Ep #154: Your Thoughts Are Valid—Now What? 3 Steps to Shift Your Mindset

This is the Strong Is a Mindset podcast, Episode #154. If you’ve ever wanted to change your mindset, but you’re not sure what that means or how to do it, this episode is going to help you. Today, we’re talking about what to do when your thoughts are valid, but they’re not helping you.

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? Today, we’re talking about a coaching concept that came from dozens of coaching sessions. It’s another tool that I want to share with you so you can go out into the world and start practicing it now. And to be clear, I know I say the word tool a lot on the podcast. And when I say that, what I mean is that these are mindset tools. It’s not like a hammer that you’re pulling out of your pocket. No one will know that you’re using these tools unless you were to announce it. And even though you can’t see it, the tool still exists and it’s there to help you. So, my goal by giving you all these concepts that you can’t see or touch or hold really, is to give you mindset tools that you can start applying in your brain to give you different ways of thinking.

And that is how you change your mindset. So, to my core, this is truly how I believe you change your life by changing your thinking. And I don’t know about you, but for me, when I started all of this personal development work, I could understand in theory how my thinking was getting in the way. It made sense. I got the message that it was my mindset that was keeping me stuck. But that was only a small part of the process. Because while I could see that my mindset was not helping me, I didn’t necessarily understand what to do about it. I didn’t understand how to change it.

And so that’s where I got really trapped. But then with time, coaching, therapy, getting certified as a coach, tons of self-help books, podcasts, all the things, what I’ve learned is that you can change your thinking with the help of tools, concepts, frameworks. I can’t just tell you, hey, think differently and poof, it happens. It doesn’t work that way. At least it didn’t for me. So instead, I started using tools that I learned from my mentors and therapists and coaches, from my certifications, and from my own independent studying.

And then, as I started coaching lots and lots of women and found recurring themes and recurring roadblocks on their way to progress, I started creating some of my own tools. So now, when I start working with someone, I feel like I’ve got a big toolbox to share with them. And the idea here is to try these tools out, find the tools that land and resonate with you, and come back to them, use them, apply them to your life. See how they work. Keep what lands with you and then leave the rest. And truthfully, that’s how I see this podcast. It’s a toolkit for you. And I hope within this toolkit, you find various concepts and mindset shifts that you can use over and over again.

And my ultimate goal is that you walk away with a new way of thinking and a new way of acting, and at the end of it all, you feel better. And this is not to say that my goal is to make your life feel like an episode of The Care Bears, okay? No. Instead, my goal is to equip you with tools and skills and ideas that you can use to manage your life when it is not easy. That’s really it. I want you to be prepared to deal with the hard stuff, knowing that in our lives, there will always be hard stuff that comes up. And I hope I can give you loads of concepts and tools to call on when things are not easy.

And so with that in mind, this week, I want to share a concept I’ve been using in nearly every session lately. It’s a framework to help clients get unstuck, especially in moments when their thoughts are totally valid, but not actually helping them move forward. These are the thoughts that feel true, the ones that have evidence, the ones that are absolutely justifiable, but are also keeping you swimming in circles. And what this tool does is give you a way to work with your thoughts instead of fighting against them.

So, the framework is very simple. It’s a simple mnemonic or memory tool, and it’s designed to help you work through challenging thought patterns in three steps. And the tool is Acknowledge, Validate, and Decide, or AVD. So remember, I went to med school, this is how I got through it with mnemonics. So, I’m going to walk you through exactly what this means, why it even matters, and how to apply this concept to your own habits and mindset, especially when the work of changing your thinking feels hard.

So first, where in the world did this tool come from? Well, to be perfectly honest, it came from me having a really hard time changing my own mindset. When I was training to become a coach, when I was getting coached myself, and even when I was going through therapy, I kept running into the same idea over and over again. And it’s the idea that thoughts are not fact. I learned it. I’ve taught it on the podcast. I’ve shared it with clients. I’ve told it to myself. But what in the world does that actually mean?

Well, it means that just because we think something to ourselves, that does not make it true. Like if you tell me, because this is something I hear all the time. If you tell me, I don’t have time to take care of myself. I don’t have time to exercise. I don’t have time to get healthy meals together. So think about those statements. Often, we say them as if they are hard fact. But the reality is, they’re not. I would argue respectfully that you do, in fact, have time to take care of yourself, but you may need help finding it and enforcing it. It may mean making some really hard choices.

