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Introduction and Episode Overview
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Hello everybody. Welcome back to the UFFDA! Podcast. I'm Jordan Rudolph. And I'm Emily Morris. We are happy to be with you on season four, episode 40. And today we are talking, uh, we're answering, helping answer the question of how do I maintain results?
How do you maintain results? Mm-hmm. And we're gonna dive into a few different. Areas or viewpoints on this? Yeah. Uh, because we need to, and we'll, we'll hopefully uncover a piece that you can, you can identify for yourself, uh, and give you some action steps going forward to help make sure that you understand what this is, uh, as it pertains to you.
Mm. And this is kind of, uh, our answer I guess from our, from our standpoint, from a bias standpoint of working with thousands and thousands of people and, um, maybe giving you more of the insight of like the habits or the things that we see from the people that have the best success. For sure.
The Importance of Long-Term Maintenance
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Well, and it's only natural when we [00:01:00] think about changing some area of our life, right?
To get the results that we want to get. There's going to have to be change associated with that. So when we think about that. Oftentimes we neglect, or forego, or overlook maybe is the best word there, what the long term of this looks like. We're just so focused on the short term change that often that long term kind of gets lost in the process, if you will.
Um, we only think about then that maintaining, it becomes, and we've talked about this in previous episodes, of like maintenance being a goal as well. It becomes kind of the goal after the goal, if you will. So, so much energy can be focused into the initial change that often that overlook happens. When we start to talk about the maintenance side of things, we start to talk about the goal after the goal.
But if we can blend these two things together and we both. Get results that we [00:02:00] want to see with having some of that maintenance in mind with having some of that long-term outlook in mind, or a lot of that long-term outlook in mind. It can be just that much easier when we start to have to transition out of whatever we did in the short term to get the results that we wanted to see.
Yeah. I I, I hope that all made sense to, to the listener. You there? Um. Um, because there's a lot in that to unpack, but realizing like, it's not just about e even though we can focus on the here and now and what's the best thing I can do for me today right now, uh, and being present in that moment. It's, it's, you're doing yourself a massive dis disservice and thinking, like giving yourself either real or artificial deadlines of, uh, doing this.
Because what happens is, like anybody can do something super intense for a short amount of time. Hmm. And it's, and it's relative to the person, but we can go extreme. But what happens long [00:03:00] term is like, that's not the way to be sustainable. Mm-hmm. Like, you can't do that. This is where a lot of times these transformation challenges that are out there, or like even 75 hard, some things like that, like people fall in love with it, but then they, they, when they're done, they, they, there's like statistical research studies out there from.
Positive psychology and beyond, where people get depressed and unhappy, someone happy because they don't know mm-hmm. What's next? They, they put so much intensity, effort, effort and emphasis on the given said, like short term thing that they almost, uh, it, it, it disrupted their reality of their expectations a little bit of like what's after that?
Mm-hmm.
Mindset and Realistic Expectations
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And, and before we dive too much into that mindset and that focus and talking about goal pull. And horizons and goals. I think it's, it's fair for us to acknowledge too. Uh, two, two important things that I was thinking of when EM was talking or you were talking there. Em, uh, number one is, uh, when we, they're both mindset based, but [00:04:00] the first one is when we think, um, about, uh, said goal and, and obviously we're gonna use health and fitness as an example here.
We should, right? But when you think about said goal towards your health and fitness. Uh, we should be understanding, uh, of like what it takes to get there and understand, like be more realistic about things. Mm-hmm. And we can have checkpoints and we can have, uh, certain tests and retests and assessments and, and, and checkpoints that we can monitor our progress and helps us tweak and change, but.
What happens is people don't, they don't like that they think that they want to quick fix. They think that exactly what they should be doing should be working 'cause it worked for this person, worked for that person. I saw that it worked for social media. I saw that worked for that, but that's not the case.
Like you are an individual that has to have something. So, um, going through the mindset and having an understanding, the expectation, and then the other part of it was there, there is, it's much easier to maintain results than it is to try to get new [00:05:00] results. Mm-hmm. So when you learn how to maintain all of these results that you're after, it's actually much, much, much easier to do than, rather than trying to, to do something extreme all of the time.
