How to Start and Maintain a Routine
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About the Show
On this episode, Chuck Gaidica is joined by Ann Marie Wakula, certified personal trainer and macro nutrition coach. Together, they discuss how to approach starting and maintain a new routine.
In this episode of A Healthier Michigan Podcast, we explore:
- How to track your progress and layout a plan
- How to use visual tracking to maintain motivation
- Strategies for getting back on track after experiencing a setback
Transcript
Chuck Gaidica:
Did you know it can take someone anywhere from 18 to 254 days to form a new habit. This is a Healthier Michigan podcast, episode 141. And coming up, we're going to discuss how to start and maintain a new routine.
Did you know it can take someone anywhere from 18 to 254 days to form a new habit. This is a Healthier Michigan podcast, episode 141. And coming up, we're going to discuss how to start and maintain a new routine.
Welcome to a Healthier Michigan podcast. It's a podcast that's dedicated to navigating how we can all improve our health and wellbeing through small, healthy habits we can start implementing. Right now I'm your host, Chuck Gaidica, and every other week we'll sit down with a certified expert and we discuss topics that cover fitness, nutrition a lot more. And on this episode, we're going in deep on ways we can well approach starting a new routine and how to navigate the pitfalls of maintaining one. With us today as a certified personal trainer, a macro nutrition coach, mom of three, have I got that right? Ann Marie Wakula.
Ann Marie Wakula:
Yes.
Chuck Gaidica:
Well, you're used to coaching all kinds of size people on how to get a new routine going, right?
Ann Marie Wakula:
I am, from kids all the way up to adults and beyond.
Chuck Gaidica:
Yeah. Well, you know, for a lot of us, this is maybe a discussion we would be having with each other around New Year's resolutions and whatever, but it does seem like that when we start a new routine, Ann Marie, it feels like it's only a matter of time until we kind of fall off the wagon. And that's not the usual suspects, maybe like diet or lifestyle change. It's all kinds of things. So we plan, we make schedules, we stay on top of a routine that we set in place, but the moment we have a little setback, it seems like things unravel. And then of course, once we're in that unraveling thing going downhill, it's sometimes harder to get back into a routine. Right?
Ann Marie Wakula:
Absolutely. So there are a lot of reasons why people struggle to follow new routines, lack of motivation being one of them. That's just having a hard time getting into the actual routine of it or feeling overwhelmed by goals or you're just not flexible with your routine. You put it in your calendar and you're being rigid, but you have life that happens. I feel like this conversation is coming at a really good time because a lot of people are getting back into a routine after coming off summer. So I think me as a parent, I think of milestones like when summer vacation is over and kids get back to school, I'm going to do X, Y, and Z or New Year's resolutions, right? I'm going to wait until January because... So we look at these big events in our lives and think when that routine is going to start or when it best fits our lives. So I started a new routine myself this week.
Chuck Gaidica:
Oh, what is that?
Ann Marie Wakula:
So it is centered around workouts. I do workout daily, but I can be kind of flexible with my time when my kids are not in school and I'm not driving them to and from activities. But now I can't. I have to be done with my workout by 7:30 every morning. So now I'm getting up and setting my alarm 5:15 and I'm starting that early morning. Yeah, early morning workout routine. But it's 5:15 because I need... Ann Marie needs to wake up and have a cup of coffee time. So I actually get started at 6:30, but I know exactly what starting a new routine is all about because I do it for myself.
Chuck Gaidica:
So with yourself and your family and then even somebody who you've coached or worked with, what do you see as the major roadblocks that are kind of a recurring theme? What pops up over and over again that can be helpful to all of us to sort of watch out for?
Ann Marie Wakula:
Wanting to change everything all at once. When you start a routine, you're like, "Okay, I want to drink more water. I want to work out five times a week. I want to get 10,000 steps in." So we're all thinking of that big picture and that sets you up for failure because it's really overwhelming. It's like, "Oh, gosh, now where do I start?" And then you become numb and you don't start at all, or you have a lot of negative self-talk when you don't actually live up to your own expectations.
Chuck Gaidica:
Oh, interesting. And you said you've used the word start a couple of times and it strikes me, we can't begin something if we don't start it. I mean, we talk about it a lot. We verbalize it, we visualize it, but really you've got to put one foot in front of the other and just get going, somehow jump into it.
Ann Marie Wakula:
I think the first thing that helps people get started is actually figuring out what their why is and what is motivating them to do X, Y, and Z. Is it your physical appearance? Do you have a goal in mind that's maybe a wedding or something that you're looking forward to that you want to get in shape for? Do you want to feel more confident? Do you want it to help with mental benefits? If you were talking working out specifically, do you want to increase your energy or longevity of life, disease prevention, social interaction, what exactly is your why for starting something new? And I think when we define our why, then we could say level of importance of all these big picture things, if you line them up, what is priority? What can I start with first?