And you do, in fact, have time to exercise. But again, it means making some hard decisions and changing some things in your life and your schedule. We all have the same hours in a week, and while our responsibilities are all different, I do truly believe that it is possible for you to have the time you need to take care of yourself. But if you’ve created a very busy, very overscheduled life, then yes, it can feel like there is just no time. And you may start saying that to yourself. You may say it out loud to your family, to your friends. You may be saying that on repeat. And so, then what happens when you tell yourself and everyone else that you don’t have enough time? Well, when you say it enough times, it becomes your truth. It becomes your belief. It becomes fact. And so this is where it gets interesting.

So even though I teach that thoughts are not fact, and just because you think it doesn’t make it true, it is not that simple. It’s not that cut and dry. Because even though I just sat here and told you that I don’t have time is not fact, when you say it to yourself constantly, it will feel like fact, and that’s enough. So even though I don’t have time is really not the absolute truth, it will feel like the truth. It will feel limiting, and it will feel hard. And as a result, changing that thought will also feel hard.

So, this tool partly came about in response to this obstacle that I kept running into when I was trying to change my own life. I could see that the things I was telling myself, like I am broken, I am not good enough, or if I just stay fit, then all will be okay. I could see how telling myself those things was not the absolute truth. But that didn’t really help me. At the same time, I was having the same version of the same conversation with my clients, and I would just hear them say things like, this feels so hard, or I don’t want to get up early to work out, or I don’t want to plan meals. I just want this to be easy. They would share their thoughts with me, and they felt like the absolute truth to them.

And here’s what I want you to know. None of these are wrong. If you’ve ever thought any of these, you’re not wrong for thinking this way. My clients are not wrong. They weren’t complaining. They weren’t being lazy, and they weren’t making excuses. They were just being honest. And I’m not here to take that away from them. I’m not here to tell you that the way you’re thinking is wrong. That is not it at all. I don’t ever want to take your thoughts away from you or make you wrong for thinking a certain way or make you feel bad for thinking the way you do. That’s not it.

So, instead of making your thoughts wrong, and instead of pushing back and telling you to just flip a switch and change how you think, I want you to do something different. So with my clients, I started using this simple framework to walk them through the discomfort of sitting with challenging thoughts. I wanted them to have a tool to handle the discomfort of being honest about what they’re thinking and feeling, even if it doesn’t sound good or feel productive.

I wanted them to be able to sit with their thoughts without feeling compelled to rush and fix it or reframe it. So, the idea of acknowledge, validate, and decide really gave myself and gave my clients the space to sit in that discomfort, to name it, understand it, and then decide what to do with it. And really, at the heart of it, this is just another way to help you slow down your brain, give you space for awareness, meet yourself where you are, and give yourself a path forward. So, let’s talk through the pieces to this.

So first, you acknowledge. And what that means is when a client tells me, this is hard, whether that’s in relation to changing her diet, starting an early morning exercise routine, saying no at work, whatever it is, we don’t argue it. We acknowledge it. So again, let me be super clear about what exactly that means. I know I can sometimes use words that sound coachy, and I don’t want any of this to sound fuzzy. I want it tangible. So, when I say you acknowledge your thought or feeling, it means you name it and accept whatever it is. And that’s instead of denying it or ignoring it. Acknowledging what you’re thinking and feeling means you take a second to recognize the reality of what is happening. You call it out. And when I say that, you do it without judgment or shame.

So, acknowledge means you recognize it. That is the first step towards regaining control. And here’s why I think this matters. Often, we don’t do this. Instead, we feel angry or resentful or heavy, but we don’t do the work of unearthing why that is. Does that ever happen to you where you feel off? Maybe because you’ve had a few days of eating off plan and not feeling great about it, or a few days where you’ve slept through your morning workouts, or a Monday morning after a weekend of being off the chain, and you just feel off. But if you don’t call it out and you don’t give it a name, then you don’t give yourself the opportunity to do anything with it. You just kind of accept feeling off, when really, you can do a whole lot more with it.

And this comes down to the whole idea of the jar. I think I’ve mentioned it before, and if any of my clients are listening, they know what I’m going to say, because in all honesty, this to me is the heart and soul of coaching. So, there’s a saying, you can’t see the label when you’re sitting in the jar. And acknowledging your thoughts and feelings is like stepping outside of that jar to get a clear view of what’s actually going on inside.

