Stop blaming your kids…

“Barriers are designed to stop you; hurdles are designed to be overcome.”

I said this for the first time on this week’s podcast episode and it might be my favorite line/realization/analogy I’ve ever come up with.

I’ve been doing this long enough that I’ve heard of every reason in the world why someone is having a hard time getting in shape.

Last Thursday, 6 people gave me 6 different reasons that they’re struggling to stick to their plan.

Those reasons:

- work is busy (it’s always busy)

- kids sport schedules are crazy (this infuriates me - you signed them up)

- we’re going on vacation next week (not this week)

- we got back from vacation last week (also not this week)

- my kids are sick (kids are always sick)

- I’m a *insert astrological sign that I don’t remember* and *some planet I don’t recall* is (or isn’t, I don’t know) in *retrograde or something* (dead serious this happened)

These are all reasons that it’s hard. I get it. A lot of them, I experience too (not the retrograde thing - though I probably wouldn’t know it if I did 🤷🏻‍♂️)

And there are times when I wish it wasn’t so freaking hard.

But we stay stuck because we let those REASONS turn into EXCUSES.

We give ourselves permission to not keep the promises we made to ourselves and we blame our circumstances rather than taking responsibility.

And we don’t often recognize it, but the circumstance we often blame is our kids.

But it’s not their fault. They are kids and you chose to have them.

I’m not saying that it’s not hard to stay in shape as a parent; it is.

But that doesn’t mean that you get a pass just because you had kids.

If anything, it’s more important for you to do it because you have kids.

Remember the difference between barriers and hurdles? Kids are not a barrier to you taking care of your fitness, nutrition, and health.

Having kids is a hurdle and people can get really good at navigating hurdles (there’s literally an Olympic sport all about doing it really well).

But it doesn’t make any sense to blame the hurdle for being there in a race full of hurdles. We put them there and we signed up for the race.

So we need to stop trying to run the race as if the hurdles aren’t there and learn a pattern and system to consistently overcome them.

The race is different now, but that doesn’t mean we don’t need to run it.

Your kids aren’t stopping you from being in shape; they’re the reason you need to be.

To your health,

Jeff

P.s. If you’d like to hear me dig into this more, I talk about how to create those systems to “raise the floor” on our hardest days on this week’s podcast episode. You can check it out here.

P.p.s. Next week, I’m opening up slots for moms who’d like some help navigating the hurdles of staying in shape with kids. But, because you’re here, you can claim a spot early. I’m going to limit the number I take to make sure I can deliver the support needed, so, if that’s you, just reply “HURDLES” to this email and we can get started.