Mm-hmm. Much easier. Yeah. But easy also doesn't mean simple. Right. Simple doesn't seem easy. Simple doesn't and easy. So I should, I should flip that around and think it's like simple. Mm-hmm. It's, it's, it's simpler to. Uh, maintain results than it's to try to always get new ones. Mm-hmm. Well, and when you're saying that right, we're using the word learn and it is a skill, right?
There is a new potential thing involved that we have to master. That we have to progress. So when we think of shifting gears. Into whatever change we want to make, right? If it is a short term, very high intensity, similar to a 75 hard, where we have to learn how to do all of these things, there is a learning curve there.
We just put ourselves under [00:06:00] a massive timeline and huge deadlines, barriers, rigid structure where it forces some of that external environment to change and make it. A little simpler. Definitely not easy to accomplish when we're talking maintenance, that learning phase of how to maintain. Becomes less rigid in a timeline structure and can then almost yield to, because there's no timeline.
Oh, there's freedom here. I don't have to be as structured. I don't have to be as rigid with my goals, with my, you know, the things that are required with my nutrition, with my training, right? Because I, I don't have a timeline anymore. So that relaxation piece can almost take over and get the best of us sometimes where.
When we are in that learning, like it is still a learning process, we're still learning. We should be approaching that maintenance with just as much rigor as a [00:07:00] lifestyle change because it. Is just as similar as a lifestyle change, just to a lesser degree. So we still have to hold ourselves to the standard of making sure we're doing the things to maintain the results that we got.
Right. And a little bit general, because it can apply to all sorts of health and fitness goals. Well, it's different for everybody. And that, and everybody's maintenance is different from everybody else too. Just like how they got there is gonna be different. Is different. Right. Yeah. So it, it's. Challenging then to speak in absolutes.
But if it's a nutrition habit, right, okay, cool. What does that nutrition habit look like for the long term? What do we need to do in order to maintain and giving ourselves the time and the space to practice that, to learn that so that it can be ingrained for the long term maintenance of our, of our goals for sure.
Or results for the results.
Specific Strategies for Maintaining Results
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Yeah, and, and maybe to help clear this up as some examples. If your goal is weight loss, which is technically fat loss, we do not want to just lose general [00:08:00] weight because that means we're most likely losing muscle. We do not want that. If you want sustainable results and for independence, uh, long-term success, we need to maintain our strength and muscle.
Uh, so fat loss and your goal is fat loss. What needs to be true? What We need to be in a caloric deficit. We need to be. Consuming less calories than our body is burning, which is individualized for everybody. But that's a, that's a specific right thing for the person. But a general rule of thumb, uh, the grams of protein should also be close to one gram per pound of body weight.
You heard that correctly? I know this still shocks people per pound of body weight. If your goal is fat loss. To help make sure, again, we're preserving muscle and promoting more fat loss and boosting your metabolism. Mm-hmm. Okay. So, and that is different from everybody because not everybody's the exact same weight.
So that's how we can get specific. And then, um, depending on where they're at in a, in an exercise standpoint or what they do for their lifestyle, somebody that's very active and [00:09:00] getting a lot of steps in is gonna have a very different type of prescription or. Um, specific habits from somebody who sits on a desk eight or nine hours a day.
Mm-hmm. Very, very, very different. But those things are all true from a general standpoint. Then we dive into the specifics. Uh, and, and, and another general, a very general one could be you should be eating more high quality food rather than like, quantity or like, people always sacrifice quality for convenience and we've been duped, tricked.
And, and, and, and everything in between. To think that convenience is the, is the thing that we should value most. Mm-hmm. We've, we've become more of a convenient life when we clicked on something. We want it back right away when we, when we searched for something now. And like, does anyone, anybody listening to this remember dial up internet?
Do you remember Dial? I do remember dial up internet. Yes. We had one computer in the living room you go through and we didn't really use it much, but Right. It was there go through the 60 seconds of Yeah. All the noises to get on and then. Click and then wait 10 seconds till the [00:10:00] next page loads. Mm-hmm.
Now, if something doesn't load in five seconds, four seconds, we're pissy. I am a hundred percent right. I hate slow internet. I'm checking, I'm checking wifi, I'm checking internet connection. I'm like, what's wrong with the phone? Right. All things, uh, but those are general things that from a quality standpoint versus convenience that we're looking into, uh, those are non-negotiables, I think.
