hey what's up welcome back to the podcast let's talk about november december those last 61 days of the year isn't it crazy that it's literally almost 2027 i don't know about you but this year has really flown by for me and i don't know if i love it i will say i mean it's been an awesome year my clients are absolutely killing it the business is doing well i had a chance to travel a little bit more for work and then we also went to greece of course summer was nice right we're still getting outside we got our first bit of snow last week but right now it's still dry i see um so we're gonna go outside this weekend of course as well but i mean i know how you feel already right that little little voice should we just start on in january right should we just wait you still think that would be the better time to start right there's actual research on this by the way the people who commit before the new year actually have a bigger chance of success now let's not even get into the whole like new year's resolution thing because we do know that i mean more than nine out of ten people will feel that by the end of the year and i think about 50 already in february or even before that but that's not the point of this episode i'm gonna set you up for success here just how i do that with my clients because november december is a little bit of a different season in my opinion okay look you're gonna have events maybe even every week if you have kids right then there are maybe work get-togethers or like we call them in norway julebord with friends right there's a full calendar that's already full but now we're adding the thanksgiving celebrations if you're in the u.s we're adding the christmas celebrations which is i mean that's where i live in norway that's huge obviously and it almost feels like a time that's supposed to be fun celebration yeah it gets dark and cold but it's also a nice season to spend time with family and friends it's almost like something that's supposed to be fun and relaxed around food and let's be honest there's a massive social aspect to nutrition as well that we often kind of ignore or maybe not ignore but don't talk about it enough maybe okay because it's a very real thing we connect over food i mean let's be honest if we travel right you want to try the local cuisines but more about that you know as we get closer to summer next year of course when we start to travel a bit more again but i think this time of the year while it should be fun and cozy and we're celebrating and yeah we are gonna have some more social settings dinners whether it's with friends and families right maybe you're gonna have a couple extra glasses but it becomes this stress right you're already worrying about it i can tell right or at least if i base it off of my clients who are already running around and it's already busy and then it's like family dinner which is a huge topic for our clients and that being said i do want to record a dedicated podcast to that as well so we can talk to you how do you reach your goals while including family dinners because the last thing i want you to do is eat out of a tupperware when the rest of the family is sitting together with one meal you're on this corner of the table with your own little thing right we do not want that that will not drive a healthy relationship with food do i think there's a time and place for tracking and weighing your food absolutely do i think there are different methods for different people at different stages at different times of the year 100 1000 okay so let's talk about that last block of 2026 and that's still crazy to say i mean by this time i mean when an episode airs it's maybe like 65 days left but i really don't know how i feel about that one damn i'm gonna be 37 soon january 2nd is my birthday i'll be 37 damn it's been a good year it's been a great year i will say that busy year but really good so all that being said thanksgiving christmas youtube right christmas celebrations how are you going to manage your settings what if you're in a fat loss phase right now what if you're just getting into tracking your macros what if you're just now like getting a little bit of momentum what if you're on a roll already you're losing body fat do we need to worry about weight regain over the holidays or if you're still looking to start with that big weight loss journey should you wait um is there something you can already do now should we focus a bit more on muscle growth focusing on good workouts at the gym progressive overload building that lean tissue that we know takes time okay let's touch on a few things okay i have some loose outline notes for myself here but i want to start with a bigger picture let's let's call it periodization right the seasons of nutrition and then let's also touch on a few specific strategies to consider to include right it's not going to be all inclusive list might even forget a few uh but as we get closer and closer to christmas i will be mentioning them more because i know how big of a deal this for many people look i will say this like my clients through summer they didn't gain a whole bunch of weight you know and that's such a nice feeling because it's not that they were strict during vacation not at all no we just have a healthy combination of healthy habits and balance that out with the enjoyment factor right everything in moderation it is the most boring thing to say especially when it comes to alcohol and the social settings and eating out but let's let's just have a realistic just a relaxed mindset around