Ep #211: Am I Getting Too Comfortable? Why Worrying Less Is a Good Sign

This is the Strong Is a Mindset podcast, Episode #211. Have you ever made progress, gotten healthier, and then wondered if you’re becoming too relaxed and slipping backwards because you’re not obsessing anymore? Today, we’re talking about why feeling calmer doesn’t necessarily mean you’re losing progress.

This is the Strong Is a Mindset podcast, where you’ll learn how to build both a strong body and a strong mind by eating, moving, and thinking. I’m your host Physician, Personal Trainer, Certified Health Coach and Certified Life Coach, Carrie Holland. 

Hey, how are you? What’s new? What’s good? So, what’s good here? Well, today’s episode is inspired by an interesting coaching conversation I had recently. A client shared something that I found fascinating because on the surface, it sounded like a problem, but the more we talked about it, the more I realized it might actually be evidence of progress. And then, I reflected back on some of my other coaching experiences and realized that this is most definitely a pattern. And it looks something like this.

So imagine you’re trying to improve your habits and improve your health, including your relationship with food. So, you put in the work and make legitimate changes, like less processed foods, more lean protein and fiber and veggies, and more complete meals instead of piecemeal snacks that you call lunch. And then, you finally start feeling better. Not just physically better, but mentally too. And as you start to feel better, food stops taking up so much time and space in your brain. So meaning, you eat something off plan and you don’t end up in a spiral. Or you miss a workout today and just get it done tomorrow instead of waiting until next Monday. And the endless negotiations and bargains and self-monitoring that used to take up so much of your brain space have mostly stopped.

All really great things, I would argue. So now, imagine all of these things happening for you because you made them happen, and instead of feeling relieved, you start wondering if something is wrong. You wonder if maybe you should be worried. Maybe you even start to think that you’re getting complacent and being this way might make you go backwards and regain weight or become sedentary again. And it’s so interesting if you really think about this because the exact thing that so many people are working for, for food and exercise to take up less space in their brain, that happens, and instead of feeling good about it, you question it and worry that something might be wrong.

And that is exactly what happened with my client. She has a long-standing, complicated relationship with herself and with food, and she has been doing a lot of work to change that. And in a recent session, she told me how much things were improving for her. She wasn’t spiraling anymore. She wasn’t binging. She wasn’t quitting after one off meal. She wasn’t beating herself up about her choices. She was eating foods that she liked and having fun foods like ice cream without it becoming an ordeal, which was most definitely not the case for her in the past. And while all of this great progress was happening, she was ultimately worried it all meant she was slipping. She even said it, “I’m feeling okay, and that scares me.”

So my client was worried that she was becoming too relaxed, and she worried that her becoming less worried meant she was becoming less disciplined, and if this was the beginning of going backwards. It’s so interesting. And I think this happens because so many of us have been taught that if we’re not constantly thinking about food, or if we’re not constantly worried about gaining weight, or if we’re not policing every decision, then we must be letting ourselves go. But I don’t think that’s true, not at all. And that is where we’re going today. We’re going to talk about why progress sometimes feels uncomfortable and why feeling more calm might actually be one of the strongest signs that your habits are getting locked in and becoming part of who you are and not a reason to worry. All right? So let’s go.

So let me put it out there from the get-go, one of the biggest reasons why so many of us get tripped up on this. The reason so many people start to feel like they’re slipping when they get to a point of not thinking about their habits all the time is because of a very sneaky concept we’ve learned. And what we’ve learned was that anxiety equals effort. Meaning, many of us have been conditioned to believe that if we are constantly worrying about our health, our exercise, or our food, then we must be doing a good job taking care of it. And I said this is sneaky because it is. So think about some of the things that we tell ourselves or tell other people, things like, “I have to stay on top of this. I can’t let myself go. I’ve got to be careful. I need to keep myself in check. I can’t get too comfortable here.”

