One part of my mission is for us to help move each other way from black-and-white thinking. I'm talking about how our beliefs evolve; where they typically start out, and how they change over time.

Why does that matter?

Because we all have opinions about food, fitness, form, stress, health, body weight, body image, success etc, but when black-and-white thinking is operating it is an action stopper. We say things like 'I need to workout, but I don't have the time/energy today'.

When was the last time you used 'but' in a sentence?

Usually, black and white thinking happens in the early stages of forming our beliefs, then we might grapple with some hard stuff, have some conflicting conversations, and with some more life experience, our beliefs can sometimes soften. We find it's not quite as black and white as we thought. I'm not saying this black-and-white stage is bad, in fact it's very possibly necessary as we journey along to building a strong foundation of belief around our health and fitness, and in life. It can help us discover our non-negotiables.

Nonetheless, I think with some more awareness we can still transform this stage of our beliefs. A strong, one-sided stance point isn't necessarily helpful. For instance, instead of the word 'but' being a barrier, how about we substitute for 'AND'?

With the word 'and' we can acknowledge the truth of both parts of the sentence, but we can also open up possibilities and solutions.

You can love your body AND want to change it.

You can push yourself to grow as a person AND still have self-compassion when things don't go well.

You can struggle with consistency AND succeed.

You can feel terrified, uncertain or not good enough AND pursue and accomplish remarkable things.

You can make a plan, not follow it, AND still benefit from having made the plan.

You can approach your goals realistically AND still dream big.

You can feel like there's no way it's going to happen AND still work towards making it happen.

This week, I invite you to think about all of the contradictions you believe in, and I ask you - are they truly contradictions? If you were to hold space for both being true, what could change?

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