Jim Hill: Welcome to “Weight Loss And…”, where we delve into the world of weight loss. I'm Jim Hill.

Holly Wyatt: And I'm Holly Wyatt. We're both dedicated to helping you lose weight, keep it off, and live your best life while you're doing it.

Jim Hill: Indeed, we now realize successful weight loss combines the science and art of medicine, knowing what to do and why you will do it.

Holly Wyatt: Yes, the “And” allows us to talk about all the other stuff that makes your journey so much bigger, better, and exciting.

Jim Hill: Ready for the “And” factor?

Holly Wyatt: Let's dive in.

Jim Hill: Here we go! Welcome to another episode of “Weight Loss And..” I'm Jim Hill along with Holly Wyatt. Holly, how do I stay motivated to lose weight?

Our listeners ask this question in several different ways. Oftentimes I hear, I know what to do, but how do I get the drive or the energy to do it? Another way of asking it is, how can I stick with my diet and exercise plan for more than a few days or weeks? And then how can I keep from quitting my diet plan? You got answers to these, Holly?

Holly Wyatt: I don't know if I have all the answers, but we hear these questions a lot, some form of this question. I would say questions about motivation, and how do I stay motivated are one of the top questions that I get.

We talk about the three big buckets. We talk about people asking, “Is their metabolism broken?” People ask, can it be easier? But that third bucket that I get is, how do I stay motivated? Long-term motivation is a common struggle for people.

Jim Hill: And I know oftentimes people want to focus on what to do, what to eat, how to exercise, but you got to do it. It only works if you do it. And motivation is part of what I know you and I consider mindset or mind state. And it's really important in the long term. If you don't have the motivation, it's very hard to stick with your lifestyle changes.

Even if your plan is a good one, it won't work unless you do it every day. And I think what we want people to understand is to understand where that motivation comes from and how people can have different types of motivation.

Holly Wyatt: I think you make a perfect point. People tend to focus their energy on what can I do. And we spend a lot of time even on this podcast talking about evidence-based, science-based what. But what you said is, if you don't do that, if you're not motivated to do it, then the best what, the most science evident that will work doesn't work because you don't have the energy to do it. So the idea is, I think you have to spend a lot of time on what you're going to do, but equally on this motivation topic. And people don't really spend as much time on it. I know as a physician, we're not trained even on how to help motivate people. We're trained on what to tell them to do, but we're not trained on how to motivate them.

Jim Hill: So I love it. And Polly, I hear that oftentimes people say, well, diet and exercise don't work. It has worked every time it's been done. It's not that diet and exercise don't work. It's that people don't stick with the diet and exercise program.

Holly Wyatt: So it needs equal attention, is I guess kind of the point. So that's a why, I think, for people to listen to this and realize they should think about this just as much as they think about what they're going to eat and how they're going to move and all that other stuff. So let's get started with what is motivation. I mean, motivation is kind of a term that's hard to define.

It's something that we don't really measure. We like things that we can see and measure, but we can't measure motivation in terms of pounds milligrams, or calories. There's no blood test you can take to say, whether is my motivation high or low.

Is it in the normal range? Motivation to me is like a feeling. It's almost an energy. And it is when you have it, right? You recognize that you're like, that's motivation. It's a feeling. And most people want more of it. And that's why they come to me and say, how do I stay motivated?

Can you give me more motivation? So you recognize it, but it's really hard to measure because it's a feeling. I also think of it as a kind of energy. I like to think of it as an energy that pushes you or allows you or prompts you really to get up early and go for a walk if that's what you're trying to do.

Or say no to that bag of chips or prioritize prepping some healthy food. It's that energy, that desire, that drive, that feeling that is associated with wanting to do something, wanting to make some changes. And when you have it, you feel good. It feels easy. And when you don't, you're struggling with making those changes by doing that stuff.

Jim Hill: I just happened to have here the scientific definition of motivation. I'm sure you're interested in this, Holly. Motivation is an internal state that propels individuals to engage in goal-directed behavior. It is a complex phenomenon and its precise definition is disputed. Now, that helps a lot.