these things because i will say this don't make this a bigger deal than it deserves to be because it really isn't look it's called holidays not holly weeks holiday months and that's what a lot of people treat this as it's like well it's christmas season now right well what is that two three days where you're actually doing something okay a little bit more maybe with like friends family get-togethers uh maybe something with work but in all reality we're literally talking a handful of this you're gonna tell me that those few days derail you completely those few days make you gain five kilos those few days make it so that you have to wait right now even though we have more than 60 days left to build habits momentum even if you don't track at all we can focus on some basics fruits veggies protein hydration steps working out sleep stress management right let's be real here for a second we're all grown-ups we're talking a few days come on it's a couple days holly days not holly months okay and with that mindset we're going to first talk about periodization the seasons of nutrition my clients are very familiar with this my clients know that hey when we start coaching you will not be dining all the time even if you got 20 30 40 kilos to lose you're not going to be dining forever that's literally what you've done already in the past right you have gone from one diet to the next to the next to the next none of them taught you the exit strategy none of them made you feel like you could actually be off plan meaning look like i don't even call it on or off plan right look vacations holidays social settings dinners at the restaurant a birthday like those are part of the plan but those diets and meal plans and the 12 week fat loss things you've done in the past where you sign up with a coach and all you got was a couple workouts and i must say well look the program is great but the the nutrition part it's just the recipes and like a meal plan for the dose 12 weeks like if if you never got a plan update for 12 weeks that's a massive red flag okay but there's never the exit strategy that you're supposed to learn you still feel like well can i have this should i have this how do i include this because it's not on my meal plan how do i track this right but okay periodization the seasons of nutrition if i look at a full year with a client let's imagine you are a new client right let's imagine you start with me right now like at the time of this recording it's october 22nd we got all of november december ahead of us and it will really depend on where you're at your diet history what are your goals a lot of people do come on with the fat loss goal and sometimes they are aware of gut issues thyroid hormones etc or they aren't and maybe that doctor just told them like you have a slow metabolism but then we find out hey actually you're hypothyroid oh hang on you have hashimoto's now obviously it's not my time and place to to diagnose and i will never do so but i will educate my clients and say hey look like for example if we see tpo ab over 34 that generally is indicative of hashimoto's i will not give you an official diagnosis that's something to talk to your doctor about but this is a clue right if we have the labs the symptoms oh okay so you got cold hands hairs falling out you're constipated okay so you have a hard time losing weight you gain weight out of nowhere okay you have no energy brain fog hmm let's look a little bit deeper so we have these digestive issues we have all those other signs and symptoms oh hang on your lab panel actually shows you that your iron is in a tank and your ferritin your tsh is through the roof or maybe it's even normal but your t4 and t3 are low your tpo ab is elevated oh now we understand or something completely different right i'm just using thyroid as an example here but it massively depends on where your cornea your current lifestyle the mindset right that kind of like the disorder eating patterns that kind of show up a little bit mind you i'm not talking about eating disorders i'm talking about disorder eating tendencies and patterns okay the restrict binge cycle the strict during the day and then binging in the evening because those cravings get too bad right emotional eating stress eating those little things right stuff that we can just address the nutrition and lifestyle right and through actual coaching like having that conversation hey let's actually map out what you want out of life okay so what are the general challenges and obstacles that tend to come up okay so how are we going to then work through them how can we set up your environment so that you don't have to worry about those challenges and obstacles the reason i'm getting detailed here is that i cannot tell you that you will dive into fat laws right now before the holidays there's a chance and it all depends on my client's intake which is why we don't just say hey well just do a few weeks and no like we commit okay for the long term and that is how my clients also maintain their results for life assuming they're proactive they adhere to the plan they communicate with me they share when things are difficult they don't just get frustrated with weighing their food whatever no they just bring it up family dinners a big one that i talked about earlier but let's imagine okay let's imagine you're actually in a pretty good spot to be honest with you like let's just say you've just not really built the routines and habits you do have that you know strict week followed by the big weekend or maybe like on