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Although it’s fairly rare these days I must admit yesterday I woke up decidedly UN-fresh!

Previously I’ve spoken about the importance of the night before in your ideal fat burning day. And of course best practice set-up the night before is equally applicable to your ideal effective, efficient working day. Well, today’s podcast is for when your night before is decidedly UN-ideal. 

For the next time you find yourself a little low on sleep. Hung-over. Or with an unplanned day that is being wasted on unimportant tasks or frustrating fire-fighting. Let’s chat:

Damage control when you find yourself in an UN-ideal fat burning day!

Here are 5 steps to selvedge what you can of your day:

For fun I’m also going to get my rhyme on with the first 4 steps… ACE, PLACE, BASE and FACE!

One. It’s not an absolute right off!

Whether we’re talking food – and you’ve overindulged or perhaps efficiency – and it’s been an unproductive morning. Right now, is your chance to make a better decision regarding your next meal or your next task.

Never wait until tomorrow when you can take control back TODAY.

=> I’m all for zero excuses however Step One is not about being ACE! Adjusting your expectations to account for your current “state” is better than righting the whole day off. Lower the bar a tad if you have to and just take that next step.

• Maybe that’s going for a 20 minute walk rather than a 60 minute weights session?
• Perhaps it’s starting with your easiest work task rather than the more challenging one at the top of your list?
• It’s amazing how motion builds emotion and you might just get into the swing of it once you start. Even if you don’t, an easier something aways beats nothing.

Two. Quit the self indulgent behaviours that are making the situation worse.

You don’t need hot chips because you’re hung over. Or Oreos because you’ve got a tough proposal to write. Just like I don’t need 6 coffees because I’m tired. Let’s both grab a glass of water and I’ll see you soon for point 3!

First though here are several quotes / sayings I use on myself.

• Jim Rohn’s: “Don’t wish it was easier, wish you were better.”
• Ask yourself: “How do I want to feel at the end of today?”
• Acknowledge: Your action(s) today will guide your action(s) tomorrow. For better or worse.

=> Step two is about the PLACE you’re coming from. And NO, I don’t mean that shady pub you’re stumbling home from at 5am!

I mean the mindset you’re coming from. No matter what you inflicted upon your body last night TODAY has got to be about respect and support.

Bare with me here: One of my key health beliefs is that my body and I are a team.

Of course from time to time I might treat it with a little less respect than it deserves. However, and I’m pretty sure this is true for you too: Our bodies are incredibly forgiving.

The moment you decide that everything you do today about respecting, supporting and getting your body back on track for the rest of the day (or in a worst case scenario) for a fresh and efficient day tomorrow you’ll see a positive response.

Three. Set a timer to help you make a start.

My iPhone timer has got to be my most effective time management and productivity tool. Zero pressure to finish or get it perfect. Just begin a task (maybe exercise?) and stick with it till your timer goes off.

The more daunting the task the shorter period of time I recommend you set it for.

• A timer relieves the sense that you’re stuck for endless hours in a daunting or tedious task.
• It adds a sense of urgency and focus for that short, achievable period.
• I also find, with a timer running I’m less inclined to be swayed by distractions.

=> Step three is about starting your day with a positive BASE or foundation. 

In case you’re tempted to claim perfectionism as a reason to not make a start? It’s an excuse to do nothing. Rather than high standards perfectionism = zero standards. Because zero is exactly what gets done when you’re stuck waiting for perfect. Make a start. You can always improve on what you’ve done and the best feedback as to what needs fine tuning comes once you have something to build on.

Four. Learn from the experience.

Looking back on my most UN-ideal fat burning days, during and at the end of those UN-ideal days… I felt crap-o-la!

It’s not something I want to repeat. I feel AWESOME when I’m efficient and productive and that’s something I keep at the forefront of my mind when I’m tempted to trek off to time-wasting type activities.

=> Step four is a chance to FACE facts and mitigate the potential for damage next time.

Now I’m yet to meet the person who’s exclaimed: “I’m never drinking again!” who’s never had a drink again. Myself included. That’s cool. In defence of alcohol – I love it – and I’m a firm believer that vice is a normal even necessary part of life.

However, there are always lessons to be learnt and potential damage to be out planned next time.

