Videos

Feel free to tune in regularly to watch and read great content; you can reach me for an initial session here or call (323) 736-1978

Below each video I’ll have a transcription for the video in case you’re in a place where you’re unable to watch it. Some of the videos below are pending transcription, stay tuned!

Below is a personal video about my own journey through a recent set-back and how it relates to goal-setting:

LIFE COACH TOMMY: HEY GUYS, LIFE COACH TOMMY, HERE. GOOD MORNING, HAPPY FRIDAY! WANTED TO SEND A SHOUT OUT TO YOU GUYS. HOPE YOU ARE ENJOYING NOW THE THIRD DAY OF THE NEW DECADE 2020, THE NEW YEAR 2020 AND THE NEW DECADE THE NEW 20S.

WANTED TO SHARE WITH YOU SOMETHING PERSONAL – SOMETHING I’VE GONE THROUGH JUST IN THE PAST MONTH WHEN IT COMES TO MY FITNESS GOALS AND HOW THIS RELATES TO GOAL-SETTING. ESSENTIALLY, I GOT REALLY SICK BACK IN THE FIRST WEEK OF SEPTEMBER. IF YOU ARE WATCHING THESE VIDEOS ON A REGULAR BASIS YOU’LL KNOW THAT ABOUT A MONTH AGO YOU COULD HEAR IN MY VOICE I WAS REALLY SICK.

AND, FOR ABOUT THREE AND A HALF WEEKS, I WASN’T ABLE TO GO TO THE GYM. I DIDN’T HAVE ENERGY, I WAS SICK. I WAS COUGHING – WENT TO THE DOCTOR, DOCTOR SAID I HAD A SINUS INFECTION – GAVE ME ANTIBIOTICS. ANYWAYS, IT WAS A WHOLE JOURNEY, THREE AND A HALF WEEKS. AND, I KNEW THAT I WOULD LOSE GAINS BECAUSE I HAD BEEN WORKING OUT HARDCORE SINCE JULY OF 2018, AND THEN I MADE A DECISION TO COMPETE IN A BODYBUILDING – CLASSIC PHYSIQUE BODYBUILDING COMPETITION – GET MY IFBB PRO CARD – THAT STANDS FOR THE INTERNATIONAL FEDERATION OF BODYBUILDING. AND, ESSENTIALLY, I KNEW, GOING DOWN THIS ROAD, MAKING THAT DECISION, WHICH I MADE IN SEPTEMBER OF 2019, THAT I WOULD HAVE TO DEAL WITH SETBACKS. AND, I ACKNOWLEDGED WHEN I GOT SICK AT THE TOP OF DECEMBER THAT I WAS EXPERIENCING A SETBACK.

AND, SURE ENOUGH, THIS WEEK, NOW I’M BETTER, THIS WEEK HAS BEEN THE FIRST WEEK WHERE I’VE HAD A FULL GYM WORKOUT. I DID CHEST ON MONDAY, I DID CARDIO ON TUESDAY AND WEDNESDAY. I DID BICEPS AND BACK ON YESTERDAY AND THIS MORNING I DID LEGS AND TRICEPS

AND, ESSENTIALLY, WHAT I NOTICED IS THAT MY FEAR WAS VALIDATED: I LOST GAINS. I LOST STRENGTH. MY CHEST ISN’T AS STRONG AS IT WAS THREE AND A HALF WEEKS AGO. MY BICEPS AREN’T AS STRONG AS THEY WERE THREE AND A WEEKS AGO. MY LEGS AREN’T AS STRONG AS THEY WERE THREE AND A HALF WEEKS AGO.

HOWEVER, I MADE A DECISION AND I’M NOT GOING TO LET THIS SET BACK SLOW ME DOWN OR ALTER MY DECISION OR MAKE ME CHANGE MY MIND THAT I’M NOT ABLE TO COMPETE IN THE CLASSIC PHYSIQUE IFBB COMPETITION.

SO THAT’S MY JOURNEY THAT’S WHAT I’M DOING AND I’M STICKING TO IT. I GOT A SETBACK AND NOW ESSENTIALLY WHAT I DID IN SEPTEMBER I’M GOING TO HAVE TO DO AGAIN TO GET BACK UP TO – BEFORE THE SETBACK MY LEG – MY LINEAR LEG PRESS WORKOUT WAS 740 POUNDS. THIS MORNING I COULD BARELY DO 630 POUNDS. SO I LOST ABOUT 100 POUNDS THERE. CHEST, SAME THING, I WAS MAXING 215 BEFORE THE SETBACK. AND I WAS STRUGGLING TO GET THROUGH THREE SETS OF 155.