I think one of the other things I was just thinking of there too, and I, I was gonna allude to this when I was talking about the two things that need to be true with. A maintenance is simpler than trying to always get new results. Um, a lot of people don't consider themself a quote unquote fit or healthy person.
They consider themselves something else. So when you go through a 75 hard, when you go through a transformation challenge, when you go through a 30 day why, or we're doing a drop two sizes program right now, um, which is all built on behaviors and healthy habits. Um. They don't consider themself a lean person, a fit person, a healthy person.
[00:11:00] So them even just considering that they're unconscious, there's, they're, they're unconsciously, their subconscious mind is already thinking mm-hmm. Everything that they're doing is against who they actually are. And you don't have to consider yourself when you think about the fit person. You don't have to look on Instagram and type in fit person or search for fit person and see everything on those images and on those, on those pages.
Fitness is a very, very broad thing, but everyone's got kind of like their ideals. Um, you don't have to look like that. You don't have to be like that. Like that person could have an eating disorder. That person could have been training and dieting for that specific moment to be in that specific video or post or picture for weeks, if not months, to get there, to take a thousand pictures in that.
Week or two timeframe just to have content for the rest of their life. But you have to understand like you can be a better person. You, you, there's a, there's a game that you have to, a [00:12:00] visualization, a, a process that you have to go through to tell yourself that. I think that's one of the biggest things that we see people, um, you know, like we can, we can, we can see friends training together.
We can see family training together. We, we, we've helped 'em all. But when we see the person having success long term over another person, it's oftentimes 'cause that per that person will say, oh well. He or she's so, she's so fit. Oh, she does everything so well. Like somewhere in their process of what they do in the day to day, they're telling themselves no, they're telling themselves that's not them.
So they shouldn't be, they, they're okay. It's okay to have the quick trip. It's okay to have the fast food. It's okay to settle for convenience. It's okay to skip my workout today. Mm-hmm. In their head, they're, they're, they're telling themselves like, yeah, you're not that fit. Right. You're not that healthy.
You don't need to do that. Well, and that's where all of those little seemingly little decisions add up over time. Mm-hmm. We're. Yeah, it is easy to say, ah, yeah, I can, you know, push my workout today. I have a busy day. I don't wanna go, you know, whatever, something came up, I can do it tomorrow. Right? But that one [00:13:00] decision then creates the cascade of you already gave yourself permission to do, to push your workout and miss the, miss the session.
Okay. What else are we giving ourselves permission to do that is going against the habits that we had instilled over that past period of time, or that. Are the habits we want to have. Over the course of the time you're telling your brain that, Hey, it's okay. We don't have to do this today. And those first moments where we start to see that slide start to see that trickle makes it all the more easy to have that continue to happen instead of.
Having that mindset of, no, this is the person I am, I am the person that gets my workout in. If I have to go in early, if I have to go in at a different time, whatever that, you know, flexibility. But there's still rigidity in some of that as well. You're still the person that gets their workout in and doesn't push it right.
For, again, the majority of the time there's always exceptions to the rule, but, and if we dive into that more, we can [00:14:00] unpack a few things.
The Role of Environment and Support Systems
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And one of it might be environmental. Mm-hmm. Like, like we've talked about in this show several times, 80% of your environment will dictate your decisions. We're not saying you have a poopy family or poopy friends, but maybe the people that you're hanging around with most aren't aligned with who you want to be.
So another thing that some of these individuals that maybe we're thinking about right now, they align themselves with people that are more so like them, or they attract that and they kind of create that with it too. Right? Like somebody. Who's quote unquote fit, lean, doesn't have to worry about fat loss, probably hangs out with people like that so that it doesn't feel like when you're going out to eat or going to somebody's house, they're like, oh God, you're doing that fitness thing again and you're looking at a person across from you that is high blood pressure.
Mm-hmm. Diabetes, pre-diabetic, like name the things. Mm-hmm. In chronic pain. Knee arthritis, like whatever, it's Right. Just go through the whole thing. Mm-hmm. So, uh, there, there, there, your input, your environment that's giving you input might [00:15:00] support you not having the lifestyle that you actually want or that you think you want, uh, type of thing.
