Change Academy

Most of us have a long list of things about our lives (or ourselves) that we would like to change. And while that is a great place to start, when you are working on creating a more fulfilling life, the problem is that when we try to make a bunch of changes at once, we end up changing nothing. That is why knowing what to focus on and when is essential. Key Takeaways: All goals feel and are important, and doing them in a particular order doesn’t mean you don’t value or will forget about the other goals.Focusing on one new behaviour at a time -- instead of trying to change everything at once -- can actually help you accomplish your goals more quickly.Cultivating the ability to prioritize and focus can help us with other aspects of our livesWhen choosing what to focus on, prioritize behaviours that you perceive to be impactful AND that you feel ready to tackle now. Lab Experiment: Make a list of all the changes that you’d like to make. Consider their potential impact and your readiness to do them.Choose no more than three to focus on and put all the others on hold - for now.Estimate how long you will need to focus on each one (in order to either accomplish it or create a solid habit.)Decide what the very first step for each one will be, including when/where/how you will take it--and then take that first step! Interested in having Monica present at your next live or virtual event?  Learn more. ★ Support this podcast ★

It's hard to keep believing that change is possible when all the evidence seems to point to the contrary. And that's why it's so important to collect some evidence that a different choice is possible.Takeaways: You can’t lie to yourself - you need evidence to convince your brain that this is true, possible and worth doing.Evidence can come internally or externally.It takes deliberate practice to collect enough evidence to make it stick. One success is unlikely to convince your inner skeptic.Habits that have good evidence behind them, gain momentum.Lab Experiment: Choose a behaviour or habit that you have struggled with but failed to change in the past. Those past failed attempts could be considered evidence that change is, in fact, not possible.Collect at least one piece of counter-evidence. This can be either an example of someone in a similar situation or (ideally) one time in which you actually succeeded in changing your long-standing behaviour.Think about how many pieces of counter-evidence you would need to collect in order to believe that you do, in fact, have the ability to change this pattern in a more lasting way.Then, start collecting (and counting!) that evidence. You may even find that it doesn’t take as many pieces of evidence as you thought to begin believing something new about yourself. Interested in having Monica present at your next live or virtual event?  Learn more. ★ Support this podcast ★

We humans like comfort. We believe that making ourselves comfortable is a good way to take care of ourselves and make ourselves feel content. But is this desire truly helpful or is it simply a way to keep ourselves stuck exactly where we are?Most of us place a certain value on being comfortable. And sometimes, something that is comfortable is very pleasurable (like putting on a favourite comfy sweater or connecting with an old friend). But often, it’s simply familiar (like the way your family celebrates holidays).By the same token, something that is uncomfortable at first, because it’s unfamiliar, may end up being very rewarding. But if we are unwilling to be uncomfortable, we’ll never find out.FOLLOW the Change Academy:Subscribe to the podcast (and leave a review/rating)Sign up for our newsletter at changeacademypodcast.com (and you’ll get a downloadable copy of each episode’s lab experiment)Connect with us on social @changeacpodDrop us a note about what you’re working on and how we can help Interested in having Monica present at your next live or virtual event?  Learn more. ★ Support this podcast ★

You have probably heard the term 'grit' thrown around but what does it actually mean? Our guest on this episode boils it down to “getting back up, one more time.”In this episode, Monica interviews guest Rebecca Louise, of the It Takes Grit podcast about why we feel stuck what it takes to get unstuck.Rebecca has helped millions of people improve their mindset and achieve their goals. The secret behind Rebecca’s success isn’t just her (as she says) cheeky British humour; people come to Rebecca because she’s shared many of the same experiences as them – so she knows what’s it’s like to feel lost, unable to find the right career, be broke, divorced, and struggle with an unhelpful relationship with food. It wasn’t until Rebecca changed her mindset and started to become the master of her habits that she was able o truly find her way to a career that she loved and a lifestyle that matched. Key Takeaways: The only way you can fail at something is if you quit.Instead of saying that you are stuck, admit to yourself that you have stopped and then find a way to get going again.Action creates motivation, not the other way around.If we are so locked to our identities as someone who defined by their past or in need of fixing, we will find it hard to make change. Don’t take advice from someone you wouldn’t trade places with. And then make sure you actually follow their advice.Lab Experiment: Think about the last time you asked for help, heard some good advice on a podcast, or found some helpful knowledge in a book you read.Then think about whether or not you actually took action based on what you learned.If the answer is “no” or even “sort of,” see if you can identify why you didn’t take action. Was it because you are too tied to your identity as someone who is X, Y or Z? Is it because you were scared that it actually might work? Or did you think it was going to take too much effort?Learning how to do this type of introspection can help you avoid that stuck feeling and help you become the curious experimenter that we all want to be. Resources and Links: Resources and Links: It Takes Grit podcast episode:  How to get unstuckRebeccas's new book, It Takes Grit Interested in having Monica present at your next live or virtual event?  Learn more. ★ Support this podcast ★

What are the pros and cons of using rewards vs. consequences as our compelling reason to change?Sometimes our compelling reason is a positive vision of a future we want to create. But other times it’s a negative vision of a future we want to avoid. Is one better at keeping us on the path toward our ideal self more than the other? Key Takeaways: There is no clear winner or wrong way to do this. Just knowing the difference and trying each on for size is important.No matter which version you feel works best for you, make sure you develop a clear and detailed picture of the Reward or the Consequence.Be aware of the language that you choose when you are working on developing or solidifying a behaviour.Performing an action is often more achievable than not performing one.Lab Experiment: State your compelling reason (or your Why) for making the change you want to make and pay attention to whether it is based around a reward or consequence. Before you lock it in, turn it around and see if you can restate it as the opposite. Give each version time to breathe and then consider which one feels more motivating, calming, satisfying or doable in the long run.Resources: The Savvy Psychologist:  How to Overcome Feelings of Shame.Harvard Business Review:  What Motivates Employees More: Rewards or Punishments? Interested in having Monica present at your next live or virtual event?  Learn more. ★ Support this podcast ★