Think about all of those assertions. They all sound responsible, right? They sound like something a committed person would say. That sounds like someone with discipline. But notice what all of those thoughts have in common. They all imply that if you stop watching yourself so closely, something bad is going to happen, and the wheels will come off the bus, and all of your progress will fall apart. So, if you stop worrying, you’ll stop trying. Or if you stop thinking about food all the time, you’ll go back to overeating. Or if you stop intensely monitoring your workouts, you’ll quit them all together. And it all adds up to the same thing: the fear that if you stop keeping such a close watch on yourself, you’ll lose all the progress you’ve made. Because you’ve come to believe that worrying and thinking about it, or maybe obsessing about it, is the one thing keeping you on track.

And I get that. If you’ve spent years of your life trying to lose weight, or if you’ve spent years starting over again every Monday, or if you’ve spent years feeling like your body and your health is the one area of your life that you just can’t quite figure out, then it makes total sense that you’ve developed the habit of constantly checking in on yourself. So your brain may be totally accustomed to running the same inner dialogue that sounds something like, “How’d I do today? Did I eat too much? Did I have too many carbs? If I have this ice cream, is this going to throw my whole day off? Do I need to tighten things up tomorrow because today wasn’t the best?” And after a while, that dialogue is happening so often that it just feels normal. You don’t know any different because that’s the way your brain has been operating for years.

And so then, when you finally take a different approach and when that constant self-monitoring starts to fade, and you stop thinking about food every five minutes, or you have a cookie and move on with your life, something really interesting happens. Instead of feeling relieved, you freak out. You wonder if you’ve become careless. It is so interesting and so ironic and really very common.

But here’s what I want to offer you. There is a big difference between paying attention and living in a constant state of high alert. So let me explain what I mean here. Building and maintaining healthy habits requires awareness, and it requires intention. So you still make a plan, you still follow through, and you still care. You’re still thinking about what you’re doing here. However, that is very different from endlessly evaluating your every move around food and exercise because you don’t trust yourself. Monitoring yourself every minute is not the same thing as having healthy habits. One is driven by fear; the other is driven by trust.

So think about it. If you feel like you have to constantly check yourself, constantly negotiate with yourself, or constantly remind yourself not to mess up, then your health is still relying on vigilant self-monitoring instead of habits you actually trust. But when habits become part of who you are and are built on a foundation of self-trust, they stop requiring so much of your mental energy. You still make intentional choices, but you aren’t spending all day wondering whether you’re doing enough or whether you’re getting off track.

And I honestly think that was exactly what my client was bumping into. She wasn’t caring less; she was just worrying less. And that was making her nervous. So, why does this even happen? Why does worrying less suddenly make us feel like we’re caring less? Well, I think it’s because once we’ve started believing that worry is what keeps us committed, another belief slips in alongside it, and we start believing that feeling bad is what keeps you on track.

So think about what happens after a choice you’re not proud of. Maybe you overeat one day, or you skip a workout, or the scale goes up a few pounds. What is your first reaction? For so many people, it’s guilt or frustration or disappointment. Or maybe you start beating yourself up about it and promise yourself you’ll do better tomorrow. And after enough runs through that cycle, something interesting happens. You stop trusting your habits and you start trusting the guilt instead. It’s almost as if the guilt itself is evidence that you’re still trying. Have you ever thought to yourself deep in the recesses of your brain, “Well, at least I know I care because I feel terrible about it.” And that is what I’m talking about. It’s subtle and it’s sneaky, but it’s so important.

We often use guilt as proof that we’re committed. But guilt and commitment are not the same thing. So I want you to really hear that. Guilt and commitment are not the same. And you can even think about it this way. What if you’ve been giving guilt credit for something that it was never actually doing? Here’s what I mean. What if guilt isn’t actually the reason you keep trying? What if guilt is just the emotion that has been tagging along while you’ve been trying to change? Do you see the difference here? Those are two very different things.

Think about it this way. If every time you overeat, you feel guilty, and every time you get back on track, you also feel guilty, your brain naturally starts connecting those two events. It makes a connection that guilt must be the thing that got you back on track because after all, the guilt showed up and then I started making better choices again. But as we say in science all the time, correlation is not causation. Just because two things happen together doesn’t mean one caused the other. So, maybe guilt was just there. And maybe what actually got you back on track was your decision, your grit, your habits, and most importantly, your willingness to try again.