And, and I'm not, again, not suggesting to get new friends and new family, but if you surround yourself with more of those people and realize what their habits are in doing that, like. Those people aren't going out and, uh, stopping at fast food multiple times if at all during the week. Mm-hmm. They're not, uh, having cocktails and, and drinks every night.
Like they're just not doing it Right. Um, and that's the part of it where you can kind of look at a little bit your, if your environment and, and ultimately then getting to the lifestyle thing, which I think is what we're ultimately gonna lead to here. Um. Outside of the topic that we need to discuss with our listeners of the moving goalpost.
Right. Well, and you're just saying about friends and family and, and people, some of the environment piece is. Literally your environment, what are you actually keeping around from a nutrition side? What are we keeping around the house? Are, are you ready to and [00:16:00] prepared with workout clothes that fit appropriately that you're, you know, happy to put on and go to the gym and get your workout in?
Right? So some of those pieces are the people and some of those people, some of those pieces, excuse me, are not the people. They are the actual things in your environment as well. So it kind of goes twofold, hand in hand when we talk from an environmental side and introduce. The things around us that will make us most successful in the long term to maintain.
Yeah. Yeah. And it's just places, it's just things to look at, to be aware of. What what'll happen is people will, backtracking just a moment here of, they'll think of it harder on themselves, like they're not good enough. Mm-hmm. They don't deserve, they didn't earn. And then when they start having those conversations or they never were a fit person, they'll never be a fit person.
I'm not a fit person, so why do I need to keep doing this like that? They, they're, they're, they're telling themselves a story that they decided to believe in and, and they decided that something had to be true at some [00:17:00] point for them to continue to follow up with that story. Mm-hmm. Or make a new one in their head.
And that can happen very quickly. We, we tend to complicate things very quickly and, uh, we tend to create and worry about things that. Uh, probably won't or never will, like, won't happen or never did happen. Mm-hmm. Right. We, we spend a lot of time and energy in that, so it's understanding a little bit more about yourself.
Uh, ultimately those people that we have worked with that continue to have these results are very aware of what's going on in their life. Uh, their understanding when they're going through very stressful situations and understanding what that stress does to their body. And, and how that cortisol can build up and, and really halt fat loss or halt.
Um, even just the body feeling good, like not all pain is physical pain. Like, there could be a lot of emotional and mental stress that's happening that creates a life of pain. Uh, it could be psychologically based [00:18:00] as well. Like there's a lot of things that build up into pain and, and can go through that.
Uh, and the, and the pain that I'm talking about is also physical pain in this circumstance, not just like a, an emotional pain. So there, there's a lot that goes into it and.
Embracing the Process and Lifestyle Changes
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We're not saying that everybody has to completely shift their mindset into becoming a quote unquote fit person, but I think there's some merit to taking a step back and figuring out who you want to be or what these goals are and why they matter, and looking at that person that you want to be like.
If you continue doing everything that you're doing right now that you're not happy with, like the things that are frustrating you, the things that you keep cycling through and yo-yoing with, and you continue that cycle for another year. Another two years, another three years. What type of person are you gonna be in a year, two years, three years, five years.
If you keep doing exactly the way things are going right now, because this is the cycle that people go in, they start focusing on their fears and their frustrations and all the things that they're [00:19:00] upset about and, and, and disappointing them and those all things, all of those things become a reality.
Mm-hmm. And, and then we see 'em where they wake up 20 years later and they're like, yeah, I'm up 60 pounds. I've got. I'm in pain here, chronic, low back, chronic knee, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Like the list goes on. Uh, all important, but just saving the time, yada, yada, yada, from that side of things. But this is what happens.
Like people wake up and they're like, yeah, I don't even know how this happened. I have no idea how I got 60 pounds heavier and, and so much pain. Mm-hmm. Well, I think a, a big piece of that is what you were just saying, like the awareness piece to that, and also the mindset piece to that as well, of just taking inventory.
Right now and answering that question that you just asked, like, what, what does this look like in a year? What does this look like in two years? If that's who you wanna be, awesome. Keep executing, continue on, we found it. Mm-hmm. If it's not, what needs to change? How does it need to change? What does it need to look like?
