Adulting - #66 Finding Your Power Hour In Lockdown with Adrienne Herbert

Episode Date: May 31, 2020

Hey podulters, I hope you're well :). In today's episode I speak to personal trainer, motivational speaker and soon to be author, Adrienne Herbert. Adrienne explains what 'The Power Hour' is, we discuss the importance of a good nights sleep and touch a little on whether or not it's ok to have a weight-loss goal. I hope you enjoy :) Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Gambling problem? Call 1-866-531-2600. Or visit connectsontario.ca. Select games only. Guarantee void if platform or game outages occur. Guarantee requires play by at least one customer until jackpot is awarded. Or 11 p.m. well. I have a fab episode coming up for you with the wonderful Adrienne from the Power Hour podcast. You might follow her on Instagram. She is a motivational speaker, personal trainer, soon to be author of the same name of the Power Hour podcast. You might follow her on Instagram. She is a motivational speaker, personal trainer, soon to be author of the same name of the Power Hour. She's got such amazing energy. I'm sure even listening to her, you'll kind of feel uplifted. And we talk about the

ways that you can sort of enhance your life through that magic morning power that she talks about, as well as just you trying to, you know, take on little simple changes to your lifestyle that might make you feel like you're just getting that bit more out of your life. We also do end up talking a little bit about, you know, exercise and our relationship with nutrition. We kind of go all around the houses, but I absolutely love it and I hope that you enjoy it too. As always, please do rate, review and subscribe. Bye! Hello and welcome to Adulting. Today I'm joined by Adrienne. Hey Anoni, thank you so much for having me. Thank you so much for coming on. So for people who don't know who you are and what you do, could you give us a little introduction to you? Yes, absolutely and I'll take the word little

and I'll keep it short because I think as you are and as so many of us are now, I think we do so many different things, so multifaceted, and I certainly do lots of things. But yeah, I am a wellness coach. I am a podcast host, soon to be author, and I'm a runner. And essentially, I feel like the best way to describe what I do is I'm a professional encourager. I absolutely love that and I would say that's 100% true like your attitude and your mood even when I listen to you talking I can feel myself almost getting like worked up because you're just so energetic and you're like a really positive force to be around. Massive congratulations on your book when is that coming out? Thank you. Yeah, it's going to be out on the 31st of December this year, but it's actually

already available for pre-order. So it's mad, actually, that people are sending me these little screen grabs being like, oh, my gosh, I've ordered the book. I can't wait to read it. And I'm just so, so excited to share it. So, yeah, I'm working hard on that right now. Oh, amazing. Well, talk to me about, so your podcast is called The Power Hour. I listen to it quite a lot. I absolutely love it. And it's all about harnessing time and making your day the best that it can be, like getting the most out of your day. But right now, I mean, you're a mother, you're someone who's really active, you're writing a book. What are the things that you, how do you wrestle with all of those things? Because for anyone, they might think you've got a lot on your plate. But evidently, we were just talking about this a bit before, but I see you as someone that's really accomplished in making the most of your time what are the things that you like to encourage people to talk about and I guess a bit like what happens on your podcast sort of thing okay cool so I should probably start off for anyone listening who has no idea what the power hour is what it's all about and why I have a power hour and basically what it is

is I think that starting your day the first hour of your day is incredibly important and I call it the power hour because I believe that time is the most valuable thing that we all have it's the one thing you can't get more of we only have a certain amount of time so I think it's really important to make the most of it and I think that giving your time to somebody else and also you know investing time in yourself is something that I see people doing less and less and it's going to the bottom of the priority list. So the reason that I encourage people to start their day with a power hour is to say that it's like the domino effect.

If you start with that first hour, that's the first domino to fall. So use that hour to focus either on, it could be focusing on yourself. It could be focused on personal development, professional, a career goal, a physical goal, meditation, running, whatever it is that you feel like you would benefit you. Put it at the start of your day. Do it first. Make it in order of priority. Start the day with something that is going to give you more energy than it takes from you. Because for the rest of the day, as we know, the world is busy. We live in a high speed, so many distractions, the world is crazy busy. And for the rest of the day, things will be fighting for your time and attention,

whether that's work commitments, kids, social media, whatever it is, you're going to have these challenges of creating time for yourself. So yeah, so the power hour, essentially in a nutshell, all about that first hour of the day. I am someone who does get up pretty early. I get up at half five every day. And in fact, recently I've been waking up before that, before my alarm. So between five and 5.30. And again, because of this distraction, in that time, that magic hour in the morning, it's before my son's awake. It's before people are sending me WhatsApps. It's before there's anything just that I need to do. I can really use the time for myself. So first hour sometimes is running. This morning,

I ran for an hour, literally 60 minutes. Other times I'll get up and I will just grab a pen and paper and I journal and I have these six questions that I like to answer in the morning. So I'll get up and I will just grab a pen and paper and I journal and I have these six questions that I like to answer in the morning. So I'll write down my six answers. I might do a bit of a stretch. I might make a drink. I might read. At the moment, I'm reading a lot and I find like I read so much more and I retain the information better if I read in the morning versus trying to read in the evening before I go to bed and often like read three pages and fall asleep. So some mornings I just wake up, open the blinds, grab my book and read for an hour. So yeah, I've been doing that. And then I was doing, I started doing it a few years ago and that ultimately led me to talking to other people about it. And when I was invited to speak at wellness festivals or I was invited to, I deliver keynotes and I speak to companies and corporate

environments around. I speak about optimizing energy. I speak about everything from the importance of daily movement as a trainer to cultivating your mindset for growth and for success to confidence, motivation. I deliver these talks. And at the end, I was always getting questions. And the questions that were coming up the most were, how and why do you get up at half five every day? What's that all about? And then the second question that was coming up was around sleep. Like, well, if you're getting up at half five, what's the deal with sleep? And kind of saying, what impact has it had on your life? So I started to go down this rabbit hole and I was kind of thinking, you know, I don't have all the answers. I can only share my own experience. But I went down this rabbit hole and thought, I know I'm not the only person who benefits from this morning magic.

So, you know, we've probably heard of the 5am club and morning, morning, what's the other one? There's like lots of books around this kind of morning rituals. So I started to ask other people, other people who I saw as being high performers or high achievers, whatever you would call them, around, do they have a morning routine? Do they have intentional daily practices? Do they have tools? Do they have hacks? Do they have things that essentially we can all do? You know, whether I was talking to Olympic athletes or whether I was talking to other

authors or whoever, I was kind of finding out or whether I was talking to you know other authors or whoever I was kind of finding out like well what time do you get up in the morning and what do you do first thing in the day and how does that impact you why do you do it is there anything you you avoid in the morning like what's the deal with this morning thing why is it having such a and basically a disproportionate impact on my life and I found found that, yeah, lots of high performers, lots of high achievers were telling me, you know what, Adrienne, I get up at this time. I don't look at my phone. I do this first, then I do this. Other people telling me, oh, I have the, I do a cold shower therapy or I do a breath work or I go straight to yoga or I walk or I run. And

essentially that's what I guess led me to starting the podcast because I thought, okay, if I could harness all of these different people's morning routines find out what they do why they do it and share it with other people then you know essentially as I said anyone can do these they're small things it's not saying you have to change your entire life you know many of us aren't going to train like an Olympic athlete many of us might not be CEOs of six-figure businesses, seven-figure businesses, whatever the personal ambition or the professional ambition is, I've seen and witnessed that ordinary people can achieve extraordinary things. I've witnessed it time and time again. So I thought, okay, great. A, I want to level up. I want to learn from these people. I want to utilize,

maximize my time. I've got big goals. I have huge audacious ambitions. So I thought that's going to help me. And I also thought how wonderful would it be for people to have access to all of these high performers, what they do, siphon all this information and just take one thing away from every episode that they can use into their own life. So that's what led me to the podcast, which has now led to the book deal. So yeah, I mean, that was quite a long answer, I know, Nita, your question. I absolutely love it because you talk as much as me.

