Needless Needs

It's no secret that we all buy things we don’t really need. Things that just sort of sit around as a ‘just incase’ or a ‘one day’ item.

What? It was 50% off…

Yeah but it was 100% off if you didn’t buy it.

Sometimes the clutter of all our ‘things’ can distract us from the other things in our life that really do add value. The things that make us feel good and add meaning when we use, look at, spend time with, or wear.

This clutter occupies space in our homes, and can even possibly make you feel overwhelmed and cluttered in your thoughts.

I’m certainly not perfect, as I developed a shopping addiction (among other addictions) from a young age that I thought at the time helped acutely fill the emotional voids and traumas.

Now that I’m a little older I've had time to look in the revision mirror and see that this ‘stuff’ really didn’t fill any voids at all, (except those in my wardrobe) and really just distracted me from dealing with my circumstances and doing something meaningful or productive with my time.

Sure, these things acted as a momentary distraction and a very (very) short term pleasure of displaying a shiny new item on my finger, ear lobe or shelf, but this energy and the resources necessary for constant new ‘things’ was misplaced energy and added no real ‘meaning’ or progress.

I’m not here to lecture you on what you ‘need’ and how to best spend your money. I’m not even here to tell you how great it feels to get rid of your old ‘stuff’ or push you to donate it to Vinnies (although that’s not a bad idea =p )

What I am here to do is expose the similarities between hoarding ‘stuff’ and ‘ideas and habits’, and make clear how detrimental this can be.

Just like our old high school love letters that we hang onto, or that third bike that collects dust in the garage, hanging onto old ideas and habits that no longer serve us or add meaning to our lives can get in the way of new ideas and habits that can.

When we buy a new item or adopt a new habit, we don’t go through a ceremony in a white dress or suit in front of our family and friends where we vow to take care of it in sickness and in health.  

You don’t hold this item’s hand as you both awkwardly cut the first slice of an overpriced cake.

No.

You’ve made NO moral or legal commitment to any idea or habit.

Even if we don’t always get rid of the things we no longer need, we know we SHOULD and the same goes for an idea or habit that no longer serves us.   

And if you’ve mastered this and have been nailing adjusting or totally replacing old habits for better ones, good for you!

BUT

What happens when people adopt and let go of ideas and habits SO often that none have a chance to really give meaning make a positive impact?

If you’re reading this, it means you have access to a computer and the internet, and you have the interest and want to invest in your health, education and/or physique.

It also means that you also likely have FB, instagram, and who else knows what other forms of communication platforms.

With these platforms comes an unavoidable world of hundreds of businesses each day competing for your attention.

There’s skinny insta models and jacked up bodybuilders promoting all sorts of diets, training philosophies, ‘individualised’ nutrition plans (yeah right), detox teas, weight loss programs, active wear brands, supplements and so much more.

We rip our eyes away from our phones for a moment and we see ads on TV, on billboards, we hear it on the radio, in between songs on spotify and watch Joe Blow on Sunrise talk about how he lost 120 pounds by just eating white potato for a year.

No wonder people abandon ideas and habits so often to try new ones ….I’m dizzy just thinking about it!!

It’s no surprise then, that our attention spans are SHORT and that, so many of our clients have tried many diets before coming to us.

They try something for a small window of time, don’t really know how to track success or set realistic expectations, then move onto the next one because they don’t have their dream body within a couple weeks.

Sure, it might not be anyone's ‘fault’ that attention spans are so short, or that people jump from one thing to another in the quest for betterness, or even perfection, but it certainly is a skill we can work on.  

Social media can be a GREAT tool to keep us connected, up to date with our friends and maybe even current affairs. But it can also be VERY time consuming tool that can bombard us with misinformation and false promises from businesses trying to reach into your back pocket by playing on the things they know you want.

How EASY is it to sell a product using a sexualised image of a woman in a bikini that promises 10 pounds in 10 days.

No hard work. A click bait photo. Easy money for the company.

Isn’t that what I do as a Flex Success Coach?

Well… we don’t sell any products. We don’t set unrealistic expectations. We don’t gain followers or clients with over sexualised images. We sell knowledge through a coaching service that provides a client with the individualised plans they need to reach their goals. We hold those clients accountable to the work they have committed to do. We provide each client with learning exercises until they know how to go about their own nutrition and we are up front with the amount of work and the time it takes to get there in a sustainable and healthy way.

Not very sexy, right.

Who wants to buy that when you can buy that detox tea that promises you 10 pounds in 10 days?!

Take my money!

We do this because we don’t care what you can do in 10 days, we care what you can do for the next 10 weeks, 10 months and 10 years...

We don't sell sexy because we would rather sell the tools you need for long-term success. We can think of this endless barrage of weight loss products and 8 week challenges as all that excess ‘stuff’ we keep in our house.

That stuff that gets in the way of things that really add meaning and positive change.

That stuff takes up our most precious resource of all.

Our time

And

Our attention

If we are constantly jumping from one thing to the next in the hope that ‘this time it will be different’, then what we are really doing is distracting ourselves from putting those resources into something that will really illicit long term, sustainable, measurable, meaningful change.

So, where to now?

It's time to have a garage sale so that you can get rid of the habits etc. 

It’s time to have a garage sale for those ideas and habits that have you running around in circles, and replace those many items with a single, good quality, evidenced based system that will serve you for life.

Screw fads and quick fixes, when it results in long term disappointment.

Diet Smart. Not Hard. 

Coach Lizzy.