Holly Wyatt: But I like what you just said, that internal state, something inside of you, a state, right? An emotional state, which means, that when we talk about states, states change. You can be in one state and then another state, so it fluctuates. And so an internal state and I think that does really kind of speak to motivation that propels you, pushes you forward in a goal-directed behavior.

So I like that definition a little bit. I think it's there. But I do think there are a lot of people disagreeing like always. It's not just that's not the only definition out there. So, Jim, how many different types of motivation? We're using motivation as a big term, but people divide it up. How many different types of motivation do you think exist?

Jim Hill: Hmm, Holly, I feel like you're trying to trick me on this one. I think whatever answer I give is going to be either the wrong answer or incomplete.

Holly Wyatt: Give it a try. Tell me what you think.

Jim Hill: Six.

Holly Wyatt: Do you think there are six types of motivation?

Jim Hill: I don't know. You tell me.

Holly Wyatt: So it was a little bit of a trick question. No matter what you said, you would be right. But I was setting you up for success, Jim.

I wasn't setting you up to fail. But people have diced and sliced motivation in different ways. So if you look it up, you're going to see people say there are two types. There are three types. There are five types. I'm sure there's someone out there that says there are six types, Jim. So you would be right.

I've seen 11 types. And so how you dice it and slice it and divide it, there's not just one way to do that.

You can divide it up in many, many different ways. So you answered the question correctly. And I think it kind of fits with the idea that there's not only one right answer, which we talk about so much.

Jim Hill: That's a big theme of what we've learned about weight management. If someone tells you there's one way to do it, go the other way. There's more than one way. And what we're trying to do is help you choose one that works for you. And there may be more than one that works for you. So you do have options, but it's important to know where your motivation is coming from.

Holly Wyatt: And there's, like I said, different ways. We're going to talk about a couple of ways to divide motivation, to think about motivation. And really, it's like, which one sits with you best? Thinking about motivation really may be the right answer for you. But I like to simplify it when I'm thinking about motivation when I'm coaching about motivation, and when I'm talking to people about increasing motivation are two big types or two big buckets. And then a lot of times all these other little types of motivation or other types of motivation will fit into one of these two big buckets.

And the first bucket that I want to talk about is something we call extrinsic motivation. And it's motivation or energy that's kind of outside of you. It describes all the types of motivation that are driven by external rewards. So motivation that may be driven by people or society, things that aren't internal, things that are outside of you that do drive or push your behavior, influence your behavior. External rewards are things that like money, you do something because you want to win a prize, or you're being paid for it or winning a competition. So you're doing it because you want that prize. Sometimes we do things because we don't want to be punished.

So it can go the other way. You can get a reward or there could be a punishment or a stick. I sometimes call it carrots or the good things and sticks are the bad things, but you might get punished. That's an external reward or punishment.

Others giving you compliments, those are things that may motivate you that are outside of you or fall into this external kind of reward bucket. And I talk to people when they're trying to lose weight, I say, how many of you have been motivated to lose weight because of a diet bet? There's something it's called diet bet. There's a big pot of money you sign up if you don't even know exactly how it works. But, if you lose a lot of weight, you get the money and it motivates a lot of people.

And that's an external kind of reward. How many people have shown up to a workout because other people were waiting for you? You're trying to work out and there's a whole group waiting for you or needing you to be there. That's an external thing. Or maybe you lost weight because another person wanted you to. So that was really about external motivators. So external rewards or pressure to do that behavior.

All behaviors, not just weight loss behaviors, can be motivated by external rewards or pressure. And one of the ones I was thinking about, I remember when I was in, I guess it's high school, we had tardies. And if you were late to class, you got a tardy. And if you got three tardies, then you were sent to the principal's office. And that was the kind of external pressure for kids to show up on time to class. Do you remember that, Jim? Did you have that?

Jim Hill: Oh, I was very compliant. I was always early. I would never have been late. So, it was a big motivation for me. I guess, Holly, thinking through other things you could think about for some people, maybe fear of speeding tickets. So you drive the speed limit for fear of speeding tickets.

And in all honesty, that probably doesn't motivate me. I tend to drive fast, but for a lot of people, it does. But other things, insurance companies reward you for good driving behavior. That's when I wish I could get more of a discount.

And I haven't had a speeding ticket in a while, so I'm doing better. Studying to get good grades motivates people. These grades are external rewards, and that's a pressure to stick with a certain sort of behavior.