I don't wake up at five, but I do try to wake up at six. People's reactions tend to be quite horrified when they hear you saying what time you wake up. Yep. But one of the massive things, I'm sure you've read Matthew Walker's Why We Sleep and he often talks about how like sleep is so important that was a massive thing for me but

people seem to think it's better to go to bed really late and then like wake up later and I'm the same as you I'd rather get up earlier in the morning but there is this kind of idea that some people are naturally early birds and some people are like night owls because when I read that I have friends who literally can't wake up before nine like they really really struggle and learning that was so interesting that there are people that are like more predisposed to the mornings I definitely think I'm one of those people um than the evenings but like what how many hours of sleep a night do you try and get to make sure you're up at 5 5 30 or 4 at the minute yeah so great great question I think the sleep is so important.

I actually have done an episode on the show with a sleep scientist and doctor, a wonderful doctor called Sophie Bostock, and we go really deep on this. And especially as you described, talking about the different types of chromosomes that mean you're either your disposition of being an early bird or a night owl. And that is a real thing. There is a science behind it. However, I'd say that social, cultural, technology, all these things that impact our lifestyles now are actually having a higher, having a bit greater impact on us than our chromosomes. So there's a lot of people who will say, I'm a night owl. There's no way I could get up early. No way, Adrienne. Don't want to hear about this power hour. But actually, A, they've never tried it.

And B, it's actually all the lifestyle factors that make them think that they're a night owl when maybe they're not. So the way to truly test whether you're a night owl or a morning person is that you need to, you know, there's things you need to eliminate. So technology, light, caffeine, there's all these things that if you took them away, not forever, but maybe for even just as short as four or five days, if you went to, I don't know, when people are on holiday sometimes and they're out in natural light and they find, oh, I'm actually naturally, I want to go to sleep at 9pm. And they'll say, oh, it's because I'm exhausted because I work all the time. And now that I'm a holiday, I'm having a rest, I can recover and sleep. And they're finding that they're naturally wanting to fall asleep at 9pm, whereas normally they wouldn't. And it's actually because they're

your factory settings, if you like. Those things are going back to how your body's resetting to where it actually wants to be. So I, as I said, yeah, usually waking up between 5 and 5.30, I try to be in bed before 10, which isn't, I don't know if that's super early. Some people are like, what? I'm still having dinner or whatever. But for me, I just found that, you know what? I had to be really honest with myself. So if I wind back like a couple of years, my son's eight years old now, but let's go back to when he was say five years old. I, like so many people would say, you know, I was time poor. You know, that's what I hear from so many people. Adrian, I don't have time. Oh, I want to do this, but I don't have time. I want to read more. I don't have time. I want to work out more. I don't have time. One day I'm going to do this

and I'm going to do that. If I had more time, it's like this magic thing that we think that one day we're suddenly going to have more time than we have today. It won't happen. That's not the reality. We have to, we have to make the's not the reality. We have to make the changes and the choices. We have to take it into our own hands, take action and say, okay, how am I going to cultivate more time? So going back, as I said, to when Jude was five and I was, it was the first time that I'd ever, I was ever training for a marathon. First time I was ever training for the London marathon, an endurance race. I'd never done endurance events before. And I was also, you know, working, doing, I was writing my blog. I was doing lots of different things. And yeah,

I had a five-year-old. It's, you know, kids wake up early. There's lots to do, you know, breakfast, you know, their first like little spellings, things for school, getting them to school, afterschool clubs, swimming, athletics, football, friends, birthday parties. Honestly, who knew that a five-year-old could have such a rocking social life, but they do. So there's all these things and challenges. And I found myself echoing the same sentiment of others of, oh, I'm so time poor. So when I looked at this marathon training plan and it said, you know, seven miles, eight miles, nine miles, as the weeks roll on in the plan, the time that you're out running just goes up and up and up. And some of these runs are like 90 minutes or two hours. And I was like, when am I going to find the time to train for this race? Like 90 minute run, two hour run. I don't have time. So that was why

I decided, okay, if this is important to you, if this is something that you want, you're going to have to adapt, adjust, make sacrifice, make change, whatever you want to call it. You're going to have to take ownership of this and not just, you know, by deciding to get up an hour earlier to go and do my hour running before Jude woke up and the day started, that was intentional. It was an action. It was a choice. So it's not to say that like, oh, I'm just a morning person and I just jump out of bed and grab my trainers. Like,

of course, that doesn't happen every day. Now it kind of does because it's become a habit. It's been three years. But initially, you know, I had to, it was an intentional action. It was intentional choice. And I kind of just said to myself, let's be honest, what are you doing, Adrienne, between 9pm and midnight? I was like, okay, I am watching, maybe watching a bit of TV. I've got my laptop open. And I'm probably, I would say that I was working in quotes, but actually, what are you doing productive work? If you're kind of scrolling through one site, maybe writing a little bit, maybe looking at ASOS. I would be like, oh, but I'm working between nine and 12 because that's when I'm, yeah, I don't know, I'm creative. I'm doing all this. No, actually the reality was that in those three hours, I was faffing around. I was doing just, and it's not to say you can never have time that is just, watch Netflix and chill. Cool. I'm not telling people every hour of your day has to be productive. No. But for me, I was like, okay, if you can just accept the fact that you're just wasting time in

the evenings, not really doing anything, use that time to sleep and actually recharge your body, your brain. There's so much research gone into sleep more recently and become more popularized by Matthew Walker, as you said, and through other sleep experts, that people are really now grappling with this idea that, yes, you can learn more about exercise, you can talk about nutrition, you can, you know, do these little hacks, but actually sleep is the one thing that lifts every boat in your harbor. Sleep affects everything from your hormone production to your, you know, to your, um, your appetite, to your mood, to your ability to perform, you know, peak performance. They're now looking, you know, everyone from Formula One drivers to Olympians, they're looking at actually this idea that sleep and recovery is actually

not just as important as performance, but actually as training, but maybe even more important than the training that you're doing. So I just got real with myself and I just said, you know what, if you want to get up early, if you want to train for this race, if you want to do all these things, if you have, as I said, big ambitions and audacious goals, and you want to, I don't know, start a podcast, do all these things, start different things, work with different people, you have got to prioritize. You've got to get up. You've got to set that alarm and you've got to think, you know what, is your goal, is the thing you want, is it more important? If it's important to you, I believe you will do the work. I believe if it's going to add value