So, I think we’ve been giving guilt too much credit. And I think that gets us to the deeper issue, and that is for so many women, deep down, you don’t fully trust yourself yet. You don’t trust that you can make a healthy choice without feeling bad first. You don’t trust that you can enjoy dessert without turning it into three days of overeating. You don’t trust that missing one workout won’t become a whole month of missed workouts. So instead, you’ve started to rely on guilt, worry, and constantly monitoring yourself because they feel like a form of protection. They feel like the things that are keeping you successful. And here’s a problem with that. If guilt becomes your accountability system, then feeling better and having less guilt starts to feel dangerous. Because now you’ve removed the thing that you believed was keeping you successful, and your brain naturally starts wondering, “If I’m not worried anymore, am I still committed? If I don’t feel guilty anymore, am I letting myself go? And if I’m not constantly thinking about food, do I even care anymore?” And that is the trap. You’ve started believing that worrying and caring are the same thing, but they’re not.

And if that’s the case, then what does caring actually look like? Well, I don’t think it looks like obsessing. I don’t think it looks like constant self-monitoring. And I don’t think it looks like spending all day negotiating with yourself either. Think about brushing your teeth. Most of you probably didn’t wake up this morning wondering whether you’re going to brush your teeth today. You didn’t negotiate with yourself about it. You didn’t need a motivational podcast. You didn’t have to weigh the pros and cons. You didn’t promise yourself that this was finally the day you were going to become someone who brushed her teeth consistently. You just brushed your teeth. And not because it’s exciting, not because you were especially motivated. You just did it because it’s part of who you are. And I think that’s a really helpful way to think about other healthy habits.

Like eventually, protein is just lunch. Strength training is just what you do on Tuesdays. Going for a walk after dinner does not require a full-on debate in your brain. And drinking water is not a project. They’re just things you do. And I think that’s the part that surprises people. We often expect healthy habits to keep feeling exciting or difficult or like they require constant willpower. But if you’re doing this well, the opposite usually happens. Those habits become so practiced that they stop demanding so much of your attention. Your habits become quieter, less emotional, and less dramatic. They start operating in the background because you’ve practiced them enough that they’ve just become part of your normal life.

And I know that doesn’t sound exciting. It actually might sound kind of boring. But if I’m being fully honest here, boring is the goal. And I know that sounds strange, but here’s why this matters. When healthy habits become boring and ordinary, they stop taking up so much space in your brain. You’re not thinking about food or exercise all day. You just make the choice and you move on with your life. And ironically, that’s exactly why it can feel so uncomfortable at first, because we’ve spent so many years believing that healthy living should feel like constant effort. That when it finally starts to feel ordinary, we mistake it for complacency. When really, that just might be what progress feels like.

So, now, at this point, you might be wondering, “Okay, but how do I know? How do I know if I’m actually building trust in myself and my habits or if I’m being complacent?” Because there is a big difference. And I think that’s a really important question. The problem is that most of us have been trained to measure progress using a very small set of metrics. We look at the scale. We look at our percent body fat. We ask ourselves whether we ate perfectly today with zero misses. But what if those aren’t the only signs of progress? What if some of the biggest changes happen way before the scale even moves? What if some of the biggest changes aren’t physical at all but are mental?

Because if this episode is about learning to trust yourself, then it makes sense that some of the evidence of that trust would show up in the way you think, not just in the number you see on the scale. So, maybe progress starts looking a little different. Maybe you don’t negotiate with yourself quite as much anymore. You decide what you’re going to have for lunch, and then you eat lunch. You don’t spend 30 minutes arguing with yourself about whether you’ve earned it, whether it’s too many carbs, or whether you should skip dinner because you had dessert. Or maybe progress looks like recovering faster. So you have a meal that wasn’t exactly what you planned and you acknowledge it. And then you get back to your normal routine without feeling like you have to make up for it. So one cookie stays at one cookie, or one missed workout stays at one missed workout. Nothing more. They don’t become a reason to quit.

