Keto Mom here!
It is often easy to blame parents and the environment or how you grew up. The majority of the things that you do throughout your day, whether you like it or not, we're learned and imitated by your family or the people that you are around or the way that you were raised. Even now, if you've been working in the same environment for years, you've picked up on people's habits, the way that people talk and the way that they do things naturally without even knowing it. That's how a habit is formed, that's how you learn things, you imitate others. And when you're around the same people, you pick up each other's habits, good or bad.
Points to Ponder
02:24 "You don't rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your systems"
03:10 Your systems are your habits
04:12 The role of family and friends in shaping your habits
05:55 How things are learned
07:18 You don't want to be by yourself
08:13 The grandma story
09:34 Habits have been formed
10:36 We imitate
11:44 Join a group of people that are already doing it
12:46 Accountability
14:48 Imitate the Powerful
16:22 The normal behavior of the tribe often overpowers the desire of the individual
Full Episode Transcript
Good morning! Welcome to the Keto Mom page, we are talking about your environment, the habits that you have, and how those have been created. So, as you're tuning in, we are reading the "Atomic Habits" by James Clear, every single morning. The goal is to create systems in your life, to help you sustain the lifestyle that you want. Or just to create the lifestyle you want, and keep it there. Not binge eating or binge dieting, reaching a goal and then giving up or falling off track and coming back in a year and restarting. We want to eliminate the start of goal accomplishment, if you accomplish it, and then the fall off and restarting again.
It's just this vicious cycle which I hear often, because most of the time people set a goal, they go after swimsuit season, vacation season, wedding season, whatever it is. They go after that, with full force without creating systems in place, so after they accomplish the goal they go back to their old habits and old ways of eating.
Thus gaining the weight back and starting all over again, and we are working on eliminating that. We're doing that by diving into books, reading and understanding why we do what we do. So we're on chapter nine, if you are brand new, post new below because I'd love to chat with you. Understand what your goals are, and why are you on the Keto Mom page. If you're not brand new, we've been doing this for a little while, going through books every single day.
We went through the book, The "Miracle Morning" by Hal Elrod and if you're doing the 30 day challenge, I believe we are on day nine. How's it working for you? If you've never read the book, go get it. It's super powerful, it's a small read, easy read, let's just say simple. Things can be simple, but not easy. It's a simple read and a simple concept if you put it into place. So the basis of this book "Atomic Habits" is this one phrase. If you don't have it written down, I would write it down, I would have it on your fridge, or somewhere where you can just remember the idea of a system and a habit.
This is what James clear says "You don't rise to the level of your goals, you fall to the level of your systems".
We have a goal, most of you here want fat loss or most of you want to feel better. I'm going to guess 90% of you set a new year's resolution this year. My question is, are you still working towards your New Year's resolution? Everybody can set goals, everybody probably has some type of goal, but you fall to the level of your systems. The systems are what's in between you're today, so we've got today, and you've got the goal. What's in between is your systems, these are your habits, or the things that you need to get to the goal. And if you don't have those, you might accomplish the goal that you want. Maybe it's losing twenty pounds, or whatever it is. But if you did not create the system, then you and I probably have been chatting about how you lost the weight, then gained it back and then lost the weight and I gained it back. Because you didn't have the systems in place to keep you going, which is part of creating a life style. So where are you tuning in from? I'm tuning in from Minnesota, I love Minnesota. We moved back here almost a year ago in July, we've lived in many states in this country. We've actually been blessed to travel the world. But I will always and forever, love Minnesota. Don't mind the snow, it's beautiful out right now. If you follow along every single day, or diving into chapter nine, that title of the chapter is "The role of family and friends in shaping your habits".
You might not even think about this, or maybe you do, but it is often easy to blame parents and the environment or how you grew up. The majority of the things that you do throughout your day, whether you like it or not, we're learned and imitated by your family or the people that you were around or the way that you were raised. Even now if you've been working in the same environment for years, you've picked up on people's habits, the way that people talk and the way that they do things naturally without even knowing it.
When we moved back to Minnesota last year, we joined a new church, and with that came new friendships. We've created a really great bond between some incredible families. We laugh together, and we're together every weekend. Our kids have started imitating each other, in fact, our oldest daughter said,
"Mom, all of you moms have learned how we talk"...