to your life, if it's going to make you healthier, happier, whatever the goal, you have to be real with yourself. You can't, you know, that thing of like, I don't want to be harsh and say that all people are full of excuses and, but we all do it. Right. I definitely have done that where it's like, Oh, but I can't because of this and people, Oh, but I've got kids and all but this, all but that. And actually I just thought, get real Adrian, if you want to do it, make it happen, get up, get out the door, focus and get your head in the game. And once I did, once I, like I said, initially it took, you know, discipline and, uh, it took a lot of intentional, intentional action. Then it later on became a habit. Now it's just a habit. Now I wake up, I don't think, oh, you know,

it's quarter past five. Now I'm just like, wicked. It's the morning. Let's go get up. Um, and so yeah, evenings, like I said, in bed by 10. And yeah, I mean, I can go on and on about like the evening wind down and the routine and the sleep and stuff. But essentially, it's just about prioritize your sleep in a nutshell. There are so many things I want to say to that. I think you're so right on so many points, especially how our lifestyle factors, we perhaps don't realize how much they're impacting us. And especially from the point of I would say you're someone who really probably runs at optimum in terms of like you're getting a good night's sleep you eat really nutritious foods and you exercise a lot and your body I would imagine like if you went out and got smashed I imagine your

hangover would probably be like a hundred times worse than someone who drinks more frequently because you're constantly in a state where you probably feel really well would you agree would you agree with that okay I don't know let me have a think basically I think again I don't want you to paint honestly I know I feel like you're painting me as this like everything sorry no no it's fine but I'm just being honest because I think perhaps that's other people's perception that everything's optimal and everything's great and perfect and you know what the reality is it's not you, I don't have the perfect diet or the perfect exercise routine, or, you know, this is, these are things that I continually strive for and try to do. But I'd say with regards to like, you know, say for example, a hangover or

it's, I don't know, I feel like it's a weird one because I know that I can go out, I can have like, you know, back in the day anyway, this is when we used to go out, you know, go out and have like six gin and tonics and be literally, I mean, that's a lot and I'll be like drunk and thinking oh my gosh I'm yeah but as soon as I get home I have a pint of water I go to bed I wake up and I'm kind of fine so yeah I don't know if that if that's is that the answer you expected I think that's even worse only because I guess maybe I don't know maybe I'm not doing it very often so I guess maybe that's the thing I think if I I definitely could feel it and I think to be honest maybe that's a bad example gin tonic wine I can feel it so I've had

like if I share a bottle of red wine I definitely feel like foggy in the morning and I think that to be honest when we're talking then about lifestyle and people not necessarily noticing I think it's such a you you know, everyone's habits, you think that they're just, for example, people who drink alcohol maybe three or four nights a week, you know, they might have a glass of wine while they're cooking dinner. They might, you know, drinking four nights a week. It's not like, oh my gosh, this shocking thing. People are like, yeah, of course I have a glass of wine whilst I'm cooking dinner. That's normal. So I think looking at what your habits are and looking at what's optimum for you, sometimes you have to zoom out. Do you see what I

mean? And look at a wider spectrum to look at your own habits. Because yeah, for some people, drinking four nights a week might not be shocking at all. Whereas for me, if I drank four nights in a week, I definitely would feel it. Yeah. So I think maybe I worded that wrong. Basically, what I meant was, which is something I've realized as well, is especially with alcohol, when you drink, so being on holiday is quite a good example. So when I'm on holiday and I'm drinking every night because we're on holiday and we're abroad, I do find that I start to get really used to that and feel like that's normal. And my new normal becomes quite suboptimal, but because I've got so used to drinking that much and maybe not exercising as much and not sleeping as much then when I go back to being in a better slightly better routine I suddenly wake up and I think

oh my god I feel so much better I think what I was trying to say was what happens is when we're talking like this it might seem like such a big pass to stretch out in front of someone thinking waking up at 5am every day and going for a run every day and all of those things but if you strip it back it's actually like really small incremental changes so for for instance, I used to drink, I'm actually drinking more on lockdown, but I stopped ever drinking in the week because I was like, I've realized how much it impacts me. Even one glass of wine, as you say, would impact my sleep, which would impact my exercise, which would impact my work. And it's all like a domino effect. Whereas if I drunk on a Friday night or on a Saturday night, that became so crucial to me having a good

week. But I hadn't ever really recognized that, as you say, that one small glass of wine, which seems so innocuous until I'd read about sleep and things I hadn't realized. And it's the knock-on effects, all these little small actions. And one thing I think is true as well is, as you say, like missing that power hour or not having that time to yourself can make you feel more exhausted. I definitely see this at uni, like if I'd lie in and then I couldn't be bothered to do something you just kind of set the tone for the day and as much as I never want to put pressure on anyone or not acknowledge the privilege that comes with you know having time to exercise like maybe people work a lot of job there's so many different layers to it like socioeconomic facts and stuff but taking all of

that away we all need to give ourselves a lot more credence than we do. Like, I think we all have this default setting and think, oh, well, before I got into exercise, I never thought I'd be able to do it. I never, ever thought I could go for a run or go to the gym. And now I'm like, of course I can. And it's, as you say, it's habit. But getting sometimes from A to B can be, seem like almost an insurmountable task for people. It feels like, how we even even get there so if we like stripped it down to the really small changes and things that you think are really easy to adopt like what what would those be on a really like small micro level that everyone could do do you know what I mean yeah absolutely it's a brilliant question I think micro steps is what I

call it is is really. And I think firstly, first thing I'd say is it's important to think about your own personality and look at your previous. So what I mean by personality in this instance is some people are all or nothing and they can say, oh, you know, I'm all or nothing. If I'm going to make a change, I want to go big, or if I want to do something, I'm doing it a hundred percent or not at all. Other people say, oh no, for me, it's like, you know, I like to make small incremental changes, incremental steps, and I can't change too many things at once. And so knowing that and acknowledging that there isn't one way that's better than the other, but knowing which one works better for you is the key. So starting off with that. And then if you decide, okay, right, some micro steps,

what are the small things that I could do? Then don't, you know, yeah, firstly, yeah, don't change everything at once. Because if you're like, right, I'm going to get up early. I'm going to start exercising. I'm going to stop drinking alcohol. I'm going to do it. You're literally going to hate your life. You're just going to be like, this is not my life. I can't recognize what I'm doing.