Chuck Gaidica:
Well, then what's your why question? Simon Sinek asks it for all kinds of reasons, business and other things. But for me, in a grander sense, and maybe even more profound than I want to work out because I'm going... It's here comes summer, right? I'm going to the beach. I look at pictures of my family and I think, "Well, I'd like to be around." I mean, all of a sudden our kids are having kids, and I'm looking thinking, "Man, I'm trying to get my longevity as part of this health plan." And part of that for me has always been trying to offer myself some grace that I may fall off the wagon or have a little fun zone with some ice cream one day, but as long as I'm doing... If I miss that one of the five days, to your point, I still beat myself up a little bit, but I think, "Well, if I've got consistency, it's all going to come out in the long run as long as I'm sticking with some kind of routine," right?
Ann Marie Wakula:
Absolutely. And that's where, again, prioritizing, picking that one thing you want to start with, and then let's look at your week. So we take the big picture and we narrow it down to what can I do this week? And then you line up your activities for the week and say, "Okay, well, this weekend I have a social event on Friday, so I know that I can get in... My goal is five workouts, but I can realistically get in two." Just going two times versus zero times, or this can be for anything, it doesn't necessarily have to be for working out, but going two times is better than going on at all. And that over time all adds up to a complete transformation because you're being consistent.
Chuck Gaidica:
And there are certain routines that we want to establish and maintain. I'll give you a good example of my own. So as an adult, this was going back a few years, I decided I should learn how to play the piano. It is not my gifting. So I took a year of lessons, I established a weekly routine of lessons with somebody who's showing me what to do, and at the end of the year, I could play when the saints come marching in. And I thought, "Oh my gosh, it's just taking... Oh my gosh." So at some point when you have a routine and it's taking that long, and as a type A guy, I wanted to know how to play it tomorrow.
So for me, I had to pull the plug on that routine and I thought, "Well, there's a better use of my time to find joy, to find fulfillment." So that's a different kind of routine maybe than a workout where I don't want to pull the plug. I maybe want to adjust, but I think sometimes there is a routine that I've lived it where you do say, "I give up. It's just not my thing." And that's just the way it is.
Ann Marie Wakula:
And that's okay. You tried it, right?
Chuck Gaidica:
And I moved on.
Ann Marie Wakula:
Yeah. And you moved on. What was the next thing that you moved on to?
Chuck Gaidica:
Well, actually, funny enough, it was artistically inclined. It was painting. I had never painted things. And I don't mean like, oh, I'm a great house painter. I'm cheap. My wife says, "Man, you're the best price house painter around." But it's not that, I mean painting on canvas, and I'm actually not awful at it, but beauty is in the eye of the beholder. So for me, creating, gardening, painting, it's something I can see happen before my eyes. It didn't take a year of practice. I know it's a lifelong thing, but I just realized, "Well, I started to know thyself." I started to recognize I need to have some fulfillment immediately where I see something being created. And that alone was a great gift in an experiment in finding a routine.
Ann Marie Wakula:
I love that because you set different measurable goals. The end game, you looked at that a year away and you were like, "That's not for me. I want to make smaller milestones, shorter milestones." Whether it's going to be a week setting your expectations going, "Okay, it's going to take me a year to learn this song, but what can I do in a week or a month that's going to make me feel fulfilled like I'm reaching my goal and then at the end I know that this is the bigger picture?"
Chuck Gaidica:
Oh, after a year, I realized just get a piano that plays itself. I'm just telling you that's not my gifting. So it's just didn't worked out.
Ann Marie Wakula:
Hey, but you tried it. And a lot of people don't get started. Mine is the violin, and I haven't started the violin yet, but it's on my bucket list of things to do.
Chuck Gaidica:
Well, that's good. And you sound like you are also not only big on, but you practice personally, this idea of laying out a plan, calendar, put it in your phone so that you're getting reminders. Oh, time to do it.
Ann Marie Wakula:
Oh, absolutely. So first and foremost, I love, like I said, the calendar because I'm a very visual person and I keep a lot of things in my head and I need to write it out on paper. So I'll just go online and print out September's calendar and it will look blank. But that's how I start filling in all of the places that I can actually put myself in and what my goals are. So starting with that calendar, even if it's like, gosh, talking specifically too, we need something more to visualize, like drinking water, six glasses of water on that calendar. You can print those out on Etsy if that's your goal. And just marking it off, marking it off. So setting very small realistic goals on that calendar and getting it on there. So you've got an appointment with yourself. Very, very important.