a smaller scale the you know the coffee in the morning protein mart for lunch and then a big snack attack in the evening right let's just say it's mostly just lifestyle nutrition a little bit of mindset work cool okay so you want to lose some body fat okay so what about your food diary how much are you currently eating that's our week one oh shit okay so you know based on your food diary i think we're averaging out around maintenance i just see a lot of ups and downs let's say you are pretty low during the week and then the weekends are pretty big i've seen that look i've literally seen 1200 during the week and then like three four thousand over weekend days including alcohol like i'm not kidding i'm seeing this all the time and then i'm like okay let's do this okay we got some weight to lose how about this how about we put you in a moderate deficit let's call it 80 of expected maintenance and hold there while we work on the mindset the routines the things you've been struggling with fix your hunger fix your meals make those more balanced fix your blood sugar and let's see how we move in that case there's a good chance you might be losing weight for a couple weeks already before the holiday season but then we need to be real here okay we are talking end of year we are talking holiday season so what does that look like for you again everything literally everything we do inside our coaching program is tailored as for the action steps now obviously we have our massive educational course and resources for clients that are currently being updated for the odyssey 2.0 but like that's that's obviously like hey the information i think everyone should understand the tools the resources right but the action steps and like what we do between you and me as you know a teamwork collaboration to get you to your goals that is a totally tailored effort and it simply would not make sense for us to even do the same thing with everyone right doesn't work that way so i'm then going to ask you okay so what does end of year look like for you all right like so we're not really celebrating too much okay you mentioned it's a few days in december and between this week and this week let's do the following okay let's let's just assume that you are responsive to the the test calorie deficit while you are proactively working through the things you've been struggling with with me okay perfect so let's see we are moving here you're losing body fat you've seen progress at the gym your energy is better your hunger and cravings are actually kind of fixed it's not that bad anymore you know what let's just do this let's run this up until you know second week maybe first week of december and take a nice diet break four weeks right we're not going to do reverse diet we're just going to bump into maintenance four weeks at maintenance and then on the days where you know you are going to you the board you have that christmas dinner christmas eve look don't track those days come on nothing is all or nothing right um we we just can't have that like i'm not saying go overboard like you got to practice some moderation and we'll touch on a few basic practices in a sec but you you can't only be successful when you're tracking okay i'm really big on it when you're at home making your own meals absolutely during your fat loss phases reverse diets even muscle gain the initial stages where most people will at least go towards maintenance early on or spend some time there while we work through the functional issues depending on the case okay look if you're responding and we really work on those day-to-day habits we're already spending a good chunk of time building habits and those should translate to the social setting and i was going to tell my clients look any social setting is a new opportunity to learn and grow how did it go well actually you know what pretty good we're still making progress okay not a big deal let's move on oh actually we had all our time and something came up we overate or whatever it was didn't go according to plan and i can tell my client doesn't feel good about it oh let's dive a little bit deeper cool communication such a big piece such a big piece now do i get clients from time to time who don't share absolutely you'll get clients from time to time who just get frustrated and then you know a month two months later they tell me well you know i'm weighing on my food and this is frustrating and take progress photos and i'm tired of measuring myself oh hang on okay this is news for me but you're telling me that this has been a few months oh okay so maybe communication needs to improve a little bit here let's find a solution here okay okay what season are we in okay let's do this look there's always a solution if you just talk you know but i will say those are the very rare cases okay i love my clients and virtually all of them with the seasonal exception right they they communicate they share stuff with me but it's just to show you look like if it's actual teamwork we can figure out anything you know especially the things you struggle with but okay so every social setting is a learning opportunity so we talked about getting ready for at least for our routines right we're working on those we tested a deficit um and let's just take a nice diet break four weeks right starting in december somewhere depending on your plans and then maybe continue to push fat loss with a little bit of a lower caloric targets into january to keep the ball rolling run that for two to three months then maybe do a reverse diet which