And you're setting yourself up for failure. So in opposition to that, set yourself up for success. So give yourself goals, which are what I say, like close on the horizon, you know, so it's not like this huge thing that you're going to work towards for a month. A good example might be, okay, I'm going to start off with a 10 minute walk every morning for five days, a 10 minute walk every morning for five days. It does that mean I need to get up 10 minutes earlier, maybe 20 minutes earlier and just start there? Because what you do when you start off with this goal that's, as I say, close on the horizon

is you prove to yourself that you can do, that you can achieve, that you can set a goal and you can achieve it. You prove to yourself that you mean what you say. I talk sometimes about this idea of casting a vote and you cast a vote that says, I said I was going to go for a walk for 10 minutes and I did it. I said I was going to, I don't know, not drink three coffees today, just have one coffee and I did it. Every time you do that, you give yourself proof and you cast a yes vote. And essentially it's not about like proving it to anyone else or like this invisible tally chart of yes and no votes. It's just for yourself. So every time you, for example, hit snooze, you don't get up, you don't do the walk, you're casting a no vote,

which is like, nah, actually, I'm not the kind of person who means what I say. I'm not the kind of person who gets up and does a walk or a run or whatever. And so I think over time, if you can cast more yes votes than no, you will start to embody the habits, the behaviors. It builds your confidence within yourself. Do you know what I'm saying? So I think for me, that's a good place to start is to start with a 10 minute morning practice of, it could be 10 minutes of stretching, 10 minutes of also, another thing to think about is that I'm giving these examples of like walking and stretching. Those might not be desirable for you. Those might not be things that are going to take you towards

like the outcome that you want. So maybe for you, it's like, I want to do 10 minutes of HIIT training or 10 minutes of boxing or 10 minutes of strength because there's all these different... I'm big on neuroplasticity and all the different things that affect our body and brain. And when we move, there's so much science now around how movement impacts the body, not just the physical body, but also our mentality and our hormones. So if, for example, you're, let's say on a psychological level, you're going through something in your life and you feel a lack of control, you might feel, I don't know, maybe a vulnerability, maybe a weakness. That's fine. It's all, you know, all of these things, we all are experiencing the world. this is the human condition to have

these different ups and downs and highs and lows. So it's not useful to go, okay, pull yourself out of it, snap yourself out of it. I don't like that kind of language. But what I do think it's useful to do is think, okay, what is the feeling that I want to feel? So for example, I want to feel stronger emotionally, physically. then actually something like strength training for 10 minutes in the morning, it's not just the physical. You don't just train the body and go, okay, my bicep is stronger. You're actually telling your, your body's telling the brain, the brain telling the body, I am stronger. I am getting stronger. I can lift myself. I can endure. I can overcome. And so those kinds of things I think are super powerful. I'm really

obsessed on this right now because for me, someone who's busy, busy, go, go, my energy is always thriving mode, doing mode. I know that sometimes I need stillness and I need solitude and I need calm to kind of balance out this frantic energy. So again, looking at like, can you sit still for 10 minutes with no input, with no podcast, with no music, with nothing, just sit for 10 minutes. That for me is probably more challenging than running 10 miles. So, you know, look at what the challenges that would benefit you in the morning and just start with 10 minutes. I love this concept of positive affirmations and it was a huge that was a massive transformation with me when it comes to exercise because another

especially when you talk about movement I think why I think it's so impactful and powerful it's not once have you mentioned physicality or what you look like or weight loss and I think that can be so damaging for people when when we do talk about exercise because that we become fixated on that and I would always be fixated on how much weight can I lose by doing X amount of exercise. And then something changed. And I started to think how you talk about it, which was, what will I gain by doing this? So as you say, like, I find that I get so much mental clarity for movement, and I feel like my head's cleared. And especially if I'm having a bad day, if I do exercise, I'm like, well, at least, you know, I've gone and moved my body and actually it

does have this and I think we're getting there I think the world is speaking a bit more like that but then I don't know if that's just the people I follow and the people I engage with I've become so used to this this language of like positive affirmations around exercise around movement around having a good routine because ultimately what what you talk about and what your your whole ethos is about kind of just making your life better. There's no like it's about how like these processes will improve your mood and your physicality and all of those things rather than like what you're going to gain as like an immediate tangible result. It's a holistic idea. And I think that's so crucial.

What was the changing point for you? Did you ever have those narratives before did you were you ever stuck in in more negative spaces when it came to like a relationship with food and exercise and and how has that changed or or have you always kind of had that idea around it yeah okay that's a good question which you know what it's funny no one's ever asked me that and I think it's interesting because as you said, in the space that we work in, we see and hear, I think we see and hear so many people talk around their journey from fitness to whether it was for weight loss and hating their body to now loving their body and how their attitude to food has changed. And obviously it's amazing that people feel like they can share those stories and be honest and candid and vulnerable vulnerable and it's amazing but for me it's

interesting yeah no one's ever asked me um but taking it back I used to be a professional dancer so for anyone who doesn't know that's that's I used to be a professional dancer I trained in vocational and then went into the west end and I was a performer so I've always had movement it's always been a part of my life dancing um and actually even I even did athletics but movement has always been a part of my life. So stretching, obviously, if you're in a dance studio all day, you're dancing. So I have, I guess, growing up, I started dancing when I was 12. I always had this thing of like using the body to see what you could do. So it was kind of like, can you jump higher? Can you stretch further? Can

you get this line? And although the dance world, world I will I should have caveat by saying the dance world is obviously you know there's a lot of importance on aesthetics and people looking a certain way however the focus was always around performance for me anyway it was always about performance it was always about like like I said like kicking your leg higher or the back bend or the shape or the movement and also the feeling that you could evoke through through movement through dance through through music so for me I'm very fortunate that you know I never had this kind of um I guess this idea that like exercise was as was a way of as for a lot of women let's be honest you know burning fat burning calories changing the shape of their body trying to make their body smaller trying to you know slog away for hours to earn a piece of cake.

It was never that narrative. For me, it was always around performance and movement. But then, as I studied to become, when I later changed careers and studied to become a trainer, I definitely, I'm not naive to that. I've worked with so many women and I'm a mother. I've worked with so many postnatal women who would just say to me, Adrienne, I've booked you. I want to lose weight. I want to lose weight because I've had kids and I don't like my tummy. Basically, they were like, I know you're going to talk to me. I was talking to them about improving their posture and strength and this and that. And they were like, yeah, that's cool, but I want to lose weight. And that was their goal. It was like, I want to drop a dress size because for me, that's where my confidence is. That's where I, you know, I want to feel better because,

and I know that I'll feel better when I look better. And so for a lot of women, that narrative is so entwined, you know, there's been so we, you know, I'm sure you've discussed this so many times and only I know you have around, you know, the beauty standards and just like the cultural influences that have been pushed onto us since birth about the way women's bodies should look and that if they do look this way, you will feel this way. And if you are not in constant pursuit of this ideal aesthetic, then what are you really doing? You know, why are you really going to the gym? Like, let's be honest. It's because you're trying to lose weight. So I definitely have experienced, you know, working with women and saying to them as well, there is no shame in admitting that you want to lose weight. So I definitely have experienced, you know, working with women and saying to them as well, there is no shame in admitting that you want to lose weight. I think the narrative now around like love your body at any shape and any size is wonderful. Like, amen. Like, thank you. Finally,

women are allowed to be the way they actually, you know, however they want to be. It's their choice. But what I would say is that what's come with that, I don't know if you'd agree, is now the opposite is that you're not allowed to admit that, you know what, I, you know, I don't know, had some kids, I've gone up a dress, like whatever, and I want to lose weight. You're not allowed to say that anymore, because you should love yourself, you should accept the body that you have is strong and healthy. And you know what, it doesn't matter, which for a lot of people, if they can, the idea and they can be truly happy, then that's great. But I'm just worried that some people fall in the middle where they're like, oh, I'm trying to tell myself that I am happy and that I want to love my body and they're on this journey, but they're almost afraid to admit that, well, actually, I'm not that happy in my skin. I don't feel super confident in the way that I look. And it's a personal choice. So, you know, I think giving women the permission to firstly, to say it's my body, it's my choice, however I want to look or train or whatever. It's a personal thing. I don't, you know, the fact that my goal is to, you know, run a marathon and encourage people to,

that's my goal. I'm not saying to everyone else, you should want to run, you should want to run a marathon. And so just by in the same, in the same way, people should be allowed to have whatever goal they want. You know, if they want to get stronger and be able to do a hundred pull-ups and good for them, like pick your goal and own it. And don't feel that you have to justify to others. Well, why do you, well, why do you want to lift weights? Well, why do you want to get stronger? Well, why do you want to be whatever you have your reason, you know, but also challenge yourself to understand what that reason is.