And we have started talking the same, we've been using the same phrases, and we joke about it. So when one of us says something, we'll laugh every time, because we've all imitated each other's verbiage. Naturally, we've been hanging out for almost six months. And if you see each other every weekend, and the kids are together, you pick up on things. That's how a habit is formed, that's how you learn things, you imitate others. And when you're around the same people, you pick up each other's habits, good or bad. So this is how we started off, he's told an incredible story. I wish I could redo the entire thing, but I can't. He told a great story about how things are learned if you put the proper education in place. He says humans are herd animals, if you've read the book "Rhinoceros Success" by Scott Alexander, it's one of the books that I send out. Anybody that usually joins our team, gets one of two books, and I ran out, but one of the books is "Rhinoceros Success" by Scott Alexander. He says you're either a cow or a rhino. A cow travels in a herd, and likes to be among other cows. A cow loves to feel longed and does not stand out. A cow is wallowing in other cows poo with the head down and does not want to be outside of its comfort zone. A Rhino is the opposite. A rhino has thick skin, and is charging after things that they want. A Rhino goes after things, whether it's uncomfortable or not.
So James Clear says, humans naturally want to be a part of a group. We want to fit in to bond with each other, to earn respect and approval. We don't want to have to feel like we have to survive all by ourselves. He says this, here's a common quote you might hear "The lone wolf dies, but the pack survives"...
You don't want to be by yourself, so naturally, you gravitate towards people that are around you and you naturally take on the habits that they have. So when you're raised in your home, whether your home was good or bad, your environment was good or bad, you took on those habits. You could probably look at your life right now and say, here's why I eat this way. Here's why I work out or I don't work out, here's why I read or I don't read. You could look at the things that you want to achieve, some of the habits that you have, or look back and say my mom or my dad did that.
We joke about it all the time, the way that I talk, the things that I do in my home, or I did something and realized that I was totally my mother. I heard a story once, I think it was from Pastor Steven Furtick. He has an incredible church called Elevation church. He told a story once about his grandma, he was in charge of making the ham. I think it was him or his wife, for one of the holidays. And whoever was making the ham, whether it was him or his wife, the family cut off both ends of the ham. They cut off the ham, they put it in the pan and they cooked the ham. At some point during the conversation, when the ham came out and they're eating it, somebody asked why did you cut off both ends of the ham? That's when they found out that everybody has always done it that way. And they backtracked it and figured out that grandma always cut off both ends of the ham before she cooked it.
They all talked about we've always done it that way, it's always been done that way. But nobody ever asked, why do you do that. So when they asked the grandma why she did that she said, because I never had a big enough pan to put the whole Ham on, so I had to cut off the ends.
Everybody else had a big enough pan, it didn't matter that the pan could fit the entire ham. They always cut off the ends because grandma did it that way. And there was never a reason why, until that moment. They all said, they just thought they were supposed to. Like it was imitated it was taught, but nobody asked the question why, they just did it. That's often where our habits have been formed. Have you asked why you do certain things or where it came from or do you just do things? The way that we cook our meals, the way that we prep in the kitchen or lack thereof. The places that we go, the way we celebrate holidays, the way all of these things are learned. So if you just take a minute and ask yourself why do I do that, you might find that the answer stems back to something so silly. So he says "We don't choose our earliest habits, they're imitated"... If you don't eat healthy today, you might not have eaten healthy growing up. Maybe you don't you don't workout because it wasn't a taught, it wasn't a learned habit. Okay, "You follow the habits of your culture without thinking without questioning, and sometimes without even remembering or recognizing it.
We imitate three different groups, we imitate the close family and friends, and we imitate the many"....
So if you're around a certain amount of people, whether you're in sports groups, most people are in an environment for eight hours a day like your work, or the powerful. You imitate these types of people, the close, the many, and the powerful. And so he just talks about, we pick up habits from people that are around us.
I just told you the story of our friends, we've been hanging out with them for months and months, and we've naturally picked up habits. it's really been verbiage, and it's really funny. So we laugh about it a lot, but we recognize it. And we're like, we're all saying the same things, super funny. "One of the most effective things that you can do to build better habits is, join a culture where you desire behavior, is a normal behavior"...
If you want a certain behavior, if you want a desired behavior, if you want to eat healthier, work out or whatever it is, you need to join a group of people that are already doing it. You need to surround yourself with those types of people, otherwise, you will not probably catch the habit as easy.
You can do it if you have the desire, the willpower and the discipline. You can do it by yourself, you're the lone wolf. But the likelihood of you keeping up, that's why joining a gym is great. Because if you just get your booty to the gym, and you're around people that are working out, you will naturally make friends. You will naturally be around people that are pushing themselves, so you will be more likely to keep going. That's why you often hear people say, I can't work out at home because I'm not disciplined enough to keep myself going. We have one of my husband's friends, his name is Justin, he shows up every single day at our door at six o'clock in the morning. And we all work out every day, unless it doesn't work out for one of our schedules.
