When good motivators go bad

We’ve all been there, sitting on the fence, we know our daily health and fitness regime is waiting, but we just can’t seem to motivate ourselves from being bad; so what’s a good girl to do?

For me, finding motivators can be as easy as connecting with friends and in hopes that somebody, anybody, is willing to push me off the rails and into my routine once again.

When life gets busy, which is a common occurrence, it happens to me all the time and I know which group I should visit to get just that push. There are people I know will be talking about their daily workouts and health habits, they are enviously consistent, perhaps that is why they have been in my life for so many years.

Whether it be in real life (IRL) friends or virtual, we all need that motivation at times to get us over our daily hurdles, both in fitness and our own nutrition; or just general well-being. We motivators cluster together, not because we are clicky, but because:

We need each other like a train needs an engine, for momentum..

What happens when good motivators go bad, when you show up a tried and true hangout and nobody is pushing through? When  your tried and true group is hosting the discussion is about desserts, cookies, cakes, and pies with no fitness in sight? When the group conversation takes that turn that has happened to many social groups, when the conversations laughingly turns to comments like:

Untrueisms about calories eaten:

• When tasting batter, calories don’t count,
• While standing or cooking calories don’t count,
• From other people’s plates calories don’t count,
• Smoothing out uneven edges of food calories don’t count,
• Finishing the food off your children’s plates don’t count,
• If food doesn’t taste good the calories don’t count,
• Size does matter: anything less than a square inch doesn’t count either,
• Eating with your opposite hand has no calories,
• Foods bought for charity like girls scout cookies or that cute neighbor kid with the $8 chocolate doesn’t count,
• Foods on tooth picks or cakes with writing don’t count either,

As you can see the list of “special circumstances” for negating calorie intakes of some of the most calories dense foods can be high when in social groups; this accelerates during holidays. It seems that there is a bit of camaraderie and fun to be had when standing around the social buffet, we’ve all been there, done that social pressure overeating.

How do you navigate around the social pressures of overlooking your workout and, seemingly, being pressured into over consuming calorie dense foods in lieu of exercise?

You can be the strong in the moment,  it might not make you the popular girl in the room, but someone needs to right the ship and  get things moving in the right direction.

I’ve laughed along with the group and then added that I was going to first get my workout done, then settle down to a nice well rounded meal. The room will do a collective groan perhaps, they’ll call you a party pooper.

Quietly, they’ll all be glad that someone stood their ground and decided to get the group back on track and backed away from the buffet table.

How do you handle the social pressures to over-consume, or forgo your workout?

Do you have a social group that you use for motivation; or a few?