brings you into spring and then you can be in maintenance for summer and that's a perfect time to like be lean stay lean right push training get nice and active boom there we go and now we're already into halfway 2027 then i'm gonna say well you're gonna have to at least maintain for a couple months i want you to learn how to maintain properly for at least two to three months in most cases preferably longer let's shift more towards muscle growth bone density super key right lift your weights muscle growth it's not going to happen if you keep under eating okay maintenance is a skill a lot of people actually struggle with that sometimes more than fat loss okay now let's imagine post summer we built some muscle we practice some moderation you know we had a nice time oh actually you would like to be a little bit leaner perfect then we go into let's call it maybe august september october or maybe september october november i generally like to get people at maintenance before the holidays though so let's let's kind of plan once again and then it's already a 12 you know month road map now let's imagine you're in a spot right now to where look as your coach i'm going to tell you look right now it's nothing not the time i like we got a lot of work to do we got to fuel and nourish the body up let's just do this we're going to take all of november december including the end of october to just fuel you up have awesome workouts push muscle growth we're going to lift weights we're going to cut the cardio we're going to drop it down to maybe a maintenance level maybe do like a once or twice a week 20 30 minutes um low intensity like that slow state kind of cardio right that could work really nicely just focus on steps and focus on progressive overload lifting weights having an actual structured program so that you can put on muscle your metabolism metabolism gets a damn break you build your metabolism by building muscle you build those strong bones you're going to have more muscle in your frame which will make you look more toned and fine later down the road now you start 2027 with more muscle now you start 2027 having already done the important work which is the pre-work which is that that metabolic priming let's almost call it right just keeping your body in a good spot look if you've been dying for such a long time like let's let's actually fuel you up for once instead of thinking less calories less calories less calories we can't live that way we just can't okay your body needs breaks at maintenance it needs it i'm gonna tell most of my clients depending on their goals some people have a lot of weight to lose so ultimately at least six months a year have to be truly at maintenance or above building muscle at least preferably eight okay but that's those those are numbers that i can't really like say they don't go for everyone it's so tailored that's why i mean that's why we do what we do it's all tailored and you know it needs to be based on you your goals etc okay where your body's truly at and yes some people need a lot more time to restore the metabolism at maintenance there's no way around there's no hack there's no pill you can take there's no glp whatever you're gonna have to do the work you're gonna have to be you're really impatient and you're gonna have to undo damage all those years of dieting have done to you now let me rephrase that because i don't love the word damage let's just put it this way every diet you've done these last years that didn't last it sets you back and we do need to reverse these kind of things and if your metabolism is truly slow if your hormones are in the tank we feel like crap if your gut is a mess maybe thyroid maybe other things then it's going to take time to reverse that but you can that's a beauty okay the metabolism slows down we can bring it right back up speeds up it slows down it's adaptive not fixed not broken whatever that's why i didn't want to use the word damage as much as it did slip up so sorry about that but you're not damaged okay now all that being said it just depends i would really like if you are listening and you're like hey i've just been dieting dieting dieting well okay well if you tell me i've tried everything well i know for a fact you haven't tried this and that is properly fueling your body now we're going to do a reverse diet starting today you got to look at your food log right now you're going to look at your estimated maintenance calories which is by the way we have a free calculator for it on our website odysseycoachingsystems.co which linked in the show notes as well but i was going to give you an idea of your expected maintenance look at where you're at look at where you roughly should be and then work your way there okay depending on how low you are sometimes you could just jump there sometimes you want to take a few steps all right and if you have questions around that just let me know but if you feel like you've tried it all like that is one thing you haven't and that is something you in my opinion have to be doing before you even try and think about fat loss and that goes into january then and then you're going to be in a better spot now that's the bigger picture that's periodization okay now let's talk about a few in the moment strategies okay the event itself whether that's with friends family work whatever it is i'll teach you my framework for this briefly and that is called reflect plan and execute goes back to tailoring everything that we do i can give you a list of tools and tactics but i would much rather