don’t go to plan. It was one of those mornings where everything takes about 4 times as long to get done. By the time we got to Nana’s place I had planned to have been about 20 minutes into my workout.

This is just one example of obstacles that get in the way of our best laid health plans. Others might be important last minute work emergencies, sorting something out for a family member, cleaning up dog vomit off the carpet, or a myriad of others.

When obstacles come up it usually means that we can’t implement our health plan the way that we thought we could. Often this creates the response of us not doing anything at all. If we can’t do all of it, we won’t do any of it. This is normal!

When we’re in the middle of dealing with an unexpected obstacle our mental and emotional resources are focused on that. After that unexpected use of time and energy it’s difficult for us to come up with a compromise where we take some healthy action that we had not planned out beforehand - doing so requires us to use up even more mental energy. We’ll often move on to the next task we had planned out rather than using any available leftover time for the intention we had initially meant for it.

“Each obstacle is a choice point to move towards or away from good health”

Instead of looking at an obstacle which stops our planned health action as a block to our progress, we can instead look at it as a choice point. We could choose to address the obstacle and then move on to the next task on our list skipping any health action. At times this is necessary, but the lack of us taking any action moves us further away from our vision of good health. Or we have the choice to take a different health action by making a compromise of our initial plan.

Because good health is a game of consistency, those imperfect health actions slowly add up to improving our health trajectory compared to skipping straight to the next task.

A helpful framework to navigate these choice points healthfully is to set yourself F.R.E.E. from the trap of all or nothing thinking. Following these four steps helps you to take perfectly imperfect health actions.

Flexibility

Flexibility instead of rigidity

When we have a great plan we often want to rigidly stick to it. When we are squeezed, rigidly holding our plan does not align with our current reality. Flexibility is being OK to change our plans. We must be flexible to move around obstacles that are placed in our path rather than rigidly butting up against them.

Realistic

Realistic instead of Idealistic

When we make plans they tend to skew towards the idealistic end of the spectrum.  When our plans get squeezed, idealistic runs out of room pretty quickly. We need to come up with something realistic which will fit in the space that we have available.

It needs to be practical rather than optimal

Exciting

To get it done make it fun

The goal of navigating a choice point is to take a healthy action, even though it is not the one you had initially planned. You're much more likely to take action on an exciting opportunity than a dull one.

Ease

Navigate your choice points with Ease

Even when we have had the flexibility to come up with an exciting new plan that fits our current reality our action can still stall if we are too hard on ourselves. Beating ourselves up for not sticking to a plan uses up valuable resources we could be using taking healthy actions. Being easy on ourselves allows us the space to move forward with actio

After dropping the boy’s at Nana’s place I almost flagged exercise and went home for a shower before the meeting. Instead I managed to apply the FREE framework and take some perfectly imperfect health actions

F - I know I do better as a person after I’ve exercised, it usually doesn’t matter what type of exercise so I had the flexibility to alter my plan.

R - I came up with a couple of ideas that I could fit into the 25 minutes I did have (instead of the 50 minutes I had planned). It wasn’t ideal, but it would move my health in the right direction.

E - I picked the most exciting option. I enjoy going to the gym and had primed myself for it so I still went and did a modified workout. I walked in and 23 minutes later I walked out. I could have done some yoga at home (but wanted to be out of the house) or gone for a run (but it was raining and cold).

E - I went easy on myself. I’ve beaten myself up often enough to know that it hurts and tends to mean I have to exercise for longer to counteract feeling crappy about myself.

As you practise FREEing yourself up to make healthy imperfect choices when life doesn’t go to plan you slowly get better at it, just like training a muscle to lift something heavy.