Ep #218: The Tool Is Working (Just Not the Way You Expected)

This is the Strong Is a Mindset podcast, Episode #218. If you’ve ever used a tool that helped, but still wondered why the desire, discomfort, or old thought didn’t go away, let’s talk about what it actually means for a tool to work, because effective and perfect are not the same thing.

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 I wanted to talk about something that came up in a coaching session earlier this week. And I found it really interesting and actually pretty cool because my client was able to put her finger on something I think a lot of us do without even realizing it. So, we were talking about a behavior she’s trying to change. Specifically, it’s between-meal snacking, which I know can be a problem for a lot of people. And this client knows what she wants to do differently. She wants to snack less between meals because she knows she’s not even hungry.

And over the course of our time coaching together, we’ve come up with several tools that she can use when she feels the urge to snack. So, for example, she can pause instead of immediately reaching for whatever it is that’s in front of her. She can pay attention to what she’s thinking, like listening to the actual words that are floating through her head in those moments that she wants to snack. And then my favorite, she can use some very intentional self-talk to remind herself what she actually wants and why all of this matters to her.

And as we were talking through her week, she initially told me that her problem was consistency. She said something to the effect of, “It’s not that the tools don’t work, it’s that I’m not being consistent with them,” because when she pauses, it helps. When she pays attention to herself, it helps. When she uses the self-talk we practiced, that also helps. So, the tools were creating some space between having the desire for the snack and automatically acting on it. And those pauses and that space between stimulus and response, those gave her an opportunity to make a more intentional decision, which is exactly what we were aiming for. So, the tools actually do work.

But then she recognized something else. She realized she had been expecting those tools to switch off her desire for the snack completely. So, she was expecting to pause, pay attention, say the right thing to herself, and then no longer want the snack. She was expecting the tool to work 100% of the time and produce a 100% result. And as we talked through this, she realized no tool is going to do that. Meaning there probably isn’t one sentence she can say to herself that will guarantee she never wants the snack again. There isn’t one pause that will permanently remove the desire for the snack. There is no strategy that will work perfectly in every situation for the rest of her life. It just doesn’t exist.

And I don’t think that means the tools that she is using are ineffective. Really, what it means is that they’re tools, but they are not a panacea. They are not a cure-all. These tools aren’t going to completely eliminate the thoughts, the feelings, or the desire she has for the snack. The tools are there to help her respond to it. And that is a subtle but actually really important distinction because so many of us expect the things we’re practicing to deliver a complete result.

We expect the new thought to make the old thought disappear. We expect setting a boundary to eliminate the guilt. We expect that making a plan will make us want to follow it, and we expect the pause to make the desire go away. And then, we’re surprised when the tools help, but the uncomfortable part is still there. We’re still running into it.

But what if that is actually not evidence that something’s gone wrong? What if a tool can be working even when the desire is still present? What if it can help without helping 100% of the time? And what if consistency actually means continuing to practice using something that helps even though it doesn’t completely solve the problem every single time? And that is what we’re talking about today.

We’re going to talk about what it actually means for a tool to work. Why an effective tool doesn’t mean it’s a perfect one, and how expecting a 100% result from a tool can totally interfere with the repetition that change actually requires. And I’m excited to talk about this because one of my goals in this podcast is to give you loads of tools, but I think it’s equally important to consider what we’re expecting those tools to actually do. All right? So let’s go.

Let’s start by looking at what we actually mean when we say that something works. I think this is a really important place to start because most of us have a hidden definition of that word. And I call it hidden because we usually haven’t consciously decided on it. We aren’t walking around consciously thinking, hey, if I use this tool, I expect it to completely eliminate this negative thought or feeling or desire. But often, that is what we’re expecting. I know I did. When I started on this whole self-improvement journey and finally started to understand the connection between our thoughts, feelings, actions, and results, I thought, okay, good to go. I just find my negative thought, replace it with something else, and boom, problem solved.