see you reflect on your past holiday seasons the last few years and i want you to look in the mirror without judging yourself but i want you to point out what you have not been doing well but also what you are doing really well we all have both strengths and weaknesses not just bad things right and if all you can come up with this bad stuff well i'm gonna push you to really point out at least as many good things because you have a lot of good traits okay reflect and this needs to be said too if generally it's fine and you maintain your weight and it's all good then we might not even have to focus on this too much like i said it's holidays it's not holiday weeks or months but let's imagine the holiday season is generally a bit of a challenge for you now let's then think okay cool so this is how it usually goes this is something i would like to improve this is something i'm already doing well let's keep doing that maybe you're going on walks maybe you go skiing maybe you go into the mountains maybe you go whatever it is a little walk after a big meal maybe you go to the gym with friends i know a lot of people who like to do like that christmas lift and a general pr why is that well we have a bunch of calories we're fueled we're recovered we're resting a bit more we're sleeping a bit more right it's a perfect time for prs you know what i mean that's why i do like i will say this even with my clients who are currently dieting um will i start a lot of people in the fat loss phase less and less the closer we get to november or into mid you know late november i'm like hey you know let's just build because yeah you got to be a little bit more patient but it damn doesn't make a difference with january and then if you just go hard for january through march it'll be life-changing i promise you that drastic results but you got to be a little patient okay now all that being said if you notice there's something to improve here let's just try something and whether you set a daily goal and i like habit trackers we talked about it in the last episode whether you set a daily goal for yourself to check off some boxes maybe that could be it could be as basic as hydration it could be steps it could be whatever protein with every meal a certain amount of fruits and veggies the list goes on it could be breathwork journaling whatever you think could be conducive to your growth whether that's mindset-wise routine-wise habits around food habits around movement whatever that may be for you okay maybe it's reading a book maybe it's whatever going to bed on time would you point out a few things you want to focus on just a couple basics give yourself a couple boxes to check build some momentum here could be daily okay i do like a daily i think you can also zoom out a little bit and say hey for these weeks i will aim for at least two long walks i will aim for at least two to three weightlifting sessions i will make sure that xyz okay so you can do a daily you can do a weekly i don't love making um bigger timeline kind of have to check right i think it would be very damn hard to keep track of for you also to say well in the month of november i want to like and let's let's break it down into smaller daily actions preferably okay so that those days build into your weeks build into your months and that is how momentum gets created okay but that's one thing reflect plan right but then also execute and and this is where like i want you to maybe write these things down keep in top of mind i talked to my clients recently about uh vision boards which is not something i've done myself but i saw a few friends of mine do it i'm like hey that's a pretty cool idea because it's that visual that reminds you right or maybe just write it down could it be in your phone notes i look i have a whiteboard where there's a few things i want to check off right you can gamify it but also set up reminders for yourself to kind of check in with yourself okay how am i truly doing okay it goes back to the habits that we talked about last week and how those are built how long it takes etc and if you haven't listened to that episode feel free to put that in the queue for after this one right that's what i actually want you to do like i know i didn't really give you like a specific hey you know do this or this or hey if you're new here whatever sometimes i just like to dive into these episodes but real quick if you are new here i highly recommend you check out a few other episodes after this maybe starting with the one from last week okay or the one before that and of course if you're returning listener you've been here for a minute and if you're listening to this and you're like hey i've been listening to this for a while what about this what about this just hit me up on instagram so i can cover it for you on the podcast all right but now let's get into more specific things because there's one thing to say reflect and then plan and then execute okay so you create a plan but maybe based on your current skills habits experiences knowledge you don't fully know how to handle these situations um and i'm just gonna name a bunch okay alcohol often comes up and i like just teaching my clients okay this is how alcohol acts in the body the body will perceive it as a toxin because it is a toxin a poison but let's also be real a lot of us do like a drink here and there glass of wine with your partner whatever that is do i think we can objectively be healthy and reach optimal results while getting drunk every weekend no i don't think so do i think that