Holly Wyatt: So external motivators or rewards typically focus on things that can be given to you or taken away from you by someone else and are usually not directly in your control. The behavior, you control the behavior, but getting something is something that someone else has decided is important to them.

It may not be important to you, but you don't want to get in trouble. So, therefore, you are doing the behavior for that reason, or you want the reward. And you can, like I said, you can think of it as rewards or punishments. And you can think of tons of them, right?

We have tons of those in place, and they impact behavior. So that's one bucket. And we'll come back to that. The second bucket that I want people to think about is something called intrinsic behavior. This is motivation or rewards that are driven by the inside of you. Internal rewards are things that are important to you uniquely. You think it's important and someone else may not. So it's not society or others.

It's about you. Things that motivate or energize you. Things like self-improvement. Sometimes you want to do something just because you want to improve yourself.

It's important to you. You help a friend because you want to. Not because of an external reward, not because you're being paid to do it, or you're getting a gold star if you do it or others are looking at you and praising you if you do it, but you just want to do it.

That's an internal reward. You want to help somebody that's a behavior because it feels good to you. Or learning a new skill because you value learning. These types of things are those internal motivations. So lots of times we are trying to think about what that internal motivation is. And people are motivated to lose weight because of internal rewards. Some people like to keep their promises. It feels good to keep their promises.

Or it's really fun to see the scale drop. They love that sense of accomplishment, or they exercise because of the way it makes them feel. They like how it feels, not because their doctor said they had to or not because their health insurance will be low if they exercise so many minutes a week. We see that with insurance companies sometimes because I just like the way it makes them feel inside. That would be an internal motivator. They're unique, and they come from inside of you. So why do you think about that, Jim?

The other thing though is you can see both internal and external kind of coming together. So I always talk about a person who works hard and shows up to work prepared every day because they want to make more money. And a person who works hard and shows up on time every day because they want to get a promotion because they want to grow and learn and be able to take on more responsibility because that's important to them.

Jim Hill: Ah, so growth and learning would be more of an internal reward and external. The raise, the extra money, would be an external reward.

Holly Wyatt: And so it's the same thing. You could see a little bit of both. You're showing up for work on time and doing your best and there are some external rewards to it and there are some internal rewards to it. I think both types can be helpful. So Jim, do you think there's one type of motivation now talking about this external and internal motivation that's better than the other? Is internal better?

Jim Hill: I think you probably need both, and I'm sure that's what you're going to tell us, Holly, that you need both. But I think sometimes people feel like unless it's internal, it's not good. And I think the external can be okay. It's okay to work hard with the expectation that you're going to get more money. So I don't think it's an either-or and I also suspect that at some point, one's going to be more important for you than the other, but that may change over time.

Holly Wyatt: Yes, exactly. And I do think we get in our heads, no, the intrinsic's a good motivation and the extrinsic's a bad motivation. And I don't think that's the case at all.

I think understanding the difference, what is external and understanding that and what are my internal motivators and understanding that is the best case and using both and understanding how to use both, I think is really where you really can have that consistent motivation over time, that they can work together. So what do you think about this? Should we continue? Do you think this is a good topic for people? It's one of those topics that's a little bit hard to talk about.

Jim Hill: I think it's important. Again, we talk a lot about what to do, but this is how you do it, how you stay with it. And what we know is that over the long term, so many people start a weight loss program, and they're successful, but they stop it and they regain it. And it's not necessarily that what they did was wrong, but they weren't able to stay with it. You and I have done research over the years to show that just about every diet works to lose weight if you stay with it. But the problem is that it's very hard for people to stay with these behavior changes.

So maybe a first step is just for people to be aware of where they are, to think about motivation maybe on a scale of where is your motivation? Is it a zero or is it a 10? Recognize where it is. And if it's a zero, you need to fuel the fire a little bit. You need to do something to up that motivation.

Holly Wyatt: Yes. I think the first step is awareness. And so many times people don't even put that in the equation. And so being aware and knowing that's important is that first step. And I like it, I think you used the word fire.

Jim Hill: I've heard you use that, Holly.