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19 plus and physically located in Ontario. Gambling problem? Call 1-866-531-2600 or visit connectsontario.ca. Please play responsibly. Is it from you or is it from someone else? Is it from, you know, I had a client once who, you know, and sadly she said to me, my husband booked these sessions for me because we're going on holiday. And he had kind of said to her like, Oh, you know, like you should,

you know, book a trainer and shape up. And I was mortified for her. Like I was literally like, what? So she was coming to these sessions, but not for herself. You know, she had one foot in the door and one foot out the door because she'd always say to me, oh, afterwards, I went to Starbucks and I got a muffin. And, you know, she didn't really care. She didn't really want to lose weight. She didn't care about, she was perfectly happy, I think, in her body.

And so I think if your intention is coming from someone else, i.e., I mean, I'm going to say this, arsehole husband, like what a dick. Or if it's from, you know, social media, if it's from even our parents, like, let's be honest, some people have grown up with the narrative from their parents telling them, oh, you know, stop eating sugar and don't do this. And like, whatever, wherever it's come from, just take a moment to look and to reflect and turn inwards and go, okay, why do I want to move? Why do I want to exercise? Do I value the body that I have, the health, the ability that I have, if I'm in a physical able body, that I wake up without pain, that I wake up without disease and illness, I don't have to

take medication, that I can move my body, start there, and then explore the ideas, I think, of why you want to move. and yeah I mean I know I'm going on and on and on is that an answer to that question I know I love that answer first of all that woman needs to freaking leave her husband is what I would say can you believe like honestly that can you believe I was like this was this was eight maybe eight years yeah it's probably about eight years ago when I was working with clients and I I was like my jaw hit the floor I was like what she was like yeah we're going on holiday and he basically said oh guess what I booked 10 sessions with you with a personal trainer before we go on holiday that is horrendous

but I I do agree with you it's really tricky and I talk about diet culture and stuff on this podcast all the time but the difficulty is we're still living in a world apart from this very I think we think it's everywhere but I actually think this health at every size and body positivity is still such a small movement. It really hasn't hit the mainstream to the extent that it has in our echo chamber. And so the difficulty is women, as you say, feel ashamed now if they want to lose weight, which is really unfair to feel ashamed about something which we've been so conditioned to believe that we need to do. And then all of a sudden, something which you've been told pretty much from the moment you're born that you need to be the smallest you can be and whatever suddenly it's been flipped reverse as

you say which is a really positive thing but then you can't admit that you're still and I posted something there was a really good meme on Twitter and it's basically like someone was saying that like they completely agree with that diet culture should be abolished but at the same time they're so susceptible still to feeling like so we're in this tug of war where you while you you know intrinsically that, you know, you shouldn't have to change your body. It doesn't mean that you're, I have body image days sometimes. Like the other day, I literally said to Matt, I feel so gross. And it's just one of those things that is part of life really. And the difficulty is, I think we should dismantle the rhetoric that like, we need to be losing

weight all the time. But at the same time, as you say say like we should have access to the agency where we're not children you know you don't you shouldn't be forced either way I think that I think the difficulty is that people do ascribe it it really undermines the benefits of exercise when it's constantly just attributed to fat loss and weight loss and you know often more often than not if someone does change their exercise routine or their nutrition routine like your body composition may well change and that might be a really positive thing for you that you feel happy about um I've I got really tied up in knots when I'm trying to talk about this I got so worried about saying something which is because it is really

tricky but I think I think you're right I definitely don't think anyone should feel ashamed or upset if they want to say that they want to lose weight I just think that sometimes it depends who is who's saying it and where it's coming from and as you say you've really got to interrogate why do you feel that way because a lot of the time I was I'm a qualified personal trainer and I personal trained in London for about a year before I kind of stopped and changed a bit what I'm doing now but every client I had was a woman that was the same size as me who wanted to lose weight and that's like what does that say like they were all slim women and all they wanted to do was lose weight and I would I would spend hours with them talking about like why do you want to lose weight like half the sessions would actually end up being

kind of like really interrogating where that desire had come from and in the end we decide that actually maybe it was better just to get stronger in the gym and see what the outcome might be um and then they got a love for training, which they didn't have before. And that you keep that forever. So I think I agree with you. It's so hard. But if you've anyone's ever been a personal trainer, you'll know that 99% of requests that you get through are women wanting to lose weight. And they're generally not even bigger than the size eight. Yeah. And you know what, I think you're right in terms of, you know, as you said, it's quite a difficult topic to speak about, especially when I haven't, you know, I'm just speaking today in a candid, honest and open way. This is how I think and feel today.

You know, I haven't done extensive reading research on this specific topic. However, so I do think that sometimes, you know, it's quite hard, isn't it, when you share things out into the world? You know, this is my opinion. And then often people will pick it apart and say, oh, you said this and you didn't say that. So this is just me speaking from, you speaking from an honest, my experience to date. But I think what I'd say about that, as you said about there's so many benefits to exercise. And now I think people are definitely speaking about them more broadly. But I think whatever the gateway is for people to get in, if it is that they come to the gym because they want to lose weight and they go there, hopefully through the time, as you said, working with someone like

yourself or the plan or whatever, they will start to feel those benefits in other areas of their life because, you know, moving your body and exercise, it has a neurochemical change. It changes things within the body, whether it's, you know, we've all heard about the runner's high and, you know, endorphin release and dopamine and there's different things as well. So when you achieve, for example, I talk obviously a lot about running because it's my passion, but when you achieve and you run a 5k and you hit stop or you, or you do your first 10k and you get that medal or whatever it is, there's all these things that will start to, I believe anyway, impact other areas of your life. So you go, you know what? I never thought I could, honestly,