SO, ANYWAYS, THIS IS – ANYTIME YOU SET A GOAL, ESPECIALLY A LONG TERM GOAL FOR BODYBUILDING OR DIET AND FITNESS YOU ARE GOING TO HIT SETBACKS – YOU’RE GOING TO COME ACROSS SET BACKS. THE IMPORTANT THING TO DO IS TO JUST SEE THEM AS A SETBACK THAT IT’S TEMPORARY. IT ISN’T THE UNIVERSE SAYING, “STOP DOING THIS.” IT ISN’T THE UNIVERSE SAYING, “YOU CAN’T DO THIS.” YOU’RE THE ONLY ONE WHO’S GOING TO SAY YOU CAN’T DO SOMETHING. THE UNIVERSE, IF YOU WANT TO GET METAPHYSICAL, IS SIMPLY TESTING YOU AND TESTING YOUR THRESHOLD AND SEEING HOW BAD DO YOU REALLY WANT THIS. AND MY MESSAGE TO THE UNIVERSE IS: THIS IS SOMETHING I REALLY WANT, SOMETHING I REALLY WANTED ALL OF MY LIFE AND I’M FINALLY IN A PLACE IN MY LIFE WHERE I CAN ACHIEVE IT AND SO BRING ALL THE SETBACKS YOU WANT IT’S NOT GOING TO STOP ME FROM ACHIEVING THIS GOAL.

ANYWAYS, JUST WANTED TO SEND THAT OUT, SHOUT OUT – THAT DON’T LET SETBACKS DISCOURAGE, LET SETBACKS EMPOWER YOU. LET THEM BE SETBACKS AND ACKNOWLEDGE THEM AS TEMPORARY OBSTACLES TO – AGAIN IF YOU WANT TO GET METAPHYSICAL TO TEST YOUR THRESHOLD TO SEE HOW BAD YOU REALLY WANT SOMETHING.

ANYWAYS, LIFE COACH TOMMY HERE. IF YOU HAVE ANY QUESTIONS, IF YOU LIKE WHAT YOU HEAR, LIKE IT. IF YOU HAVE ANY COMMENTS, ANY QUESTIONS ABOUT WHAT I’VE SAID IN THIS FEEL FREE TO COMMENT OR SEND ME A MESSAGE. AND IF YOU’RE INTERESTED IN LIFE COACHING AND YOU REALLY WANT TO MAKE 2020 YOUR YEAR, REACH OUT TO ME, LET’S TALK, LET’S SEE IF IT’S A GOOD FIT FOR YOU. CONTACT ME HERE ALRIGHT, THANKS, A LOT. GOODBYE.

Watch this video podcast where I’m interviewed by Daniel Garza on Addiction to the Past. I answer the question on how to use the past to empower your present instead of allowing it to limit you from moving forward in life:

In this video I express The Power of ‘Why?’ – I explain how important it is to establish a deep ‘why’ before we set out to achieve our goals:

In the video below, I break down the importance of positive language with yourself and how I approach this in Life Coaching:

Here is my recent video with Daniel Garza on Put It Together Conversations where we talk about being addicted to the past. You can also find and watch this video on my home page as the FEATURED VIDEO. The transcription below is a work in progress, enjoy!

TRANSCRIPT:

Daniel: Welcome, this is Put It Together Conversations, for those of you who have been following Conversations this is a Spin Off of Put It Together Podcasts, so the guests on my show had already been on my podcasts already. You guys know Life Coach Tommy, he’s been on the show a couple of times and, as usual, they get to choose the topic we’ll discuss today and today’s topic for those who are just tuned in, is – Addiction to the Past – now why did you choose this topic?

Life Coach Tommy: Well, first of all, Hey, how are you?

Daniel: Hey, how’s it going?

Life Coach Tommy: As a Life Coach, I help people stay present and, not necessarily let go of the past – I have a lot of people who come to me and say, I want to let go of the past, my response is that that it’s impossible. The past, no matter, unless you suffer severe brain damage, the past is always going to be there. It has obviously huge deep psychological impact on who you are today, but while we can’t ever let the past go, there are attributes of the past that we can focus on to enhance our present experience.