Yeah. Specifically. Yeah. And, [00:20:00] and as we kind of dive into this final straw, one of the final straws of this episode. One of the biggest ultimate, ultimately one of the biggest mistakes that we see our clients make is they put too much emphasis on, on, on a said deadline or date. Whether it's a, a wedding, a show, an event, the end of a competition, the end of a challenge, something like that.
And they don't think about like, what's the after, after, like, what's next? Mm-hmm. And we, we ultimately wanna look at it from the standpoint of. A goalpost. Like if you reach the goalpost, if you go through the goalpost, ultimately what happens with most people, and I know if racing and stuff like that has a goal, has a finish line, uh, but what's next?
Like, okay, I've achieved this, I've done this. What's next? What do I keep doing it? And, and they realize like, oh, they're not happy. Mm-hmm. Like these people, actually, again, positive psychology research shows that these people actually become quite unhappy with their lives and it leads to a downward spiral [00:21:00] very quickly.
So if we base everything on a specific goalpost and or if we're looking at our, our goals off often in the horizon, like we're never gonna catch the horizon, it's always gonna be moving from us. If somebody's chasing you down an alley with a knife in their hand and they come running after you, you're most likely going to do what?
You're gonna run away. Run away. So if you're chasing something in particular, it's always gonna feel like it's running away from you. This is what perfectionism does to people as well. Okay, so. One of the processes, processes I think that you should do is think more about the progress over perfection in falling and falling in love with a little bit more of the process itself, the journey of that.
There's a lot more that you can take home and be a and and, and be happy with and be proud of than it is to just get to this finish line and then wonder what's next. Then you completely revert back to your old self. Hmm. [00:22:00] You can, you can create this established, uh, established lifestyle, habit behaviors type of thing.
I know it's not the sexy answer that you wanted to hear of how to maintain results, but Emily will preach this in a moment too. I'm telling you, the people that have the results, the best results long term are those that are in love with this process and why it's so much easier for them to maintain it is because it becomes part of their lifestyle and they know what they need to do.
It's a little bit different for everybody, but there's a lot of similarities too, for sure. Well, and it becomes. Not only the, the, let's use working out, for example, the gym doesn't become, you know, that place. I go two times a week or three times a week, or four times a week, however often we go, but it, that place I go and then I go home and I don't really think about it.
It becomes, you are the person who goes to the gym, period. It doesn't matter how many times per week. So if life gets crazy, maybe it does look like two. If life gets crazy, maybe it does go like four [00:23:00] it, or life gets quiets down. It does look like a little bit more, whatever that looks like. Can then ebb and flow and fluctuate, and we're never on track or off track.
It's just the thing that happens. And the track sometimes looks a little bit different, but it never becomes as extreme as yes or no. It becomes all of the, you know, dials in between and all of the levels in between. Where it can be more, where it can be less sometimes. And it really depends on what life has going on in the moment.
It depends on. What the goals are at the moment, right? What are the, the short term things that we're looking to accomplish, and how can we enjoy those process along the way of reaching those things? Are we enjoying the workouts and the specific exercises we're focusing on, or the new recipes we're trying or whatever that might look like.
Like you were saying, Jordan looks a little bit different for every individual and looks a little bit different for every goal, but still that main. Part stays the same [00:24:00] in terms of it's the person you become the person that you want to be, and that person is the person that has all of the habits that you're trying to build along the way.
For sure. And that ultimately becomes this new version of yourself, this better version of yourself that you can be happy about and fall in love with, and understand that there's work to be done, but it's valuable work that you. Um, essentially fall in love, but, but you prioritize and, and you, and you understand that there's tremendous, uh, value and pr tremendous, like bang for your buck for it mm-hmm.
Is essentially what I'm getting to. It's worth, yeah. Worthwhile for sure. Well, and the worthwhile then allows for it to feel valuable. That allows for it to feel exciting and move the needle forward in whatever else you want to pursue as well. Mm-hmm. For sure. So.
Conclusion and Final Thoughts
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I think that about sums it up. As always, thank you guys so much for tuning into this week's episode of the UTA Podcast.
Share this with someone who you think will find it valuable. Leave us a rating, a review, subscribe. Download all the things that [00:25:00] help us to grow organically, and we'll catch you in the next episode. Bye everybody. Thanks everyone. I.