Holly Wyatt: So I like to think about motivation as a fire. I even call it a motivational fire. And, I like that terminology because a fire sometimes is burning hot and roaring. And sometimes it could be very low and can even go out, which I think is a nice analogy for motivation. Sometimes it's strong, and it's just you're on fire, right? You're moving toward it. There's nothing that can stop you. Sometimes it's getting weaker and sometimes it even is gone completely. So I think it's a great way to think about it.

I also love the first thing I do where is my motivation? Is it strong? Is it low? Is it there? Being aware of it. And even like the scale you said, zero, it's completely out. Then, it's an inferno.

Jim Hill: If you're at zero, you're probably in danger of not being able to stick with your plan.

Holly Wyatt: Yes. And I even want to talk about what you do when your fire is gone out. Because that's what happens. Your fire will go out at some point. So you want to have a plan. Can you restart your fire?

Jim Hill: So if we think about external motivation as a fire, then the question is, what makes a fire get better? Fuel or, you can pour gasoline on a fire and boom, it goes up. So in your analogy, Holly, fuel would be things like money or competition, carrots and sticks, carrots and sticks work, at least in the short term, pressure from other people.

So if you're on a team that depends on you. That could be fueled by your fire. One of the things I know you and I see a lot is people want to do something for an event. I have a wedding coming up.

I want to get in that dress, and I want to lose 10 pounds by next month. Maybe your spouse tells you to do it. That could be external pressure. Or you feel society's pressure to do it. Or oftentimes, your doctor says, Holly, you need to lose weight. Your health is in danger here. All of those really could be fueled by your external motivation.

Holly Wyatt: People come to me all the time and say, my doctor, my family practice doctor said I need to lose some weight. That's some external, extrinsic, outside your motivation. As I said, we want internal and external motivation. That's good.

You're right. I think of external motivators, all the things you talked about as gasoline. You've got your goals, and you want to start a fire. If you put gasoline on a fire, what happens?

Jim Hill: It burns quickly. Holly, I built a lot of fires in my life. The problem with using gasoline is you get the fire going in the short term, but not necessarily in the long term. It may flame up, but that may only last a short period. Is that true of external motivation?

Holly Wyatt: It is, but isn't it a great way if you're trying to start a fire? You have some gasoline. It is helpful as heck, right? It's not that it's a bad way to get a fire going, or even to have some of that for a fire. It's just you got to understand it. What you're saying is exactly true.

Those external motivators, your doctor, your spouse, rewards, and wanting to fit into a dress for an event, all are powerful. There's nothing wrong with them, but you're right. They're going to work for a short period and they're going to burn out. It's going to be a finite period. If you understand that, that's okay. You're going to realize you're not going to do this for the long term. It's not going to motivate you. It's not going to be the energy for your fire for the long term, but it could work for the short term. Then, Jim, we can add in internal fuel or internal motivators.

That's that internal piece. When I'm thinking of a fire, I'm thinking of those internal motivators, what's unique to you is being the coals of a fire, the source, the coals. That's kind of almost very different from gasoline. If you can get a hot bed of coals going in a fire, then you can keep that fire going for a long period.

Jim Hill: All right. Well, do you have to rely on one or the other or can there be a little bit of both, both internal and external going on?

Holly Wyatt: I think that the best way to have a fire is to have some gasoline, understand that in the short term. Use the gasoline to get a hot bed of coals, get those internal reasons your core values, why you want to do this, how achieving these goals is going to make you feel, what brings you joy and happiness, that internal stuff that's so strong, that needs to be there for that long term success.

But a lot of times having some external gasoline on it allows you to develop those coals. And so, absolutely, I think there can be an overlap and that's even a good thing. I think there can be even an example, maybe we could show is if you're on a team that may be external pressure, you don't want to let the team members down, but you could also value others on the team. There could be an internal core value for being on a team and helping others. And so you have both some external pressure I show up because of the team and that's outside myself. But I also show up because I love how it feels to help the team, that internal stuff.

Jim Hill: Okay, I'm getting into this fire analogy, Holly. You've got me excited about this. And we talked about things that can fuel the fire. What about the opposite? If you look at a fire, it can rain, and you can have all sorts of things that can dampen your fire. If we use that analogy for our behavior change, what are the things that might zap your motivation?