Or maybe progress looks like needing less reassurance, meaning you don’t have to ask, “Was that okay?” Or, “Did I ruin my day with this pizza?” Or, “Should I just chalk it up and start over again tomorrow?” No. Instead, you make a choice and you trust yourself to make the next choice. And maybe one of the biggest signs of progress of all is that food and exercise take up less space in your brain. You are not thinking about them every waking minute. You’re thinking about work or family, your hobbies, your vacation, your life. And I don’t know about you, but those are the kind of things I want to be spending my time thinking about, not whether or not I can have cheese on my turkey burger at dinner because I had an extra scoop of peanut butter earlier in the day. You just make a decision and get on with it.

And I think that’s the kind of freedom that most of us are actually looking for. Not freedom to eat whatever we want, but freedom from having to think about food all the time because those are two very different things. And I also want to be careful here because I don’t want to misconstrue this as, “Well, once you’re healthy, you never have to think about it again because you’ve arrived and you’re all done.” No. So I’m not saying you’ll never overeat again. I’m also not saying you’ll never have times where you need to be more intentional. That’s not the goal. The goal isn’t to stop paying attention. It’s for healthy habits to stop requiring so much of your attention. And that’s the whole point. I think that’s what most people are hoping for. Not to spend more time thinking about food, but to spend less time on it.

So now, if you’re thinking, “Okay, I have made progress. I’m doing some of these things, but it still feels uncomfortable.” So please know that is completely normal because your brain has spent years learning a very different equation. For years, certainty looked like control, and control looked like vigilance, and vigilance looked like safety. So when that vigilance starts to disappear, your brain asks, “Hang on a minute here, where did my safety go?” But here’s an important thing to know. Your brain isn’t asking that because you’re failing. It’s asking that because you’re operating differently than you used to.

So it’s not that something is going wrong, it’s that something is changing in a very good way, and that’s exactly what you’ve been working for all along. Those are the wins that usually do not show up on the scale, and they’re immeasurable, but they’re often the clearest evidence that you’re making progress and building something that will last. And maybe that’s exactly what my client was starting to experience.

So maybe the goal was never to become someone who never wanted dessert, or someone who never missed a workout, or someone who never had to think about food again. And instead, maybe the goal is to become someone who trusts herself, someone who can actually enjoy pizza with her family on a Friday night without turning it into a verdict about who she is as a human being. Someone who can miss one workout without deciding she’s back at square one. Or someone who can make one choice she isn’t thrilled with and make a different choice the next time she eats, minus all the drama. Because that’s what people who trust themselves do. They don’t need every decision to be perfect. They trust that one decision doesn’t define them, like where my client is headed.

She came to her coaching session worried that she was slipping. She was worried that because she wasn’t obsessing anymore, she wasn’t trying anymore. But I don’t think she was slipping, not at all. In fact, I think she was finally experiencing something that she’d never fully experienced before: peace. Not perfection, not absence of effort, and not lack of intention, just straight up peace. And those are very different things.

So, if you’ve recognized yourself anywhere within this episode and you’re doing the work, and if food is taking up less space in your brain, or if you’re recovering faster after a choice you didn’t love, or if you’re spending less time negotiating with yourself, please do not mistake that for slipping. You are not going backwards, okay? Don’t mistake lack of panic for the absence of discipline. And don’t mistake worrying less for caring less. Because the goal was never to care less about your health. The goal is to need less fear to take care of it.

And if you want help with this, let’s go. When you coach with me, we don’t just work on what you’re eating or how you’re exercising. We work on building habits you can trust. So you don’t have to rely on guilt, fear, or constant self-monitoring to stay on track. If you’re ready for that, head over to www.CarrieHollandMD.com/contact and let’s talk about how coaching can help you build a healthier relationship with food, exercise, and yourself. All right? Thank you again for hanging out with me and I’ll catch you again next week.

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You’ll also find strength training tips to help you train smarter and see real results. My goal is to help you get strong and this strength-training guide will help you do it. Go to CarrieHollandMD.com/build strength and check it out.

Thank you for listening to the Strong Is a Mindset podcast. If you want to learn more about how to build both a strong mind and a strong body by eating, moving, and most importantly, thinking, check out CarrieHollandMD.com.