And it took probably a week or less to realize that I was totally unrealistic in my expectations of how mindset work actually works, because I was a pretty good student. Once I learned this, I was all in. I was paying attention like no one’s business, and despite me paying attention and noticing and pausing and doing all the things my coach said would help me, the negative thoughts kept coming up. I didn’t always do the thing I said I wanted to do. I still messed up, and if I’m being fully honest, I still do six years in. So what gives?

Well, I think we expect that if the tool actually works, we won’t feel uncomfortable anymore. Or we won’t have the negative thought anymore, or we won’t feel guilty, or like my client, we won’t want to snack anymore. And eventually, we shouldn’t need the tool at all anymore, right? And I get it, because that’s what I wanted too. If you’re trying to change something that has been difficult for you, of course, you want it to become easier. If you’re trying to stop eating something you don’t really want to eat, of course you would love to stop wanting it. If you’re trying to stop thinking that you are broken, you probably hope that at some point you believe it so completely that the old thought never comes back. Or if you make a plan for the week, you probably hope that the plan will eliminate the daily negotiation about whether or not you’re actually going to follow the plan.

We want to get to a point where we don’t have to work so hard at this. And that all makes sense. We use tools because we want them to help us. We want something to feel different. We want our experience to change. And there is nothing wrong with wanting that. But I think where we get tripped up is that we quietly turn that hope into the standard by which we decide whether the tool is working.

So we pause, but we still want the food. Or we set the boundary, but we still feel guilty. We make the plan, but we still don’t want to do the workout. Or we practice a new thought, but the old one is still right there. And because the thought, the feeling, or the desire didn’t completely disappear, we wonder whether the tool really worked. And I don’t think most of us are intentionally setting an impossible standard. I think we’re just looking for relief. We want the tool to make the hard part feel less hard. But without even realizing it, we can start defining working as complete elimination. Like, I don’t want it anymore. I’m no longer uncomfortable. I don’t have that thought anymore. I don’t feel guilty. I don’t need the tool anymore.

And if that is our definition of the tool working, anything less than 100% can feel like it doesn’t measure up. It can make the tool feel like a failure. So, before we decide whether a tool is working, I think we need to get clear about what we’re actually expecting the tool to do. Because if our subconscious, hidden definition of working is complete elimination of the problem, then it makes total sense that we’re going to be disappointed by so many of the tools we use because we’ve given the tool the wrong job.

Sometimes we expect the tool to function like a switch, where you flip a switch and something immediately changes. Like, the light was on and now it’s off. Or the desire for the cookie was there and now it’s gone. Or you had the thought, you used the tool, and now you don’t have the thought anymore. But that is not how most tools work, especially when we’re talking about changing a behavior, handling a hard emotion, or practicing a new way of thinking. The tool isn’t necessarily going to switch off your experience. Instead, the tool’s job is to help you manage the experience differently.

So, let’s take the pause as an example. If you have been automatically responding to a desire like random snacks for years, then the pause introduces something new into that pattern. So where before the pattern might have been, you see the food, you want the food, you eat the food, there is very little happening between the desire and the action. It’s all super fast and automatic. So now, when you add a pause, the desire might still be there. You might still be thinking about the food. You might even ultimately still decide to eat it.

But now, with the pause, you have something between wanting the food and eating the food. You have space to notice what is actually happening. And in that space, you can ask yourself whether you’re truly hungry, whether you actually even like the food, or whether eating it is really what you want to do. So the pause does not guarantee a particular decision, it really just gives you the opportunity to make a decision instead of reacting on autopilot. And that is a huge difference.

If we’ve given the pause the job of making us stop wanting the food, then for sure, it is not going to work. But if the job of the pause is to interrupt an automatic pattern and make room for a decision, then it can do exactly what it was supposed to do, even if the desire for the food is still there. And the same is true for self-talk. The purpose of practicing a new thought is not necessarily to delete the original thought from your brain. That would be awesome, but our brains just don’t work that way.