Daniel: Yes, and usual, if you have any questions going along, or need us to repeat something, let us know. My laptop is right in front of me so I can answer any question and as most of the times when the situation calls for it, I can use myself as an example so that we can move the story forward. So, it’s interesting you said that because a couple of things that are going on this week, I think I mentioned to you when we were prepping for the show, this Friday, June 21st is my 13th recovery birthday. I’ve been clean and sober now for 13 years, this Friday. Over the last several years since cancer I developed a little bit more anxiety, agoraphobia, panic attacks… I do think it has to do with things from my past – is that the part we’re talking about?

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah, yes, well, it’s definitely the emotional uncomfortableness that you’re experiencing – and, calling it emotional uncomfortableness is sort of a devaluing statement because it’s intense what you’re experiencing agoraphobia and all that stuff you’re experiencing in the present is influenced by focusing on things from the past.

Daniel: Right.

Life Coach Tommy: For example, excuse me, and, again, I’m a Life Coach and I’m not a clinical psychologist or even a psychiatrist so there a lot of things about agoraphobia that I’m not licensed to comment on as an expert. But, I do know, as a Life Coach, being agoraphobic is affected by things that have happened in the past. On a clinical level, there could be a chemical imbalance that is causing the phobia, but as a Life Coach I focus on cognitive – not necessarily cognitive behavioral therapy because, again, I’m not a licensed therapist, but that’s my approach. What can we do for emotional behavioral changes that can help those things, and addressing the past issues, but not on the level of clinical psychology where we dig deep and uncover all of these things that are affecting you.

Daniel: So it’s more about confronting what the issue is and see how we can adjust it or change it maybe?

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah, essentially, what are we putting our focus on? What, from our past, are we focusing on?

Daniel: Okay.

Life Coach Tommy: That’s my goal, my goal is to help either – if it’s not bringing value to our present, I help my clients either stop focusing on it or focusing on it a different way. Same thing with people who suffer from addiction – the bad news is addiction will never go away – ever. It is ingrained in us, whether it’s learned, whether it’s patterned behavior, whether it’s clinical, whether it’s genetic – most of the time, it’s genetic – but it doesn’t matter, it’s always going to be there.

Daniel: Okay, then let’s bring it a little closer – we’re not necessarily – are we talking about things like divorce, death in the family, losing a job, things that affected us in that way.

Life Coach Tommy: Yes.

Daniel: Then something more chemical based.

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah, that’s a great way to word that because I would say yes. Because there’s a lot things that include our present. There’s a lot of things that influence us, but it is more of the behavioral stuff. The experiences we’ve had in the past, not the chemical imbalances that are causing clinical illnesses.

Daniel: So, having abandonment issues, having insecurities because we had super strict parents – no confidence or not having a backbone for things – those are things we can change.

Life Coach Tommy: Those are things – we can realign our focus and learn from. So –

Daniel: But why would someone be addicted to that? Why would you hold on to abandonment issues – or beliefs in insecurity.

Life Coach Tommy: That’s a good question. And, it’s, again, an addiction in that, if things are going well, because we’ve experienced all this negative stuff – when things start going well – it’s almost insane, it doesn’t feel normal because of the negative past – so when things start going well for us we have to find something else to focus on – some other negativity and it can be let’s say a break up or a divorce and then you go back to that, you go back to that divorce – well, what if I had done this – what if I had done that – what if I had just been there more – or what if I hadn’t cheated on her – or what if I hadn’t done this.

Daniel: But, even though things aren’t going well, we need something to something negative?

Life Coach Tommy: We need to bring some sort of discomfort to our lives.

Daniel: Because Madeline’s asking, “Why do we hold on?” Okay, again, putting myself in the hot seat, my first relationship as an adult, my live in relationship – there was a lot of issues and, well, we’re not friends on Facebook, so, who cares – but there was drugs and there was cheating and there was miscommunication and there was verbal mistreatings obviously I left that relationship and the relationship I’m in now is a good relationship – we communicate well, we don’t do drugs, we’re very committed to each other, yet I will find the one moment in the conversation to pull on like a string ‘he said this bad thing to me’ and boom, I’m immediately a 21 year old kid in my first relationship and all those all that pain comes back – is that kind of what we’re talking about?