In this episode, we talk about impulse control and how giving in to unplanned urges can get in the way of achieving lasting change. Not only that, but it can rob us of the pleasure of anticipating and maximizing an indulgence.Main takeaways:It’s not about deprivation. We are not suggesting that we live without pleasure.  In fact, we are suggesting the opposite!Impulse indulgences are usually much less pleasurable than the ones we would plan and choose.Remember the minimum effective dose. You don’t have to blow the entire afternoon off of work, eat the entire pie, drink the whole bottle, purchase everything in your Amazon shopping cart in order to not feel deprived. Interested in having Monica present at your next live or virtual event?  Learn more. ★ Support this podcast ★

In this episode, we discuss why our past failures (or successes) don't predict our future successes (or failures). Then, more importantly, we get into how to dismantle that idea so you can clear a path for future change and growth.There is a tension between using our past to our advantage while also not getting stuck in it. And striking that balance is tricky. Cutting ourselves completely free from our past is not the goal - but learning to use our past thoughtfully, can be. Key Takeaways: Our past does not define who we are or predict our future results- unless we fail to learn from our missteps and continue taking the same actions.If we allow our past to stop us from taking action we will never make progress.Accept the idea that we can and do change, whether it is a purposeful change or just a side effect of time, we are not the same person we were in the past.Once we let go of the past, we no longer have to feel the need to fix ourselves - we can simply commit to a journey of self-improvement, where we work on being a better version of ourselves each day.Lab Experiment: An exercise to explore the ways in which your thoughts about your past may be informing or perhaps limiting your futureWrite a paragraph describing yourself and your life as it was five years ago. Jot down where you lived, what you were doing, your relationships. Try to remember what dreams you had or the goals you were working toward, any major successes or failures that preceded that period of your life. And finally, see if you can remember what you believed about yourself then. What did you think was possible or impossible for you? What did you see as your greatest strengths and weaknesses?Now write a paragraph describing yourself and your life as it is now. Your current circumstances, occupation, relationships, dreams, goals. What major successes and failures have you experienced this year. What do you believe about yourself now? What do you think is possible or impossible today? What do you see as your greatest strengths and weaknesses today?And now compare these two versions. How do you feel about what you see? Are you surprised to realize how much has or hasn’t changed? Did you fail or succeed in any new or interesting ways? Are you holding on to dreams, goals, beliefs that are no longer relevant or true?Finally, write a paragraph describing yourself and your life as you’d like it to be in 5 years. What goals would you like to have achieved? What failures might you need to experience in order to reach them? What would you like to believe about yourself five years from now? What would you like your greatest strengths to be? Interested in having Monica present at your next live or virtual event?  Learn more. ★ Support this podcast ★

The truth is that every time we give ourselves an excuse to quit, we get better at quitting. But every time we don’t quit, we get better at pushing through. So, both quitting and not quitting can become a habit. And an identity.Reasons we quit :Not seeing benefits.Fatigue and anticipation of future fatiguePerfectionism (all or nothing thinking)Success would move us out of our comfort zone.Lab Experiment: Let's do some reverse engineering. Think back to the last time you quit or gave up on a new hobby, task, job, goal, or whatever.Once you have it in mind take a deep look at two things:Was this a potentially beneficial activity? If you had continued to do this thing, how would your life look in 2 weeks, 2 months or 2 years from now? — If the answer is “not that different” then choose a different activity.Why did you give up on it? Were you not seeing benefits, were you bored or tired of it, did you feel like you were running out of willpower, were you not able to execute it the way you had imagined, did your perfectionist side creep out, or were you frightened of what your life might look like if you succeeded?Now, once you have zeroed in on one (or maybe more) of the reasons for why you quit, can you figure out how you might be able to remove some of the roadblocks to make it easier and more likely that you will succeed next time? Resources: Make “no quit” Your New Habit (Brock's Weighless LIfe blog post)The central governor model of exercise regulation (National Library of Medicine paper)Which wolf with you Feed story  Interested in having Monica present at your next live or virtual event?  Learn more. ★ Support this podcast ★

In this episode, we look at our beliefs and how deeply they affect both the choices we make in life and how we react to situations.Here is a bit of a spoiler: As we go through life, we may need to periodically reexamine our beliefs to make sure they still serve us. Interested in having Monica present at your next live or virtual event?  Learn more. ★ Support this podcast ★

This is an approach we developed to help people in our Weighless program create sustainable weight loss but this process can be applied to any change that you want to make in your life. In this episode, we explain how it works.Key Takeaways:You really need all three of these to make change sustainable. All the awareness in the world doesn't create change until you form a concrete intention. And intentions are nothing without action. And taking action without paying attention tends to fizzle out.When you learn to harness all three of these functions, there's almost nothing you can't do.Lab Experiment:If you are trying to change something or develop a new habit and it just won't stick: think about which part of the cycle you might be neglecting and ee if you can close the loop. Interested in having Monica present at your next live or virtual event?  Learn more. ★ Support this podcast ★