Acknowledging what you’re thinking and feeling will give you a different perspective on your mindset, which can feel all-encompassing and overwhelming when you’re in the thick of it. So, acknowledge means you’re taking yourself out of the jar. And when you acknowledge what you’re thinking and feeling, you give yourself space. And it may be just enough space to see your situation from a slightly different angle and give yourself the clarity you need to decide how to move forward.

Because, on the flip side, when you try to bulldoze past what you’re thinking or feeling or shame yourself for feeling it, you just double down on the resistance to moving forward and taking different action. When you try to ignore or skip over acknowledging what you’re feeling, you actually create more mental and emotional pushback against yourself. And that just makes it harder to get out of your stuck state. So, that resistance is your brain’s pushback to change or action because it feels too hard, too uncomfortable, or too unfamiliar.

So instead of moving forward, you end up reinforcing the same patterns and staying stuck. So, bulldozing past your thoughts and feelings without acknowledging them is like trying to see the label from inside the jar. It does not work. So, it’s really only when you pause to acknowledge what you’re thinking or feeling that you create enough distance to see what’s happening and gain some perspective. So that is the power of stepping outside the jar and into your own awareness.

Okay? So step one, acknowledge. Call it what it is. Name it without judgment. This feels really hard right now. And let it be what it is. That is the first step to walking through it. Okay?

Next, once you’ve acknowledged what’s there and you’ve named what you’re thinking or feeling, the next step is to validate it. So again, what exactly does that mean? What does it mean to validate? Well, to me, and how I teach my clients, is that when you validate yourself, you recognize whatever you’ve got as real. So, this means giving yourself permission to be a human. This means giving yourself permission to say, yes, I’m tired. Yes, this is hard. And that’s okay. And not in a toxic positivity kind of way, but in a true, honest with yourself, self-acceptance kind of way.

Validating your thoughts and feelings means allowing your experience to be what it is without trying to put it in a more favorable light and without trying to push it away. So, you don’t have to argue with yourself. You don’t have to pretend you’re not tired. You don’t have to slap a positive affirmation on top of your burnout. No. Instead, you give yourself grace and acceptance, and you make space for what is true for you in the moment.

So, this is really where we’re going in the opposite direction of making yourself wrong. I know I talked about it earlier, but the goal here is not to make what you’re thinking or feeling wrong. I want you to name it. You can say it to yourself. This feels hard. Or, I can’t do this. Whatever it is you’re thinking, name it. And then, instead of beating yourself up about it and getting down on yourself for thinking or feeling that way, you practice accepting it. It will feel much lighter if you accept what you’re thinking versus arguing with yourself.

So, for example, you can tell yourself, of course I’m tired. I have had a super long week. Or, of course this feels hard. I’m trying something new and that’s okay. Or, of course I want to give up. This is a normal part of the process. And that’s okay. So, when you validate yourself, you’re practicing acceptance, you’re normalizing your thoughts and feelings, and you’re supporting yourself, which is huge.

And it’s also important to note that when you validate, you’re not letting yourself off the hook. So when you say, of course I’m missing my morning workouts, I’m not sleeping enough, as an example. You’re not giving yourself a pass. Instead, you’re acknowledging and accepting your thoughts in a kind and honest way. It doesn’t mean you’re weak or giving in, and you’re not letting yourself off easy. Instead, you’re meeting yourself where you’re at with kindness and with truth.

So, to make this crystal clear, validation is not an excuse. It is not letting yourself off the hook. Instead, when you validate what you are thinking and feeling in the moment, you ease the internal resistance and create enough space and clarity in your brain to take the next small step forward. Validating yourself is what allows you to regroup, refocus, and keep moving forward in a way that feels manageable. Because really, at the heart of this, when you validate your experience, you make space for your humanity.

So, in other words, you open the door to accepting yourself fully as your messy human self, including the parts of you that struggle, feel tired, and want to give up. You respect that those feelings, they are not flaws, they are not failures, and that feeling and thinking this way is part of what it means to be a human. So, it’s about acceptance. And no, this is not sugarcoating or pretending everything is just fine. It’s about acknowledging the truth of your experience with compassion and with kindness so you can move forward with a better understanding of yourself. I want you to really hear that. When you validate, you acknowledge the truth of your experience with compassion so that you move forward with a better self-understanding. And that is what allows you to move into the last step.