Holly Wyatt: And just like you brought up, you got to be aware of where and what your motivation is. You should also be aware of what things decrease at that prevention. Can you prevent your fire from going down low?

How can you protect it from things that may dampen it? So what do you think are some things that typically occur when you've maybe really motivated and then some things have happened that maybe decrease that motivation or put some water, on the fire for this example? What are some of the things that do that for you, Jim?

Jim Hill: Well, I'll give you one great example. I'd like to do these bike trips, particularly in Europe. The last one we went on was in Greece, and it was wonderful, but we were on a boat, and sleeping on the boat was terrible. And I could not perform. I would struggle to go up hills that I ordinarily could do, and it just wasn't motivating enough. And so I think lack of sleep may be something that can contribute to losing motivation.

Holly Wyatt: Me too. That lack of sleep, and then you just don't have that motivation or energy to do some of the behaviors. And with that kind of comes a lack of self-care, right? When you're not giving yourself self-care, sleep is some piece of self-care. For me, when I get, really busy, I mean, some of these kind of fit together. You're busy, you can't take care of yourself.

But when I'm just feeling overwhelmed and so busy, my motivation goes out the window for behavioral change for things that I need to do. I just don't have the bandwidth and that energy is zapped almost. My fire goes out. It's like a storm on my motivational fire.

Jim Hill: And people talk about, again, along those lines, stressed. I'm so stressed and I'm burned out. I'm just doing so many different things. I'm just not motivated to do the diet and the exercise.

Holly Wyatt: And so I think what puts water on your fire, what decreases your motivation, it's individual. You've got to kind of figure that out. But if you look back at times when your motivation has been at its lowest or has completely gone out, kind of be a detective and say kind of what was going on. I know that sometimes lack of control or autonomy or even procrastination can dampen a fire. But that's where you can be a little bit detective. And I like the idea though of prevention. Can you prevent that fire from going out?

Jim Hill: But what if it does go out, Holly? Are there ways to get it back?

Holly Wyatt: Yes. There are ways to get it back. And that's one of the things that I like to teach. How do you start your fire? Can you be a fire starter?

One thing I can guarantee, Jim, is your fire will go out at some point. It's going to rain. Expect it.

Know it. Don't think that even when your fire is going good, and you're like, people say, “I'm super motivated.” I'm like, “Okay, that's great.”

Let's use it. But realize it will not always be like that. So let's also learn how to start your motivation when it's really low, or it's completely out. Let's have some fire starter strategies. So I have some. Do you want to hear them?

Jim Hill: I would love to hear them.

Holly Wyatt: All right. So the first one, Jim, is what you started with is awareness. The first thing you've got to know that I need to restart my fire is I don't have a fire, and you'd think, ah, duh, but no, some people keep going, and they don't even realize my fire is out.

The first thing is my fire is out. There's not a test. There's not a blood test.

There's not a number. It's a feeling. And so if you're not used to understanding what that feeling is, if you're not aware, you might miss it. You want to recognize when your fire is out as quickly as possible and restart it as quickly as possible.

So awareness is first. And then what I always like to say is then I do what I call a mini reboot is you got to give yourself a little bit of time to reset that fire. You got to give yourself some time to say, okay, I'm going to start a little fire and I need to kind of protect it.

And I've got to have that time to do that. Next is to redefine your goal. Make sure that the goal you've set and the behaviors that are associated with that goal are aligned with you and are important to you. One of the biggest mistakes I see people make is they have ambiguous or misaligned goals. When your goals are vague, or you don't really, the goal isn't important to you. It's not aligned with who you are.

Very hard to start a fire. So, Jim, I know we've talked a lot about alignment and kind of the idea of this, you need to be aligned to be able to want to continue to do this, which is the motivation for any type of goal. So, I think that's a critical piece. Am I doing this goal? Is it important to me? Then I would say, we've got to put some gasoline on it.

So, you now say, yes, this is important to me. How do I get it started? What's the easiest way to get a fire started? Gasoline. It's going to take a little bit to get that internal motivation going again, but gasoline will work right away.