if it's once a month maybe maybe do i think it's worth it objectively no but that's something you need to weigh out for yourself okay that's a personal preference thing there are going to be things you're going to have to say no to there are going to be things where you trade off the the short term you know enjoyment for the long-term benefit but there's also times and places where you say hey you know today i will have some and that's just again just a grown-up decision if you choose to do a little more with your alcohol then there's going to be at least some effects of that okay both short and long term but moderation is key it's the most boring thing to say but moderation is key okay if you're like hey i'd like to keep some drinks in okay not a big deal so what are some strategies around that you could alternate between alcoholic drinks and non-alcoholic or at least have like i like to have a bigger ratio of non-alcoholic to alcoholic of course for my caloreans look you can simply drink slower that's that's one that came up recently with the client and they're like yeah i just drink slower because then i have to drink in my hand i don't get asked if i want to have another drink and that just works and they they just kind of didn't want to deal with other people's comments and stuff so you know they just had the drink sipped and you know they enjoyed and then at some point they were like having one drink per evening and they were feeling great and now all of a sudden there's less anxiety less brain fog the next day they're fresh they can actually go on a walk they have energy to go to the gym and they told themselves hey i want to get these workouts in and because i didn't drink too much i could actually get it done but as for alcohol just just make a rational decision okay understand that there are going to be effects understand that there's a time and place for saying no and for saying yes and that you just make the decision understanding that that does not have to be all or nothing and that it should not be all or nothing if you truly give a damn about your own health and mark your goals and results okay moderation is key now that also goes for the cookies chocolates etc do i think you need to get rid of them out of the house i mean from a habit building standpoint and from a environment standpoint yeah that would be great but usually it doesn't work that way plus a lot of clients have office jobs where at the office there's a bunch of candy laying around and christmas chocolates and cookies and right oh damn those gingerbread gingerbread cookies those are so good those are my favorite i've seen them at the store already and i actually didn't buy them because i know that that's one of one of my weaknesses but okay so if your environment is filled with snacks and little things like it's going to be more difficult you're going to have to practice mobile power and self-control but then at least i'm going to bring it back to your meals if we really make those nice and whole food base and filling and balance and a good amount of protein and good amount of fiber and right healthy fats sarchy carbs whole food carbs right if you keep those meals filling especially your protein and fiber are in check then you should probably be just fine okay and then even if you do have a snack at least you're going to be already filled up from your real meals but also there hey maybe it's going to be a little bit of a willpower challenge for yourself okay cool let's see how we do there's a time and place for just focusing on that too right now i'm going to practice self-control right now let's say those dinners those those festive dinners with the great foods and all the sides and everything look i want you to have those moments there's never a time i tell my clients hey i know you got a party coming up but like no bring your meal prep meal i would i would if if i would ever say that to a client i want them to fire me to be honest with you like come on let's let's be real here why would i tell someone hey i know you have that christmas dinner but you got goals so uh well no fuck no my clients are real people i am a real person you are a real person those christmas dinners are part of the odyssey those christmas dinners are part of a healthy lifestyle and if your habits are fine you can totally have those christmas dinners without it being a big deal holidays not holly weeks now can you overdo it of course absolutely have there been times in the past where i definitely overate 100 but let's zoom out even if you have a lot of calories what about the rest of the week well the rest of the week i have my normal meals okay probably not a big deal then what about the last few months actually you know the last few months i've been doing really good i also have a plan for january already cool and by the way your plan doesn't change whether your weight is up down or the same after christmas it doesn't it's the same as with my cat my clients coming out of summer last august most of them actually gained one one and a half kilos we didn't do anything we didn't change anything they just followed their normal meals and within two to three days that weight was back down to normal because we knew it was a fluctuation if your weight bumps up at one two plus kilos in a very short period of time that will not be body fat it will come down if you just follow your normal meals without compensating without punishing yourself with cardio and that is something i do not want you to do okay i'm not going to tell you to