And that last step in the process is to decide. So that means, now that you’ve acknowledged what you’re thinking and feeling, and you validated it, you have a decision to make. You’ve got a choice. And this is huge because that choice is where all of your power sits. So, whatever it is that you’re thinking and feeling, you get to decide whether or not to stay there. You get to decide whether that thought or feeling is how you want to keep thinking and feeling. And you get to decide whether that thought or feeling is going to drive your next action.

You have the power and the authority to question your current perspective and ask yourself if you want to practice a new thought, a new feeling, and ultimately a new way of being. This right here is the heart of working on your mindset. This is it. It’s recognizing that your default way of thinking is just one option, but you can always choose another. Again, I want you to really hear this. I’m going to say it again. Your default way of thinking is just one option, but you can always choose another. Okay? This is so huge. This is where your decision-making capacity comes in. So, when you find yourself caught in the same unhelpful loop, you have the authority to pause and ask yourself, do I really want to keep believing this? Is this how I really want to think and feel here? And then, you make an empowered choice.

So, if you think, changing my habits is really hard. Okay, that’s fine. Acknowledge it. Name it. Validate it and say, changing my habits is hard and that’s okay. And then, take it a step further. Ask yourself, am I still going to do the thing? Am I still going to get up early even though it’s hard? Am I still going to eat my lunch like I planned? Or am I going for the pizza in the break room because it’s right there in front of me? Or if you think, I’m tired. Same thing. Name it. Acknowledge it. Validate it and support yourself by reminding yourself, it’s okay to be tired right now. And then, don’t stop there. Keep going. Ask yourself, what is the best decision for me in this situation? What do I want to do here?

And to be clear, you do not have to force yourself to feel differently. You just have to decide what to do. And beyond that, this process is really about reclaiming your mental power. You have the choice of not just how to act, but how you want to think and feel in your situation. You get to choose if you want to hang on to the thought, changing my habits is hard, or I’m tired, or if you want to find a different way of thinking that helps you more. So you get to decide if you want to practice thinking. Yes, changing my habits is hard and that’s okay, and I’m going to think about it differently. Do you see that? We’re combining all three steps into one here. You call it out, you acknowledge what you’re thinking. You validate it by making it okay, and then you make a conscious choice to practice thinking about it differently. That is the process. Acknowledge, validate, and decide.

And let me add something else here. You can remind yourself that this hard moment does not define you, and you don’t have to wait to feel good in order to take meaningful action. My coach has said it all the time. You can feel like poop and still show up for yourself. You can still show up for yourself. And all that means is that the conditions do not have to be perfect in order for you to take forward action. Because if you wait for perfect conditions, you’re going to be waiting forever. So instead, this is about taking control of your thinking and choosing how you respond moving forward. It’s about consciously deciding how you think, how you feel, and what action you’ll take next, even when the circumstances are challenging.

And this comes down to ownership. You get to decide to keep thinking the same thing or choose a new thought. You can choose to feel the same way or choose to practice feeling differently. You can choose to act from your default or to act from a place of intention. This is where you have the choice to say, yes, this is hard, and I’m still choosing to show up. And this is where the real, serious, legit work is. In your willingness to meet yourself with compassion, to challenge your automatic patterns, and step forward even when it feels easier to stay right where you are. So making that choice is where the real growth is, and it’s where you create lasting change. And again, this is done not by force, but with intention and practice. You are not forcing or coercing yourself or white knuckling yourself into anything here. You are simply making a purposeful choice to think and feel a certain way.

So, let me give you a real life example. This is something that I coach on commonly, so I’m going to put it out there. Let’s say you’re trying to lose weight, and you’re doing all the things. You plan your meals, you increase your protein intake, you practice eating according to your hunger and satiety cues. And then a few weeks go by, and you’ve lost 1 pound. And then you start thinking to yourself, this is taking forever. I’m doing everything right, and the scale is still not moving. All right, so let’s talk through this. So first, we acknowledge it. And all that means is you put it into words for yourself. You name it. I’m doing all the things, and I’m not getting a result. You spelled it out for yourself. And you acknowledge that this is a real thought you’re having. You take a minute to see it, to name it, and to really understand what’s behind it.

And then next, you validate it. Of course you feel frustrated. You’ve been putting in effort, and it feels like it’s not working. Recognize that what you’re feeling is real, valid, and understandable. It is a normal reaction to put in work and feel frustrated if you’re not getting the results you expect.