So, know what are some external motivators you can put on the fire and then really work on those goals after you get that external motivator going. And then protect the fire. Once you get it going, especially early, a new fire kind of needs that protection, make sure you're not allowing that rain to come in and get it. So, fire starting techniques, we actually could do a whole, we could probably do a whole show on that.

Jim Hill: I love that. I love that. And again, I think you and I have talked about the diet, the exercise, the mindset, all are important. And this whole episode has been on mindset. It's as important as what you eat and how you exercise.

Holly Wyatt: All right, Jim, it's time for me to ask one of our vulnerability questions. What do you do when your motivation is low or keep it going? What fuel source do you go to routinely? Give us an example.

Jim Hill: Okay, I'll give you an example of something that happened recently. I try to exercise every day. And I've told you before, the aerobic stuff, I love it. I can get on the bike. I can get on the elliptical. But as I'm getting older, I know I need to do the resistance, the weight-lifting stuff. But that's hard for me. So, my solution has been to get a trainer. Now, I know everything to do. But for me, having someone there walking me through it is great. Well, my trainer quit last week, two weeks ago. And it's like, holy cow, what do I do?

I'm trying to get another one. But in the meantime, it's like, well, I could skip it for a week or two. It wouldn't be that big a deal.

But here's what I know, Holly. If you haven't done the weight lifting for a while, and you do it, you get sore. And I went and did it myself because I didn't want to go through that getting sore again.

Holly Wyatt: So interesting, Jim. So, you use a trainer, it sounds like.

Jim Hill: That's my gasoline. That's my gasoline.

Holly Wyatt: It's your gasoline. And so then that gasoline was gone. So, you almost recognize that gasoline is leaving. I want to do something else. And so, you almost then said, “Okay, I don't want the stick (the soreness).”

I don't want the stick. So, I'm going to do it because the stick is the motivation for me. Exactly. That's a great example. And what good awareness on your part, right? You recognize what from the past and you kind of were able to think about it.

Jim Hill: I've been sore in the past. I don't want to do that again.

Holly Wyatt: Right. Experience. What I would say, Jim is also now thinking about how can you start to create some internal coals.

Jim Hill: So, I don't need a trainer? I like my gasoline on that one, Holly.

Holly Wyatt: So, you may always need a little bit of gasoline. But is there an internal reason why you want to do resistance training?

Jim Hill: No, there is. Because I want to be able to lift my suitcase in the overhead compartment and bring the groceries in. And that sort of thing as I get older.

Holly Wyatt: This is how I want to live my life. It's important to me that I have that functionality not be limited in any way. That's your coals, Jim. That's your internal motivator.

That will keep you going longer. So, what a perfect example of external and internal together. And one's not better than the other. The coach works. It keeps you going. I mean, that's external. That's great. But the coach went away. You were aware. You have to do something different.

Jim Hill: So, how about you, Holly? What do you do when your motivational fire goes out? Give me an example of that.

Holly Wyatt: So, I was just thinking about it. It happened. It's just happened recently. And I'm a runner. I usually like to run. But for some reason, I caught myself. I was like going home, and I was like, I have no desire, no energy to run. I'm like, it was completely out. All of a sudden, I was like, okay, my fire has gone completely out.

Normally, I'm pretty good. It's going strong. I have that desire, that internal desire, just desire in general to go out and run. And it was like nothing. So, I said, okay, I got to restart my motivation.

I recognized it. I have no motivation. I didn't beat myself up about it. I didn't get mad that my fire had gone out.

I said it's gone out. What do I need to do? I even tried that 10-minute rule that I sometimes use, right? Let me go try to run for 10 minutes. And, Jim, I ran for 10 minutes and said, nope, don't want to do it.

Don't want to do it. Came home. So, I'm like, my fire is out.

And so, I said, okay, I recognize it. I need to say, first off, is this a good goal for me? Do I want this goal? Do I like to be outrunning? And I said, yes, I want it.

It's important for my emotional health. I get my best ideas when I run. I'm so creative when I run. I feel connected when I run. So, I was like, “I want us to be running again.”

It's aligned with who I am. It's worth it. And then I said, I got to get some gasoline. I got to get some gasoline to get it going. So, interestingly, I signed up for two races that are coming up. I bought plane tickets.

Jim Hill: Ah, you've committed. You made yourself commit.