not to do certain things that often but in this case you will not punish yourself this season by doing more cardio to burn off calories it doesn't work that way you will not punish yourself because you enjoyed and had a good time by eating 1200 calories the next day unless you want to build an unhealthy relationship with food on purpose cool that is something i never have my clients do and my clients are really damn successful without damage control without punishment punishment is a negative approach that will never feed into positive lifestyle change a positive mindset a healthy relationship with food that's the only thing i'm going to tell you not to do do not punish yourself no damage control no burning calories or no no hell no it's a big hell no for my clients so things you can do i'm going to name a few of these one of my favorite ones eating mindful mindful eating eating mindfully slowly is such a big tool that's so underrated if you just put that fork down sometimes it's going to go such a long way if you properly chew your food which for digestion you should be doing anyway 20 to 30 juice per bite should be the standard which most people don't and i have a history of eating really damn fast and i still catch myself sometimes or my girlfriend calls me out and then i'm like oh yeah gotta slow down put that fork down chew your food properly savor that food taste it enjoy it and just like that i just taught you one of the absolute most impactful habits to build or behaviors to practice in social settings even without thinking about a single macro calorie now to that point another strategy which i actually discussed with the client yesterday um that i practiced myself plenty of times in the past is actually basing myself to the slowest eater at the table not making it obvious but just kind of like looking around and you know and oh they're a little bit slower yeah okay i'm just gonna gonna follow their pace i'm gonna talk a little bit more i'm gonna put that fork down this is not a weird thing look you can still enjoy those meals but it's just self-awareness if this is something you want to try i can only recommend it it worked really well for me okay but it's just one tool what works for me doesn't always work for you and the other way around it's just something i want you to consider at least but mindful eating eating slowly such a big one okay now we kind of touched on alcohol already i do like drinking uh water in between meals um i think if you can get sugar-free options of like the the christmas sodas and stuff it will objectively be better um versus the uh the full sugar ones okay then as for the snacking i mean let's at least have some other options as well um maybe we can have some you know carrot sticks and cucumber and bell pepper cut up and then we can make a low fat higher protein and kind of dairy kind of dip throw in some nice herbs and spices that could work really nicely having some fruits clementines for example those are phenomenal options and just like that we can at least squeeze in some more fruits and veggies while still allowing you to have those more you know traditional snacks but even there you know just a nice way to sneak in some extra fruits and veggies there's one more thing i'm going to tell you not to do and that is weighing your food or tracking your food during these settings now if it's from a curiosity standpoint maybe you could consider kind of eyeball tracking it just if you're like oh you know i'm just kind of wondering but do i think it's it's really helpful data i don't think so i think if you've been tracking no matter what season you're in it's already been teaching you more about those portion control and serving sizes uh for yourself for your current meal and seasons i think that's going to translate into overall awareness around okay what should roughly be on my plate if you just want to go off of a plate method maybe there's like a like a buffet or something like that we can do one third of your plates protein one third carbs one third color meaning fruits or veggies or both and then let's be honest with christmas dance especially you can assume there's going to be plenty of fats okay but the plate method that's a great one right one third of your plate protein one third of your plate carbs one third of your plate color and the last one i will teach you today and then we'll just touch on this more as we get close to the holiday season i think doing a mini check-in with yourself just to create more awareness is huge and what i mean by that is just you know you don't even have to write this down you could if you wanted to in a journal or something or in your notes or maybe you do if then planning it's something that i do with my clients sometimes if they struggle around these things but then it's more like a planning thing going back to my reflect plan and execute framework but doing a mini check-in with yourself okay so getting clear on what you want not just out of this moment but also how you want to feel right after a few hours later the next day the next week okay replaying last year's christmas or the thanksgiving whatever it was new year's maybe okay in my case birthday my birthday is january 2nd right thinking what went well where did i potentially slip sometimes that's a before the actual event thing okay so i want you to start thinking about this not just what happens but put on the detective hat and think okay what happened okay what was the trigger did i not eat my filling meals during the day was it an environment