Chuck Gaidica:
So let's go back just a hair to visual tracking, this idea of six glasses of water, whatever your goal for a routine is, right? What about visual tracking and rewards? How do they tie together and what's appropriate? Obviously, if you're trying to change your diet, having a pint of ice cream is maybe not the rewards you're after, but maybe, I don't know.
Ann Marie Wakula:
Maybe it is. I mean, there are people that may have ice cream every single night, but if you can go a week and not have ice cream and on Friday you're like, "You know what? When I get to Friday, I'm going to have an ice cream cone." That's a big deal. That's a really big deal. I see it a lot with glasses of wine. There's lots of moms that like to unwind with a glass of wine at the end of the night and they're like, "I don't want to do this anymore." Okay. Make tea Monday through Friday and Saturday have your glass of wine. It's those little things that get you through. For sure.
Chuck Gaidica:
I've got a buddy who's a metabolic specialist, a physician, and he phrases it as if you're going to change your diet, your lifestyle, all across the board, you need to allow yourself a 5% fun zone. You just need to.
Ann Marie Wakula:
Absolutely.
Chuck Gaidica:
I can just speak for myself, if I deny myself, we're coming into the season of apples, but if you deny yourself apple pie forever, you may wind up eating the whole apple pie. I'm speaking for myself.
Ann Marie Wakula:
You just took the words right out of my mouth. You end up having more and then feeling bad about yourself, like, "Oh, darn it, I've done all week. And now for me, it's daily. I have to have a piece of chocolate every day. So after lunch, I have my chocolate and I'm happy. If I don't do that for myself, I'm probably going to have a lot of cake on Saturday or a lot of chocolate on Saturday because I deprive myself through the whole week." So yeah, give yourself... I give 80/20. That's the rule that I follow, 80% clean and good, and then that 20% fun.
Chuck Gaidica:
But you know, in that fun area, if you're actually truthful about that 80%, you're waking up early, you've set this new routine for yourself, Ann Marie, and you're doing it and you've been consistent, that piece of chocolate in the afternoon or that glass of wine on a Friday, it really is kind of a drop in the bucket because your exercise, everything else is going up and you're kind of keeping that steady. It seems to me like it can, I've seen it in my own life, it just kind of filters away. You don't really see it materially.
Ann Marie Wakula:
You are so right. And you start feeling better too. If we're speaking about physical things, you start feeling better and then you're like, "I don't even really want to want that anymore." It just goes away. It's not as important. It's not a priority. You don't think about it all the time, and it's just balance. It's really balance.
Chuck Gaidica:
What about that piece of being self-critical? How do we break the bad records that can start to play in our mind, or we fell off the wagon, we're not doing the workouts we thought, and now it's been a week and it's easy to just say, "I'll skip another one." How do we get past that? And I know it's tied to a lot of deeper stuff like body image, et cetera, but we all go through those phases of being self-critical, don't we?
Ann Marie Wakula:
I think the biggest thing for that is reminding yourself where you've come from, where you started and where you are now, and then just start speaking to yourself in a more positive and encouraging tone. So looking at your accomplishments and your strengths and saying, "Okay, I've come this far, and yes, there's going to be setbacks." There's going to be life that happens, life events, vacations, there's always going to be something. Something's always going to come up. So when you reassess, I have my clients reassess at the beginning of the week, what did you do great last week, and what can you improve on? And then we get right back on. That's just picking yourself up and getting started again. And you may even realize in that self-assessment, I'm asking too much of myself right now in this time of my life. That doesn't mean that I can't do it, but maybe I need to assess the time or what I'm dedicating to this particular goal and then make adjustments from there.
Chuck Gaidica:
Well, you're living it, but as we go back to the back to school season, there is this timeframe where the beginning of that with three kids, four or five kids, in our case, you get swamped. So there may be places that you have to give and allow yourself to know that, well, in a week, I'll get back on it and we'll be fine.
Ann Marie Wakula:
Yes, absolutely. Just looking at this week in particular, I'm like, "Well, Mondays drop off. I'm taking pictures of my kids and going to breakfast with the moms. I'm not working out that day. That's okay. It's okay." And then you pick right back up again. Yeah, life and we often use that as an excuse. I'll wait until this, or when things slow down, I will. But there's always going to be something. That's why, like I said, the calendar, look at your week, plan for it and do the best that you can.
Chuck Gaidica:
So with these setbacks, have you found, even as you're coaching people, I've fallen off somehow, I've got a setback, what is the strategy? It's really easy to hear and maybe just as easy to say, "Well, just start again. I mean, just look at where you were a week ago and pick it up and let's go because we got stuff to do." But what do you do to counsel people about how to get them back from a setback?