If you’ve spent years telling yourself, “I always mess up,” one coaching session and one new sentence probably aren’t going to erase that thought. That old thought may still show up, and it may still sound entirely convincing. But the self-talk that you practice on purpose can introduce another possibility. Meaning, instead of, I always mess up being the only thought available, you’ve got another option. You can also remind yourself, hey, I’ve handled things differently before, or I can make a different decision this time. So the original thought may not go away, but it’s not the only one there.

And we can apply this idea to so many other tools, like having a plan. A plan does not automatically make you feel motivated. But it gives you direction when your motivation is low. A boundary in and of itself does not eliminate guilt. It just clarifies what you are and are not willing to do. Taking a few deep breaths before a difficult conversation, that may not remove your anxiety entirely, but it may help lower the intensity enough that you can say what you need to say. So, in every one of these examples, the tool has a specific job. It can interrupt the pattern. It can give you space, lower the intensity, offer another option, help you move forward.

But the tool itself cannot guarantee what you’ll think, how you’ll feel, or what you’ll ultimately choose. And the fact that a tool didn’t completely transform your internal experience doesn’t tell us whether it did its actual job, because a tool is support. It is not control. And I really want you to hear that. The tool is support, but the tool itself is not control. It can help you navigate challenging moments, sure, but it cannot control every thought, eliminate every feeling, or make every decision for you. And if we’re expecting it to do all of that, we’re not asking the tool to help us anymore, we’re asking the tool to erase the human nature that we all have. We’re asking it to take our humanity out of the picture, and that’s impossible.

And this is where the expectation of a 100% result starts creating another problem. It makes us less likely to use the tool consistently, because think about how this typically plays out. You use the tool. You pause or take a breath or practice a new thought or remind yourself of the plan you made earlier. But then the desire is still there. Or you still want the food. Or you still feel guilty about the boundary. Or you still don’t want to do the workout. And so, because the tool didn’t result in a complete shift, you lose confidence in it.

And you may not consciously decide, hey, this tool is completely ineffective. It might be much more subtle than that. So maybe you just don’t think to use it next time, or you remember it, but you think that didn’t really do much last time. Or maybe you use it half-heartedly. Or maybe you start looking for something else that will work faster or better. And it all adds up to you using the tool less. And then, because you’re not using the tool very often, the behavior you’re trying to stop continues and you keep reacting automatically or having the same thought or making the same choice or responding the same way you always do. And then that gives you evidence that nothing is changing.

So do you see the loop here? You use the tool and expect a 100% result. You don’t get a 100% result, so you use the tool less. And because you use the tool less, the old pattern doesn’t change. And then the old pattern continuing appears to confirm that the tool didn’t work. But the tool never really had a fair shot in the first place because every individual use was being treated like a final exam and it had to prove that it worked.

And that is a really, really tough standard for any tool to meet. So let me give you an analogy of this. Think about strength training. You know if I can find a strength training analogy, I’m here for it. So, strength training is most definitely a tool, but you would never, ever do one set of squats, look in the mirror, and conclude that squats don’t work because you don’t immediately see a better booty. You understand that the individual set matters because it’s one repetition in a much bigger process. The set doesn’t have to transform your whole body today in order to contribute to your total strength over time.

But when it comes to changing habits, we often forget that change, just like growing your glutes, requires repetition, not because you’re doing anything wrong and not because the tool is weak. It requires repetition because the default response you’re trying to change already has a ton of practice. Think about it. If you’ve responded to stress with food for years, that response has had hundreds or really more like thousands of repetitions. If you’ve spent decades always saying yes to avoid disappointing people, that pattern is well practiced. If you’ve told yourself “I’m not good enough” for most of your adult life, that thought has a significant lead on anything new you practice telling yourself in place of that.