thing was it a feeling an emotion was it stress really try to find that first little domino that set off the whole chain of events okay and of course environment audits office candy those kind of things thinking oh what did i say again yeah so i did my reflection because joan told me reflect plan and execute i did my plan what was my plan again maybe write this down somewhere that is something where i do think that's worth just keeping your phone notes or something okay but for this mini check-in she's going to review those things like oh yeah so i reflected this is you know last time how it went i'd like to change this oh actually you know i learned about these steps i could take i set myself the goal to just focus on steps on hydration what's maybe like a confidence rating etc like whatever you want to do here and this is something where i just want you to experiment okay and then we're going to say okay actually let's zoom out last couple weeks last couple months how i've been doing it doing what am i currently working on and then like i said most importantly not just how do i want to feel right here in the moment but also right after like five minutes afterwards an hour later a few hours later the next day the next week and at least if you are aware and mindful going into these moments i think you're going to be just fine i really don't see anyone fuck up in my coaching program over the holidays and if there's a weight bump just like that was the case with summer it's going to come right back down now for periodization a lot of people will be continuing or starting fat loss in january kind of depending on where they started when they started with me right so either way we know hey we are going to go into a calorie deficit now do i think that should be the reason for you to be like well i'm going to be dieting anyway might as well well no because now because we said all or nothing now because we said well now i get to enjoy before the strict diet first of all diets with my clients they're very doable people are surprised that they're still killing it at the gym they're still hitting heavier weights with more reps they still have energy they don't have that hunger and cravings and if they do it's usually a food choices thing that we can fix okay so no it's not going to be that strict and restrictive and crazy it's not extreme diet okay in january but don't have that mindset because that's going to backfire because all of a sudden yet now that holiday turns into a holly week into a holly month and now we think well i'm just going to not worry about nutrition well you could just be building habits like steps water whatever sleep right fruits veggies protein right food choices structure whatever it is daily rhythm okay working out is a perfect one right now if fall was on but don't think i'm going to relax and enjoy right now really meaning right that all or nothing like that's that nothing side of that so that then you can push really hard in january you know what's going to happen then then we're looking at a month of five plus kilos that will add at least at least four weeks for most people if not longer to your fatless phase and now because we chose comfort and enjoyment over the long term which goes back to our mini check-in now later down the road you're going to have to deal with the consequences which is more dieting more time spent in the calorie deficit and then when it's you know april and you're still dieting you're like well i really should not have overdone it during christmas and that's just one thing i do want you to be mindful of okay i just gave you a bunch of strategies we touched on periodization we touched on exactly what to do in the moment right before the moment with a mini check-in for yourself look this is a massively individual experience and what steps you will take may differ from the next okay we didn't even touch on the social like the the peer pressure sometimes around drinking and other things and i'll just have a little bit more and you know like your your you know your mother-in-law pushing more desserts and all that like we touched on that a little bit more maybe two um just think about what from this episode is most applicable to you if you have any further questions please do not hesitate to reach out to me especially if you're a client obviously hit me up right we're gonna be planning for this anyway right and i know a lot of my clients will listen here so either way we're gonna be talking about this in your check-ins but if you're already like hey you know like let's let's already discuss this now just bring it up awesome and then um obviously this podcast comes out on a monday right so we're already doing our check-in reviews or if you're just a listener look my instagram is literally in the show notes i'm not going to try and sell you especially if we haven't chatted yet you know look like there's there's links everywhere to join my coaching program like you're reaching out because you listen to my podcast it's not going to be like oh buy my coaching no look if you're listening and you're literally like okay this sounds good but i'm i'm still not really sure how i would do this just message me on instagram i'm more than happy to help i'm always happy to support my followers there as well and with that i want to wrap it up great 45 minute episode let's talk more okay have an amazing end of year we got just about what is it 65 or so days left depending on when you're listening to this podcast let's just finish strong okay i'm here to help