Holly Wyatt: I invited others to meet me there. So, now I've even got more, right? I can't show up. I got plane tickets I bought. I've got people meeting me there. I'm going to San Diego for one.

I'm going to Colfax and Denver for another race. Two of them coming up and I did something you did. I said I got to get a coach. I got to get someone who's going to be checking on me every week. Did you hit your mileage?

Did you go for your runs? All of its gasoline, all of its external. So, I just said, “I'm pouring a ton of gasoline on this fire.”

I needed a lot because mine was completely out. And now, what I'm trying to do as I'm running for these external reasons outside of me, I'm building my coals back up. Holly, why do you like to run? Why does it feel good?

I love that connection. I love the feeling of freedom when I go somewhere that I can run 10 miles. I love to be able to travel and do a race. I love the way it feels when I connect. And that's all unique to me.

Some of you may be saying, that doesn't sound good at all. It's because it's me. That's because it's an internal motivator. It's intrinsic and unique to me. Motivates only me. You have to find your ones. So, those may sound terrible to somebody else. And that's because they're internal to me.

Jim Hill: That's the key. Find what works for you.

Holly Wyatt: So, I can feel this motivation, fire, desire, and energy growing again. I can feel it. It's not an inferno, but I'm growing it. And I have some gasoline. And when that gasoline runs out, I'm going to be checking and making sure that internal motivation is still there. And I protected my fire. I said, “You know what? You need some dedicated time in your schedule to be able to go running. You can't be too busy or overwhelmed or too tired because that will put out your fire.”

Jim Hill: Holly, why don't you end the episode by giving us the pie on the plate for motivation?

Holly Wyatt: So, I think we've had a good amount of pie on the plate. Some specific things you can do. Just to review a couple of them. Be aware. Before you can make any changes, awareness always precedes action. So, be aware of your fire. Think of it that way.

Check in with yourself. Says, where is my motivation? Just like you plan and think about what you're going to eat. Just like you plan and think about, are you going to move?

Think about where my motivation is. Is it high? Is it medium? Is it low?

Is it completely gone? Right? So awareness is always first. And then, tend to your fire.

Just like your meal prep for your diet. Tend to your fire. Give it some fuel.

If you need to give it some gasoline, it's fine. That's good. Extrinsic motivators work. Know that they're usually short-term. So, be ready either to put more gasoline on or develop those coals. And as your fire is going, really think intrinsically. Why do you want to do this? Watch that private uniquely you reason why you want to hit this goal and therefore do these behaviors. And then lastly, I would say protect it from water, protect it from rain, and know how to restart it because it will go out, and it's not a biggie. Just practice how to restart it.

Jim Hill: I love it. Well, again, motivation is part of the mindset. Mindset is critical, along with what to do, it's how to do it, and how to think about it. This is the “and” part of weight loss, right? That you don't talk about a lot. So, thanks everybody for listening and joining us for our next episode of “Weight Loss And..”.

Holly Wyatt: Bye, everybody.

Jim Hill: And that's a wrap for today's episode of “Weight Loss And..”. We hope you enjoy diving into the world of weight loss with us.

Holly Wyatt: If you want to stay connected and continue exploring the “Ands” of weight loss, be sure to follow our podcast on your favorite platform.

Jim Hill: We'd also love to hear from you. Share your thoughts, questions, or topic suggestions by reaching out at [weightlossand.com](http://weightlossand.com/). Your feedback helps us tailor future episodes to your needs.

Holly Wyatt: And remember, the journey doesn't end here. Keep applying the knowledge and strategies you've learned and embrace the power of the and in your own weight loss journey.

Jim Hill: And that's a wrap for today's episode of “Weight Loss And…”, we hope you enjoy diving into the world of weight loss with us.

Holly Wyatt: If you want to stay connected and continue exploring the “Ands” of weight loss, be sure to follow our podcast on your favorite platform.

Jim Hill: We'd also love to hear from you. Share your thoughts, questions, or topic suggestions by reaching out at weightlossand.com. Your feedback helps us tailor future episodes to your needs.

Holly Wyatt: And remember, the journey doesn't end here. Keep applying the knowledge and strategies you've learned and embrace the power of the “And” in your own weight loss journey.