Stop Chasing Perfect

It's so easy to get caught up in everyone's social media highlight reel that we forget it really doesn't take much to make a difference in our day to day. With a little perspective shift, I can prove to you that you don't need the perfect routine or perfect anything to achieve your health goals.

While this will be particularly hard for you if you struggle with all-or-nothing mentality, I promise that with a little practice you can nail the art of imperfection.

Let me tell you a story to put this into perspective:

I have a client, let's call her Fiona (that's the name of my ficus, which I'm currently looking at). Fiona wants desperately to change her habits but she wants to change too much at once! She won't take any shortcuts, so she waits until the timing is perfect for her to change all her habits all at once and never deviate from them.

The problem is, the timing is never right and she spends years waiting for it to be. She has the following struggles:

• She believes only a 60-minute workout is "worth it" and if an hour isn't available, there is no point in doing a workout.

• Sugar-free foods only! Except almost everything has sugar added to it, and there's already a lot in the house that contains sugar. Might as well eat it all until it's gone.

• Meal prepping takes an entire weekend day, which she can't spare! Since the entire afternoon isn't available, she continues stopping off at fast food or convenience stores when she's out.

• She sleeps poorly! She's on her phone right up until she closes her eyes and scrolls on social media for an hour before getting out of bed on the weekend. But she's classified social media time as relaxation time so she doesn't replace it with a healthier behavior.

If I were meeting with Fiona, here's what my responses to her struggles would be:

• If you believe that the only workouts worth doing are an hour but you don't have an hour, then you end up working out for zero minutes per week.

If I could convince you to workout for 20 minutes a day, 6 days a week then by the end of the week you'd have done two full hours of exercise compared to zero minutes. Still feel like it's not worth it?

• Avoiding a single food or nutrient is a losing battle (unless you're allergic or sensitive, in which that case it would very much be winning). The best (and almost stupidest) advice I can give here is moderation. I know it sounds played out, but you can eat sweets in moderation. If you're nourished then you absolutely will be satisfied with a small treat. I truly believe nothing is off limits.

• Taking an entire day to meal prep is not for everyone, or even most of us. Your idea of meal prep can be going to the store to pick up bags of frozen vegetables, grain packets, prepped protein and bottled dressing or sauce. If it's between that or stopping at convenience stores, which one sounds better? And I bet you'd save time and money with the former.

I'm more of a fan of ingredient prep anyway - keeping things on hand that you can make different meals out of. Not making one meal to portion into five containers. You will likely be sick of this by day three anyway, and end up back at the convenience store.

• Scrolling on social media is not an acceptable form of self care. We tell ourselves we deserve time to zone out and do nothing, but I'd rather you stare at the wall. Turn your phone off every night, do something else, then turn it back on if you use it as your alarm or you need it in case of an emergency.

So now, Fiona is working out for two hours a week, buying already prepped food at the store so she doesn't have to, allowing herself to keep sweets around for when she wants them, and reading before bed instead of doom scrolling.

To you, her routine might not be perfect. But she's better off than she was before.

Also, perfect does not last.

My last point here is that perfection will not last. We will eventually rebel against anything inherently strict or restrictive. And if you're trying to achieve perfection and sacrificing other things or just not accepting when life gets in the way than at some point you're going to abandon it all, swing the other way, and find yourself right back where you started.

Have I convinced you?