Anoni, I never thought I could run a marathon. I, when I was growing up, you know, I'm Jamaican heritage for anyone who doesn't know, you know, never seen a picture of me. I'm mixed race. I'm Jamaican heritage. And I was always like, I'm a sprinter. I'm a sprinter. For me to think about running a mile, I was like, that's long distance. So the thought of doing a marathon was insanity to me. But after doing five miles, I was like, okay, if I can do five miles, maybe I can run six miles. If I can do six miles, maybe I can do eight miles. And so all these things that over years, it's been, you know, eight, nine years that I've been training and running and in this world. So I think whatever

the gateway is for someone, if it is that they start running because they want to lose weight, fine. I don't have a problem with that because I truly believe that through time and through experience and through practice, they'll get the other benefits that eventually will outweigh, you know, they'll forget that, oh yeah, like I was initially, you know, back in the day, people were like, oh, actually now I run because I want to, yeah, beat my PB time. Or now I'm training for this race because I'm signed up to a marathon in, I don't know, there's marathons all over the world. You know, now I use races as a way to travel. I'm like, where's a place I've never been? Okay, Tel Aviv. They've got a half marathon. Let me book it. So, you know, I think there's whatever the gateway is. And for a lot of women, not just women,

for men as well, I think for a lot of men, the gateway into exercise might not necessarily be weight loss, but it's still aesthetic driven. It's still this idea that, you know, I want to get buff or I want to get bigger or, you know, my upper body's weak and scrawny and I want to have this big chest. And, you know, there's still so many aesthetic goals for both men and women. And if that's their gateway in, I don't have a problem with it because I hope that, you know, the benefits of movement will outweigh that, you know, unless obviously, you know, there's always going to be exceptions to every rule. And for people with, you know, mental health disorders, people with eating disorders, all these things, I know that, you know, exercise can be, you know, if it's obsessive, if it's compulsive, it can be very detrimental. I think for the majority of people, once they engage in

a physical movement practice for a long period of time, they'll get a lot of benefit from it. No, and you're completely right. Don't apologize for what you said at all. I think that so many people will relate entirely to what you're saying. And there'll be so many people listening to this who will still totally have that narrative in their head of wanting to lose weight. I think that it would be remiss to act like we've got past that because we just haven't. And I think everyone in our industry has maybe, you're probably probably the exception there it was someone that did exactly what you just said they got in it into it purely aesthetics I did a bloody bodybuilding competition like you can't really get more aesthetics based on that and then it kind of came out the other side

and as you say like if you do stick to it and it does become a habit suddenly you love the exercise more than the weight like it does it does just happen it's just unfortunate that within society there's so many ideas around it that it takes you doing that trial and error to get to the real truth of you know why exercise is so beneficial um and I want to talk a bit more about that actually because you just brought up which I think is a really salient and interesting point about how your race gave you this preconceived idea about what your fitness would be and that you just were like oh yeah well obviously I can't run long distance and when you think about that

isn't that just insane that we've programmed to think you know oh I'm a woman or I'm mixed race or I'm whatever and as such I can't achieve xyz and I think we're all held back by those invisible socially constructed barriers and I wanted to ask coming more into the power I guess more broadly in a way from exercise and routine and nutrition with routine I think people genuinely do believe they'll have these ideas in their heads that oh I'm just lazy that's just who I am and yeah and actually if you don't challenge those little thoughts in your head which have come from whatever that might be whether it's society telling you because you think your body doesn't look like it's the kind of person that's going to exercise or your whatever it might might be how many people have you spoken to on the

power hour who really had to do a massive 180 would you say that the majority of them had to learn you know as you said it was an application process you decided one day you were going to do it do you find that more than or lot people have to make an active choice to live the way they do? Yeah, so 100%. So the first thing when you said around, you know, this idea of, you know, the labels and the ideas and the beliefs that we have about ourselves, I think, yeah, that definitely transcends across every area of our lives. And not just the way we move and exercise, but yeah, for me, you know, I think there's a couple of things. One, the Jamaican heritage, but two was actually just experience. So at school, you know, being the person who ran, I would win the a hundred meters, you know, I was fast.

So being fast always for me always meant, well, you're fast. Therefore you can't do long distance. You know, you, that you're built. I used to say, I'm not built for long distance. Cause I'm, yeah, again, like I'm fast. I've got fast twitch muscle fibers, like whatever the excuse or whatever the rationale I used to be like, yeah, like I'm not built for running marathons, forget it. So it definitely was a mindset shift, which I actively wanted to do. It's almost like I wanted to challenge myself and my own bias to be like, actually, Adrienne, maybe you can run further, you know? And so I think for a lot of us, we've got to investigate where do these things come from? Because, you know, as a parent now, I'm very aware of, you know, the language that I use around my son, the things that I

encourage him to do or not do, because I think that's where a lot of these things come from. If you think back to school, you know, we all probably can think of the groups. It was like, those are the smart kids. Those are the music people. Those are the sporty ones. Those are the cool kids that you're put into these boxes through your peers, through social hierarchy, through your teachers, your parents. Even if your parents told you that you're the pretty one or the smart one, those things, as though they sound harmless and silly, they are crucial to building our own beliefs around ourselves and our mindset. So yeah, for a lot of people that I've interviewed on the show, I guess there's kind of two things. There's one that's people who they always had this innate belief in themselves. And maybe that came from their parents telling them like, you know, you're wonderful, you're brilliant,

you're a star. Like they kind of had this thing of like, wow, like my mom thinks I can do it. My dad thinks I can do it. My sister thinks I can do it. Like I'm good at this. And so they had this like, you know, young, naive, like amazing kind of ignorance that was like, of course I can go and become a singer or a DJ or a TV presenter or whatever. Cause they're like, of course I can. So that was, that's one side. And then the opposite of that, I think is sometimes the kind of, I'll prove you wrong attitude. So often being told that you can't do something or you're not good at it can give you this chip on your shoulder growing up. And if used in the the right way it doesn't have to be a negative thing because you can kind of have that you know I think I probably had a little bit of that for some things

in my life and you know the fact I'm now writing a book I sometimes think if some of my high school teachers knew that you know Penguin were publishing my book they probably would be surprised that I had read a book let alone written one so I think that there's these ideas sometimes where you're like, actually, I'll prove you wrong, X, Y, and Z person who thinks that I can't run a marathon or who thinks that I'm not, I don't know, I don't have, I don't know, a face for telly or whatever you want to call it. So I think there's been people who have fallen into both camps. Some that prove you wrong, they've really had to cultivate and change their habits, change their behaviors and say,

okay, maybe, you know, you said then around being lazy and people going, oh, I'm just not, you know, I just can't do this or can't do that. Actually starting to reframe the language that they use around themselves is really important and saying, stop, you know, stop telling yourself

because it's a kind of a, it's a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you tell yourself you're not a morning person and you can't function without coffee, and if you tell yourself these things, you will not only believe them, but your actions, your habits, and your behaviors will reinforce them. So what you do and what you say will not only enforce what other people expect of you, but most importantly, those things will inform what you expect of yourself. So really, you know, really be kind of police that, you know, what you do and what you say, make it the things that you want to be true. It sounds so, I remember when people used to say stuff like that, I kind of wouldn't listen. But the one time when I can tell you it's true, if you try to go for a run and you say to yourself, I can't do it, you literally won't be able to run.

I found this so many times. If I'm in my head going, oh, I can't do it. I'm too tired. I'm not going to be able to run. I physically can't go for a run. Whereas if I'm like, come on, we're going to get this. We're going to do it. You're just going to keep going.