But first of all, we know he's coming, so it's an Accountability. I've got my husband to kick me out of bed, usually he's up first. So there's three of us, and it's an accountability, we all go upstairs and we all work out. It just works for us, and it's great. But if it was just me by myself, it would be easy to sleep in. If it was just my husband by himself he would sleep in. If you go to the gym, you're surrounding yourself with people that are already doing it. Same with anything, you could do that. "New habits seem to achieve when you see others doing them every day. If you surround yourself with fit people, you will more likely to consider working out, to be a common habit"... So think about the things that you want to do, and you've got to find those people. It might be on a Facebook group, it might be here, it might be searching for stay at home moms, or form a group to do something.
"Join a culture where you desire behavior, the desire that you want is normal, and you already have something in common"...
So he tells a whole bunch of other stories, he talks about why you imitate the many because you don't want to be the lone wolf. Why do you eat the pizza at the employee lounge, why do you grab the donut at your office, because everybody's doing it. Like, I brought my lunch but everybody's going out to eat, so I'm going to go out to eat. And then you choose something that you don't want to eat, regret it and you get mad at yourself.
We tend to follow a herd, and so in your office or in workspace, you're not going to change unless you change your workspace and have a separate group that pushes you.
An accountability group to say you packed your lunch, so you can say somebody told me not to go out, I've already got my lunch here. You're fine, if you can go and have great conversation awesome, but I want you to eat your lunch. Set a precedent so you can do it right. The last person is you imitate the powerful. He says "We all are drawn to behaviors that earn respect approval, admiration and status. We want to be the one in the gym who can do the muscle ups or the musician who can play the hardest chord. We try to copy the behaviors of successful people because we desire success ourselves"...
And so whether you're watching somebody online, your family, or whether it's your work space, you are going to imitate and follow those people that are around you the most, or the behaviors that you desire, or lack thereof. If you find yourself constantly doing a bad habit, look at the environment that you're in. Why are you doing it, and how can you change it? So the chapter summary, "The culture we live in, determines which behaviors are attractive to us. We tend to adapt habits that are praised and approved by our culture, because we have a strong desire to fit in. Good or bad, we tend to imitate the habits of three groups. Family and friends, the tribe, and we've got the powerful. The most effective things that you can do to build a better habit is to join cultures where you desire the behavior. Or a group that holds you accountable to the food you're eating, or you already have something in common with the group. The normal behavior of the tribe often overpowers the desire of the individual"...
This is where everybody's going out to eat, so I'm going to do it and I chose wrong. Now I feel like garbage and I have to pay for it. Most people tend to follow the herd, so can you withstand that if you prepare and plan, you've got to have something outside of that for accountability.
"If a behavior can can get us approval, respect and praise, we find it attractive"...
So a lot of this he tells with great stories, he leads with science, he always has data in here. There's always an experiment of how it worked and what happened, and then it gives you an action step, more of an awareness. Why are you doing what you're doing? or Why did they cut off the both ends of the ham? Nobody ever asked, they just did it because it was taught and imitated from Grandma. When in reality, she wasted some of the ham because she didn't have a big enough pan. Why did we celebrate certain holidays? Because our parents did it. Why do we eat a certain way or lack thereof? Because we grew up that way. How do we change it, we surround ourselves with people that are already doing it. And to get the desired result that we want, you have to create the habits and the system.
So I hope that you're enjoying the book because I love it. It's a great awareness. I would say if you don't have the book, get it. If you want to continue to follow along, awesome. I'm always here to help. It's not just reading here, if you have questions about tips, tricks, ideas or recipes, whatever you want, continue to follow the page. If you're brand new posts new below. I'd love to know how are you liking the book? Do these morning, going through books, help you? Do you feel like it's an encouragement, does it inspire you in any way shape or form or is it a waste of time? It actually helps me because I am able to read the book again and it holds me accountable to reading and sharing. Have you guys ever heard of the Learn, Do and Teach? So you learn something, and then you do it. and then you teach somebody. Which anchors it more into yourself. So I've already learned it, I'm doing it and I'm teaching it, so I can anchor it. It's going to help me remember things, and it creates more of an awareness. So I'm always here to help reach out with questions.
I hope you guys have a great day and we'll talk to you soon.
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