Here’s an A-B-C of a few things I used to struggle with and now find a whole lot easier thanks to facing the facts and out-planning bicep-curl-to-mouth-me!

• a) Avoiding rubbish food is so much easier if you have a plan. Eat before you go out. Or have a meal easy to prepare for when you get home. Or at the very least know the better food takeaway option close to where you’re drinking.
• b) Be ok with being the odd one out. Even Contrary. You’ve got to be ok with being extraordinary unless you’re ok with the ordinary health results of the vast majority of people. Choose the vodka soda when everyone is sharing jugs of beer. Buy a bag of cashews when everyone is digging into hot chips.
• c) Create boundaries to help you succeed. This might be a drink limit. I have a certain number beyond which it tends to turn into a big night. Or maybe it’s a one drink the none water guideline. Possibly it’s time based – like curfew time – although you don’t want to encourage drinking faster! Talking of which maybe your boundary is NOT to drink in rounds… because, I’m not sure about you but in my circle of friends very often the round moves at the pace of the fastest drinker.

So for example I have a dear girlfriend and whenever I catch up with her I’m quickest on the first couple of drinks. So she ends up drinking faster. Then by drink 3, she’s found her flow. So I end up drinking faster. You can see where it’s heading right?

Thankfully we’ve both agreed on the magic number – that number to stop at because “Just one more!” and the night is going to get big!

Five. The absolute best advantage you can give yourself is to Back Yourself 100%.

To form and nurture the belief that you can be successful, in health or in whatever it is that is most important to you to succeed in right now and consistently into the future. Whatever YOU got up to last night, if you wake up feeling a little less than fresh you can 100% turn your day around.

In Backing Yourself and turning your day around, also consider: Are you more incentivised by the avoidance of pain or the promise of pleasure? 

Both are powerful motivators. They are your tools to use to propel you to take the steps you know you need to take.

For example: Thinking of skipping your walk before work? Short term you get to avoid the pain of dragging your tired body out of bed and into the cold and dark morning and enjoy the pleasure of rolling over and snuggling back under the covers again. For another 30 minutes anyway. However then you get to experience the pain of regret and disappointment in yourself – all day.

Perhaps you kid yourself that you’ll get that walk in after work tonight? You have that hanging over you all day and you know, that’ll you’ll likely just skip the walk again tonight and probably tomorrow too, because now NO-exercise is becoming a habit. Likely your food isn’t quite the great fuel it would have been once you start your day with NO-exercise and you feel guilty about that too all day.

WOW there’s a whole lot of pain as a result of that short 30 minutes of pleasure. I haven’t even touched on the medium and long term pain of not achieving your results and even more critically losing faith in your ability to stick with it and achieve your goal. Sacrificing your reputation with yourself. 

To recap those steps and did you pick up by rhyme for the first 4?!

One. It’s not an absolute right off!

Step one is not about being ACE! 

Two. Quit the self indulgent behaviours that are making the situation worse.

Step two is about the PLACE you’re coming from.

Three. Set a timer to help you make a start.

Step three about starting your day with a positive BASE or foundation.

Four. Learn from the experience.

Step four is a chance to FACE facts and mitigate the potential for damage next time.

Five. The absolute best advantage you can give yourself is to Back Yourself 100%.

To get actionable today, let’s go with step five and I’d like to dig in with the all encompassing notion of Backing Yourself both when you find yourself in and UN-ideal fat burning day and in fact, every single day.

How can you better Back Yourself or put another way, how can you have more certainty in YOU? For those of us that like the idea of certainly, in an ever changing unpredictable world it can be incredibly helpful to know that although you can’t have certainty in circumstances or what happens to you, you can always have certainly in your response. You can always have certainly in YOU.

Till then that’s it for today in Healthification. Thank you so very must for trusting me with your time and attention today. It means a lot.

The Healthification podcast is proudly bought to you by my FREE ‘Easy Vegan’ plan. It took me 25 years to transition from a meat eater to a happy, healthy Vegan! You can do it in just 3 days with my simplified ‘easy vegan’ plan!  Get the fit, strong, and healthy plant based body you deserve… while avoiding ALL the mistakes I made along the way!

Till next time, remember Creating a body and life you love is Freedom. (If this ex-carb queen, non genetically gifted, naturally uncoordinated vegan chick can do it – so can YOU!!!)

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