And then we introduce one new pause, one new thought, or one different response and expect it to compete immediately with something that we’ve practiced for years. That is a huge expectation. So the first few times you use a tool, it may feel awkward. You may have to remind yourself to do it. You may not feel dramatically different afterward, but that doesn’t mean the repetition was pointless, not at all. The individual use does not have to completely change the pattern in order to be part of changing the pattern. But if we demand proof that it works before we’re willing to practice, we get totally stuck, because practice is often what eventually creates the proof.

And I think that brings us to another key question. So if the desire, thought, or discomfort is still there even after you use the tool, what does that actually mean? Because I think we’re giving that more meaning than it deserves. And I think this is where we need to separate two things that we often treat as the same. And that is what we experience internally versus what we choose to do in response, or even more simply, what’s happening inside versus what’s happening on the outside.

Because having a desire does not require you to act on it. You can want the food but still decide not to eat it. You can want to skip the workout but still get your gear on and get it done anyway. You can want to avoid the conversation and still have it. So the desire is real, but it’s not a requirement that you act on it. And I think that distinction can be really difficult to recognize because we often give our thoughts and our feelings a whole lot of authority. We assume they’re in charge and that they are always right. So if I still want the food, maybe I should just have it. Or if I feel guilty, maybe I’m just being selfish. Or if I’m nervous about this opportunity, I must not be ready.

So we take the feeling and we turn it into evidence. We make it evidence that our decision is wrong, that we’re not ready, or that the work we’ve been doing is not helping. And I’m not saying that we should ignore every thought or feeling or desire that we have. Sometimes guilt is appropriate. Sometimes nervousness is warning us that we need to prepare. Sometimes a persistent desire is worth understanding. But the presence of a feeling by itself doesn’t tell us what it means or what we should do next. It only tells us that the feeling is there.

And honestly, that might be one of the most important parts of this whole conversation, because if every uncomfortable feeling becomes evidence that something has gone wrong, we will spend our entire lives trying to avoid discomfort before we ever allow ourselves to move forward and we’ll never get anywhere. But here is the good news. You don’t have to stop wanting or doubting or worrying or feeling guilty before you can make an intentional decisions. Sometimes desire, guilt, nervousness, those negative feelings stay with us and we decide to go and do the thing anyway. Both can be true.

So if we’re not measuring success by whether the desire or discomfort or the negative thought completely disappears, what should we be looking for instead? Okay. So when I think a tool is working, it often looks way less dramatic than we expect. Maybe it looks like noticing your urge earlier. So maybe in the past, you might not have recognized what was happening until you already reacted and ate the break room cookie. But now, maybe you catch yourself in the middle of the pattern or even just before it. So the urge is still there, but it isn’t quite as automatic as before. That means it’s working.

So maybe you pause, not necessarily for 10 minutes. Maybe it’s just long enough to recognize, I want this right now, but I don’t have to decide immediately. And sometimes the tool works by helping you make a different choice. Meaning, you want to avoid the conversation, but instead you have it. Or you want to say yes, but you hold your boundary and say no. Or you want to give up on the rest of the day, but you make one decision that keeps you moving forward.

Other times, you may make the same choice, but you do it more intentionally. So maybe you pause, think about it, and ultimately decide that you do want the dessert. But now you’re choosing it because you want it, not because you’re on autopilot. That matters too. And maybe working also looks like recovering more quickly. So that means you make a choice you’re not thrilled with, but instead of letting that affect your next few days, you acknowledge it and move on. The cookie stays at one moment instead of becoming an entire story about you being a failure.

Or maybe working just means that you’re willing to use the tool again next time, even though it didn’t give you a perfect result the first time. None of these changes are especially flashy, and none of them are 100%. You may still have the urge, you may still make the old choice sometimes. You may still need to pause and redirect yourself and try again. But you’re noticing more. You have more space between the stimulus and the response. You have more options, and you’re becoming less automatic and more intentional in how you respond. All of that is meaningful change, and all of that points to the fact that the tool is working. And if you’re only looking for the day when the thought, feeling, or desire disappears completely, you may be missing all of the evidence in front of you that the tool is already helping.