Just get through it. In the end, I'll be really good. And it's absolutely wild how much of your internal monologue translates into, as you said, everything's interconnected. So we sometimes think that if you, and also you can't, it depends if you've got like obviously mental illness or mental health issues that are going to really be detrimental to certain things, then we can't change that. But on a smaller level with our general mental health, there are certain things that you can do, which I used to think this was all really wishy-washy and bullshit. And I was quite a negative person. I was no it's all crap it's just me and whatever and then I really

started to try and practice being more positive and being like right we're gonna get this done it's gonna be a good day and it's gonna be fine and it sounds silly but it really works and I it's even like the way you talk about yourself like one of the ways I really dealt with body image issues was I just started not being a bitch to myself in my in my head and all of these things really add up and I think that in I've completely forgot to even talk about lockdown but I think the reason one of the reasons I'd love to want to speak to you now in lockdown is that whilst right now whilst kind of everything is it's sort of like we're in a vacuum like everything's kind of changed and we all come out of it now but it's probably a really good time when you could start playing around and practicing and figuring out what things actually

help you and also I think sometimes if you don't feel enough self-worth I think some people sometimes people don't feel good enough in themselves they feel that they don't deserve to try or they find it cringe like when I was I didn't think I was fit I'd be like I can't go for a run I'm too fat to run and actually that was like a bit not self-harming but it was really like not serving myself I was too concerned that I wasn't deserving and if you start to think actually I am worthy you know what like I'm just going to set my arm I'm going to get out I deserve to have a really good day I do think there's a lot to do with self-worth tied into your routine and how you look after yourself and actually they all prop each other up and you can start to feel much better within yourself when you're like, actually, I deserve to exercise.

Like if you're able-bodied and you can exercise, I think that it's such a privilege and that you should feel like I'm going to give my body that treat. And it was all of these things which before, like years ago, I would just think were nonsense. And the older I got, I started to realize it is really as simple as it has to start with you and you've got to kind of put your oxygen mask on first and like take care of your home or whatever so oh yeah sorry there's so many things as you're talking then I was like yes this and this and this because yeah one I want to kind of circle back and then I'll come back to this idea of you know the kind of yeah the idea around self-worth I think is really important but the thing that you said before that I wanted to jump on, but before I visit that topic of self-worth, the thing you just talked about with positive self-talk and positive affirmation, when people say those words, you know, stand in front of the mirror and you repeat these positive affirmations. And it actually said to put

post-its on the mirror that said things like, you know, I'm beautiful, I'm confident, like all of these things. Because it said, as you say those things to yourself every day, when you clean your teeth, you are going to start to believe the things that you say. And I found this so problematic for so many reasons. I was like, hang on a minute. I consider myself to be an intelligent person. I just felt like positive affirmations were just like telling yourself something that wasn't true in the hope that you would one day brainwash yourself into believing it. However, I'd like to say now is that I had it all wrong. This idea of positive affirmations, you know, if I put on the mirror, I'm taller, I'm taller, I'm five foot 10

and every day I say it, am I going to get taller? No. If I say every day, the sky is purple, the sky is purple, is the sky going to be purple? No. And because we're smart people, we know the difference between reality and truth. So it's not positive affirmations and positive self-talk for people who do go, this is cringe. I don't want to hear it. This is not going to work. It's BS. What I would say to those people is it is not about fooling yourself or tricking yourself or saying things that you don't mean until you mean them. It's actually just about drawing your attention away from the negative towards the positive. So by having these, you know, as you said, positive affirmations or saying to yourself on a run or before you run, I can do this. Like I can do this run. It's not about fooling yourself, kidding yourself, any of that. It's

actually around you're drawing your mind away from, because you can't believe two things that are opposing in tandem at the same time. So you're no longer thinking, I can't, I can't, this is awful, I'm rubbish. And you're focused more on the can. And so for me, that's the key thing with positive affirmations, regardless of if you think it's cringe, regardless of if you think that it isn't, try it and be open-minded to the fact that you're just shifting your attention towards what you actually want and away from what you don't want. So that's what I wanted to share about that. And then the idea that you said about self-worth. Okay. So I don't know if many people listening to your show are, I'm not really sure obviously how old they are, whether they have kids, whether they're mothers, whether they're, you know, single people, whatever. But something that comes up a lot is this idea that taking time for yourself is like this super selfish kind of, you know, almost indulgent thing, you know, of like, oh, who has time to like, you know, read, do a face mask, light a candle, do breath work, meditate. They're like, that's

so self-indulgent. Like I don't have the time for that because I'm busy giving my time to others, whether that's my kids, whether that's my work, whether that's my family, my friends, like my partner. And actually I liked that you said, you know, you gave the analogy of the putting on your oxygen mask, whatever you choose to do, for example, in the power hour in the morning, if you decide that, you know, to be, to have an impact on the world, to make change, if you want to, you know, be a support to someone else, if you want to be a better parent or a better husband, wife, spouse, partner, if you want to make change in the world, if you want to, I don't know, save the planet, save the environment,

if you want to change government policy, whatever your goal is, how can you do that goal to the best of your ability? How can you reach that if you are not filling yourself up, if you don't have full energy, if you don't feel great, if you don't optimize the things in your life? So I always say, if you want to change the world, start by changing yourself. If you want to impact others and have a positive influence on them, start by lead by example, you know, practice and demonstrate the things yourself before trying to, because that's what I hear from so many people. They're like, yeah, but I want to help this person. And yeah, but I want to do that. I'm like, that's great. I'm not saying that these things should have this individualistic approach. That's like all about me, me, me, you know, I want to be

better at this and I need to focus on my career goals and my sleep and my, it's like, once you do those things and you give to yourself, then you have more to give, to share, to encourage, to motivate for other people as well. So it's a win-win, like everybody wins from that. So yeah, that's what I think when it comes to the self-worth, the selfish, the time, it's like the more time you give to yourself, time is the most valuable thing that you can give to another person. But if you can start off by giving yourself time and valuing the time invested in yourself, it's only going to benefit your relationships, your career, every other aspect of your life as well. Totally, 100% agree. And this is something that took me so long to come to, but I guess we're talking about boundaries as as well and I used to be such a people pleaser and want to do everything for

everyone else and we used to we're taught to think especially as women I think that being a people pleaser is being kind and that's the best thing and you've got to be like available for everyone and do everything for everyone when actually all you're doing is spreading yourself really thinly not really tapping into what you want to be doing and really not giving it your best and I think what you talk about with power and all the kind of the motivational talks that you do is really about actually figuring out where your strengths and weaknesses are. And either you can decide,

you know, I want to work on something and I want to get better at something, but it's about not necessarily being the most productive. Cause actually I don't think what you do, I don't think what you talk about is productivity to the sense of like hustle culture. It's actually almost like an antidote to that it's about you know making use of the time that you can do but in a really fulfilling way I think

when we talk about productivity in other senses it's this idea of like you're getting up really early but you're on your laptop and you're grinding and you don't have time for anything else and you have a coffee and you don't eat lunch actually no it's about like I need to make time to have my lunch and I need to make time to have a really good night's sleep and actually it's about you know that whole 360 approach and I think that's what that's what real health means to me now and it's taken me years to understand that like being healthy as a 360 you know you're having a good love life and you're you're getting good night's sleep and you're eating and having fun or whatever um and yeah so

I final bit now because I'm conscious we've been talking for ages sorry no it's great I could talk to you all day it's brilliant yeah I know me too I was thinking that but I was like oh no I've got a meeting so in lockdown if you had to give like your top tips to people things that they could do now that we're in this weird scenario I mean how are you finding lockdown I didn't even ask you that are you coping okay yeah I mean yeah even ask you that. Are you coping okay? Yeah, I mean, yeah, I think so. I definitely have ups and downs in terms of frustrations. And, you know, I'm such a social person.