And then last, you decide. Do you want to keep thinking what you’re thinking? Do you want to continue thinking this is taking forever? Do you want to continue thinking I’m doing everything right and the scale is not moving? Do you want to hang on to those thoughts and use them as a reason to quit? Because often, thinking that way, that habit change is taking forever, or thinking that you’re doing all this work with nothing to show for it. Thinking that way will likely lead you to give up. Or do you want to acknowledge it and keep going? You have that choice. You have the authority to make that decision.

So really, this is your moment of power where you can shift from your default thinking to conscious, empowered choice. You get to decide if what you’re thinking is helping or hurting you. And you also get to decide to practice thinking a new thought that moves you forward instead of keeping you stuck. So, maybe you decide, yes, this is hard and it’s taking time, but I’m proud of the habits I’m building. Or maybe you decide, this is frustrating, but I’m in it for the long haul.

And either way, you take control by making a conscious decision about what happens next. This moment of decision is where your personal growth takes hold. It’s the point where you demonstrate to yourself that you are not simply at the mercy of your old habits or your default reactions. When you make an intentional choice about your next step, no matter how small it is, you create a sense of agency that builds your confidence. And it feels good to feel in control. It feels good to make decisions from a place of control. It will make you feel less like you’re living at the effect of your life and more like you’re behind the steering wheel driving your life.

Deciding on purpose how you want to think, feel, and act, it feels different. It feels better. It feels strong. It feels connected and grounded. I’m trying to find the words to really make this tangible to you, and this is it. You don’t have to feel like anything is happening to you. You don’t have to feel like you’re being pushed and pulled and molded. You are in charge. You have authority over your life, your mind, your feelings, your actions, your decisions. And the more you repeat this, the more you practice making a conscious, intentional choice instead of defaulting to what you’ve always done, the more in control of your life you will feel. This is the pathway to a new way of thinking and a new way of being. It’s a way of being that supports your goals and aligns with the life that you want to create. Okay?

So, now that we’ve talked through this, why does this work? Why does the concept of acknowledge, validate, and decide? Why would this three-step process even work? Well, it works because it does two things. It honors your current experience, and it moves you forward. So when you acknowledge what is real and true for you in the moment, you’re meeting yourself where you’re at. And again, the idea here is not to take away what you’re feeling. When I first got into coaching, I spent a lot, a lot, a lot of time thinking that I was wrong for thinking and feeling what I was thinking and feeling. And then finally, I realized I’m not wrong. I’m just calling it what it is. I’m naming what feels real and true for me when things in my life feel hard. And I want you to do that too.

But I think, at least for me anyway, where I got stuck was that I stopped there. I could name and acknowledge, and I could validate and practice telling myself that what I was feeling was okay, but then I would stop short of deciding. I would just assume that because I was thinking and feeling sad, or thinking I was broken and feeling like I was broken, or thinking and feeling that my life was too busy to do any work to change it, I would just assume that because I thought that way, that was the end of it. Game over, all done. And that’s where decide comes in. Acknowledging and validating your thoughts and feelings meets you where you are. But then, deciding what to do next is how you move yourself forward. Do you see that? This is huge. So instead of just stopping at naming it, you make a conscious decision about what to do next. That right there is how you move forward. So that third step, deciding, really is essential.

So, this concept works because it meets you where you are without judgment. And it gives you the space to take the next step from a place of clarity and compassion. It recognizes that your thoughts and feelings are valid. And it shows you that you do have a path forward even in your most messy and most challenging moments. And no, this is not toxic positivity. This is not fake it till you make it. This is not gaslighting yourself. You’re not bypassing the tough, gritty work of sitting with hard thoughts. Instead, this is about emotional maturity. It’s choosing to respond instead of react. It’s giving yourself compassion and authority. It’s both.

So, the next time you find yourself in a hard moment, acknowledge it. This is what I’m thinking or feeling. Validate it and that’s okay. And then decide what comes next. That is how you shift from default to intention. This is how you get unstuck. So please, remember, you are not broken. Your thoughts and your feelings, they are not wrong. And you don’t need to be fixed. You just need to practice deciding on purpose. All right? And if you want help with this, let’s go. When you coach with me, you will practice making decisions from a place of authority instead of doing what you’ve always done. And it will feel amazing.

Check out my website, send me a message at www.carriehollandmd.com/contact. And let’s talk about how coaching will change how you see yourself, your habits, and what you’re truly capable of. All right? Thank you again for hanging out with me, and I’ll catch you again next week.

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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.