And this brings me back to what my client said. It’s not that the tools don’t work, it’s that I’m not consistent with them. So, she was right that consistency matters. Tools can only help if we actually use them. But I also think we need to be clear about what consistency means. And in one of the earliest episodes of this podcast, I defined consistency as behavior plus repetition plus frequency. So you do the behavior, then you repeat the behavior, and then you repeat it with enough frequency that it makes a meaningful difference. That is consistency.

And notice what is not included in this definition, perfection. Consistency does not mean using the tool successfully in every single situation. It doesn’t mean pausing before every decision, catching every thought, or responding exactly the way you intended every single time. In this case, behavior means using the tool. Repetition is returning to it over and over again. And frequency means using it often enough that it becomes more familiar and more accessible to you.

So that means sometimes you’ll remember the tool early as you’re walking towards the break room snacks. Sometimes you won’t think of it until you’re already down half a cookie. And sometimes you’ll completely miss the opportunity to use the tool and only see what happened after the fact. But none of that erases the other repetitions you’ve put in. You just come back and use the tool the next time you remember. And with practice, you’re more likely to recognize your opportunities sooner and the tool becomes easier to reach for because you’ve practiced it. That is how something moves from being a concept you understand to a skill you can actually use. You don’t become consistent because the tool suddenly works perfectly. The tool becomes more useful because you practice using it even imperfectly. Do you see that?

So yes, consistency matters, but consistency does not mean getting a 100% every time. So maybe the next time you use a tool, instead of immediately asking whether it worked, try another question. Like, did this give me a little more space to decide what I wanted to do? Or did this help me respond differently than I would have on autopilot? Because those questions measure something very different. They don’t require you to stop wanting the food. They don’t require you to feel completely confident about your boundary, and they don’t require your old, unhelpful thought to completely disappear before the new one can be useful. We are just looking at whether the tool helped you participate more intentionally in what happened next.

And honestly, I think that’s the part we often overlook. We assume the tool is supposed to guarantee the right decision. But maybe its job is to give you the opportunity to make a decision in the first place, because when you’re operating on autopilot, there really isn’t much of a decision. The pattern takes over, the behavior follows, and you may not even recognize what happened until after the fact. But when a tool helps you pause or notice or remember that you’ve got other options, you’re no longer stuck inside the pattern, you have a choice. And no, you won’t always make the choice you originally planned to make. Sometimes you’ll pause and still eat the dessert. Sometimes you’ll recognize your old thought but still believe it. Sometimes you’ll prepare for the boundary and decide you’re not quite ready to set it yet.

That doesn’t mean the pause was pointless. It means you were present for the decision. You learned something about what happened and you have more information to use for next time. So this week, think about one tool you already have in your back pocket. Maybe it’s a pause, a plan, a question you ask yourself, some self-talk you’ve been practicing, whatever it is, try it, but without insisting that it produce a perfect result. Let it help you, let it create just a little bit of space or give you another option. And then practice using it again, because change rarely arrives as one lightning bolt moment where your old desire switches off and you never struggle again. Instead, it happens through a bunch of smaller moments when you notice what’s happening, interrupt your automatic response, and give yourself the opportunity to choose differently. That may not be a 100% result, but it is change and that still counts. All right?

And if you want help with this, let’s go. When you coach with me, we don’t look for one perfect tool to solve everything. We figure out what’s actually happening, identify the tools that can help you, and practice using them consistently so you start making intentional decisions even when it’s hard. Check out my website, send me a message at www.CarrieHollandMD.com/contact, and let’s talk about how coaching can help you stop operating on autopilot and start responding on purpose. Thank you again for hanging out with me and I’ll catch you again next week.

—

Hey if you want to build muscle but don’t know where to start, I’ve got you covered. Head over to CarrieHollandMD.com/buildstrength and download my free guide to help you maximize your strength training. Inside, you’ll find the essential exercises for building muscle, plus simple one, two, and three-day workout plans you can follow with just dumbbells and a bench. 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.