I love people. I love to be around people. I love to talk to people. And, you know, for me, just doing video calls, doing FaceTime, like it's not kind of. So if I'm honest, I think the thing I'm struggling with most is missing my people and the physical interaction because I thrive in that, you know, I really, really do. But yeah, I think all being, you know, I'm grateful for the roof over my head,

the food in my fridge, you know, I'm healthy. I can go out in the sunshine and move my body. So all in all I am, yeah, I'm doing okay. Thank you. Your question about what can people do? Oh my gosh. I'm also conscious of time and there's so many things that I want to say, because, you know, I think there's so many little things we can, we can try. And I think what I'd start off with is saying that trial and error, you know, like take some ownership and some agency yourself and go, okay, I'm going to try this out for a couple of days, see how it goes. See, you know, maybe write down in general, how did it make you feel before, during and after? You know, for example, if you want to try to take up something new, like a movement practice you've never done before,

whether that's running or yoga or something, start to journal, like, how did I feel before I did that? How did I feel during it when I was actually on the run or doing the class? And how did you feel after? And trial and error. So don't assume that if you do something and after three days you're like oh I don't want to do that anymore and you you have a day off or you skip it or it's like oh okay that failed that didn't work you just throw it out it didn't work when actually that's not always you know what I mean we like to polarize things it's not always the reality maybe you just you could still do it three times a week it doesn't have to be every single day so I I think, yeah, take ownership by trial and error. I think challenge yourself because to do something that you find hard.

And what I mean by that is that, you know, this narrative that I hear a lot, which I'm sure you do as well around being kind to yourself and around not putting pressure on yourself and around that is great. Sometimes we need to hear self-compassionion i'm all about self-compassion i'm not saying these things are mutually exclusive however we also need to challenge ourselves for a reason there's a reason that you know through environmental stressors that you know we adapt and improve we're the we are the most adaptable species on the planet, but what causes adaptation is friction and challenge. So challenge yourself to do something this week, which you find hard and everyone,

this is different for everyone. You know, for some people, it might be having a cold shower, you know, I mean, look up the benefits of that if you're wondering why I'm suggesting that, but yeah, it might be having a cold shower. For some people, it might be reducing their caffeine. For some people, it might be not having a glass of wine in a weekday. And like you said, wait until the weekend. Whatever it is that you find hard, give yourself a challenge this week and prove to yourself that you can do it. Because honestly, once you start to do that, once you start to shift your mind and go,

okay, I found this hard and I'm still going to do it anyway. Don't wait for the feeling that, oh, you know, I just feel super motivated and it's going to be easy all the time. It's not the reality. Things that are hard are always hard. Do you know what I mean? So for me, like, you know, I don't just wait until I feel motivated to go for a run because then I probably would never go. Like things that are hard are always going to be hard, but you can do them anyway. You can do hard things. And once you start to see it, prove it to yourself, then you're like, okay, cool. Bring on the next challenge. Like I find it difficult to have confrontational conversations with somebody I work

with. Well, maybe I can do that. I find it difficult to do this and this. Maybe I can do that and start to prove to yourself that you can do hard things. You've just said something there, which I've been trying to verbalize for ages and I couldn't get it. And what it was was that you said, being compassionate to yourself and putting stress on yourself aren't mutually exclusive. And this is something that I struggle to say or express all the time. Like having compassion for yourself is yes, being like, my body is fine. I don't need to lose weight, but it's also being compassionate, going like, I should probably move and see if that's going to make me feel better. I think sometimes you're right. Those messages get so extrapolated so far the other way that we see these two polarized ideas of like oh they work out and they train every day

and they they're obsessed with how they look when actually that probably isn't it and then the other person is they they're much there's like a moral high ground to being like comfortable in your body which is I think what you're talking about earlier and and sometimes actually we need to dilute both those messages and say it's a mixture of both it's having the self-compassion to say you know what I don't have to be the best at everything and I don't have to do the fastest run ever in the world and it doesn't matter if I don't look like Gigi Hadid or whatever but also at the same time as practicing that self-compassion you can say do you know what I want to push myself and I'm going to try something new and I will get rewarded for that that was such a nice thing to

view to I couldn't ever work out how to say that before. Great. And actually on an episode I did recently on my show with Poppy Jamie, which is the creative Happy Not Perfect app, and she talks a lot around mental well-being. And I asked her around this question in lockdown of this, you know, as you said, the polarizing thing of like, be kind to yourself, self-compassion, stay in your hoodie and, you know,

stay on the sofa and, you know, that kind of vibe versus, you know, actually being compassionate to yourself can sometimes be giving yourself that like push to do it. And she said something that I've just thought was really, really great way of articulating it. And that was, sometimes you have to be compassionate to yourself in the moment now. And sometimes you have to be compassionate to your future self. Is your future self post-lockdown going to benefit from what you're doing right now? Or is your future self going to be like, oh, great, wicked. I'm glad that I got up and I went for that walk and I read that book and I did that phone call. So yeah, I think the idea of self-compassion is definitely one that we need to explore and look at what self-compassion actually means it doesn't just mean you know do nothing and also that future

self thing so true you know when you tidy your room or something and then you get back from holiday and you're like oh my god I love my past self because I've like cleaned the whole flat that was me last week I made sweet corn fritters and I made about 20 of them and I put some in the freezer and that exactly that like about a week later I was like yes Adrienne I don't have to cook I made them I was like my future self was so grateful and happy so yeah think about your future self when you're being compassionate I think that is so true I absolutely love that I have loved talking to you and I again could probably carry on talking to you all day um but I'm sorry I think I might have to go because I have got another meeting which is really sad for people that want to find you and what you're doing

you've got your power hour book which you can pre-order now I'm assuming from everywhere yes you can you can pre-order it from waterstones and also from amazon uh the power hour podcast you can just type it in it's on itunes it's on spotify and um, you can find me on social, you can find me at Adrienne underscore LDN. So I mean, honestly, I've loved this conversation. I know that both of us talk for England and I talk incredibly fast. So I hope that your listeners have enjoyed this episode. And yeah, I'd love to hear from them if they, whatever, good, bad, anything, just yeah, reach out. Amazing. I'm sure they're used to quick talking because I'm the same as you so if anything they'll be very well adapted for you thank you so much everyone for listening and thank you Adrienne for being such a fantastic

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