Ann Marie Wakula:
Well, we start with self-compassion. I am a pretty compassionate coach, so I say, "Let's be kind to yourself, recognize what's going on with the setbacks," and then we put a game plan forward and reevaluate and adjust and starting small again. So there's a lot of people listening to this that work on their own. So listening to those two tips, and then like I said, starting small, starting small, that's huge. You don't want to go out the gate saying, "Oh, my doctor said I need to walk more, so I'm going to walk 10,000 steps." If you're only walking two, let's walk three and then maybe three weeks from now, we'll walk five. It's those small tangible goals, focusing on consistency and then visualizing the positive outcome of looking back at your why and visualizing what your life looks like a year from now if you follow through, what does your future self look like and how does that feel when you're looking at your future self?
Chuck Gaidica:
And we've discussed maybe sometimes we go down a path where we focus on all these bad things that can happen, but sometimes there's some of these great positives, right? I've started riding my bike and I discovered this trail, kind of rides along where the power lines are, but it's in this area. I've seen deer. I'm on wooden bridges. For me, the discovery of something new, I'm still riding a bike. It's still a bike ride, but I'm doing it for 12 miles, 14 miles now, and I'm just kind of going away. I'm drifting away. And I thought, "Wow, the power in the discovery of finding a new thing that really isn't that new. It's still a bike ride. I just discovered a new place to do it, it's super motivating.?
Ann Marie Wakula:
What do you enjoy about that? When you're on your bike ride and you're in that moment, what's motivating you? Is it the way that you feel or maybe being in nature, you kind of open your eyes up to all these other things around you?
Chuck Gaidica:
All of that stuff. It's the texture of the bridge. It's just being in nature. It's the idea that I'm breathing in deeply. Sometimes I am listening to a podcast to be fair. So that's what people can do with your episode here. But there are other times where I just turn it all off, I just want to hear or not hear anything. I just want to hear something quiet and peaceful and hear birds chirping. It's awesome.
Ann Marie Wakula:
Same for me. I went on a walk the other day and realized I had my earbuds in and they were silenced, and I had no sound, and I was enjoying everything around. Those are small wins. So that might not be a physical small win. That's actually a small win of enjoying your surrounding and taking in nature, and that feeling of energy that you're getting. Sometimes we think of these physical wins when there's all these other things. So really think deep when you're journaling at the end of the week on, what did I do last week that was great? What do I need to improve on and how do I feel? And how did that make me feel? A little bit deeper, deeper sense. That's a small win.
Chuck Gaidica:
Well, I think those are good ways for us to break some of these habits. As we wrap things up, do you have some great takeaways from this? Because you've had so much great stuff for us so far here.
Ann Marie Wakula:
Yeah, absolutely. So if you're ready to get started with something new, first, think of your why. Like we talked about in the beginning, why are you doing this? Whether it's to live a long healthy life, you need to be with people, mental health, personal change, stress relief, what is your why? And let that be your motivator. And then start small. So begin the routine and make it manageable so it's not overwhelming. Even if you think you can start a little bigger, just start smaller and work your way up so you have those milestones that you are achieving and it makes you feel really good, and like you want to keep doing it. Set your goals, make them clear, define them, make them measurable for your routine, and know what you're working towards so that it motivates you in that direction. And then we talked about the calendar, creating a schedule, looking at your week, figuring out when things can fit in, being realistic, knowing that life can happen, and giving yourself some grace to pick back up when things aren't going exactly as planned, and just keep going at it. Stay consistent.
Chuck Gaidica:
Well, all great advice. And I just want to ask you personally, when you get up at 5:15, would you work out for me just once or twice a week because there's no way? It's just-
Ann Marie Wakula:
I'll send you a text. "Hey, Chuck, I'm up. Let's get this done."
Chuck Gaidica:
That's great. Yeah, that's great. Well, it's good to see you. Thanks so much for all the wisdom.
Ann Marie Wakula:
Absolutely. I love being here. Thanks for having me.
Chuck Gaidica:
All right, take good care. Ann Marie Wakula, who's been with us, she's a certified personal trainer, a macro nutrition coach and coach for all of us now. We hope you enjoyed listening. Thanks for listening to a Healthier Michigan podcast. It's brought to you by Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan. If you like the show, you want to know more, we have a newly refreshed website. You can jump on and take a look at all kinds of additional content along with the podcast. Just go online to a healthiermichigan.org/podcast, or you can leave us a reviewer rating on Apple Podcast or Spotify.
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