Life Coach Tommy: That is an extreme example, but absolutely.

Daniel: Of course, I’m always extreme in my life.

Life Coach Tommy: But, yes, absolutely because suddenly, again, the 22 year old, that is all you have to rely on, that experience – because you haven’t experienced enough positive things in your past to support the moments in your present.

Daniel: Okay.

Life Coach Tommy: And so, when it starts feeling right, it actually starts feeling abnormal, so you’re going to go back to 22 year old that says well this is how this situation happened back then and so that past moment equals this present moment even though they’re two – there’s a long distance of time in between those moments – because that’s ingrained in to you emotional well – being and who you are as a person and you’ve hung on to it instead of letting it go and learning from it – you are going to put that in your present relationship and it’s going to cause some limiting – it’s going to limit you.

Daniel: Is it always that obvious, what we’re holding on to?

Life Coach Tommy: No.

Daniel: No?

Life Coach Tommy: No. The easy answer is, no. And I want to get to Madeline’s question, but the easy answer is no, it isn’t obvious. Sometimes, and I’m sure you’ve experienced your – if you get upset with your partner or you are in a situation – let’s say you’re at an audition, for example and you don’t get the part and it messes you up more than anything and the part – it was one line it was just and you are so messed up from rejection and you think why am I so messed up like this? You don’t know. You wouldn’t know. Unless you meditated on it and went back into the past and said well, what is this – what am I comparing this moment to? Same thing with your partnership is that, again you won’t always know, you’re so upset but there’s no sane reason for you to be upset.

Daniel: Okay, so now we’re going back to square one. Square one: I’m holding on to this bad memory which is this addiction to the past. On the right side we know exactly what it is we’re addicted to and why we’re holding on to it, so that’s easy. Like you can go, you can talk about it, you can go to therapy and boom – you can fix it. On the left side we have, I don’t know why – I don’t know what’s triggering this emotion. How can we identify this emotion, how can we identify the source of that emotion?

Life Coach Tommy: Unfortunately, let’s say you never had this session – we never did this – in this moment there’s not a lot you could do, in that moment. Because it would take time, you would have to journal, you would have to write down what’s going on, what happened, there would be a discovery with yourself. And it’s what I do with my clients, I help train them to identify when you’re linking the present to the past.

Daniel: Right.

Life Coach Tommy: So, essentially, the difficult answer is, it takes time to train your brain to get there. And, if something happened and you’re triggered and you don’t know why there’s nothing you can do in that moment except embrace the moment and realize that you’re being influenced by the past. And also, there’s a lot of – the modern human is being influenced a lot by evolutionary – hundreds of thousands of years of evolutionary psychology in that we are survivors – we do whatever we can to survive. So, just a side example – suicide is insane for us because it goes against our primitive instinct to survive. There’s a lot of stuff, relationship stuff, technology stuff, that is causing this modern insanity because it’s going against all of our primitive nature. So, when it comes to why we’re connecting to the past so much is that we are creatures of habit and that’s what we’ve done. We can see patterns – one of the things that has gotten us so far, we can see patterns, we can see certain things, and because this happened five minutes ago, we think – in our primitive minds – that it could happen again if these situations are met. If the same situations are hung on to – then it’s gonna happen. So because of this survival mechanism that we have we had that patterned behavior – we identify those patterns and that’s how we get their because of that but it doesn’t mean we’re always going to go there if we can challenge ourselves and sort of take a step back and say, ‘okay, I’m being triggered by the past – the present doesn’t equal the past, the future doesn’t equal the past – the past is in the past.

Daniel: Right.

Life Coach Tommy: This is a new situation how do I solve this, now.

Daniel: Got it. For those of you just joining us, we are with Life Coach Tommy, this is Put It Together Conversations and today’s topic is Addiction to the Past and we’re talking about how past experiences can trigger us to now – and there – there are big bumps in the road – I mean these are walls that can stop us from a relation, a good job, just being happy. It doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re a pessimist, or that you’re depressed all the time. Right?

Life Coach Tommy: Right.

Daniel: There could be confusion there.

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah. It’s simply acknowledging that it’s a survival mechanism, what – it’s what we’re using in our present to survive, essentially. The easy answer – the really easy answer to you know figure out what to do in the present moment is just to acknowledge that the past does not equal the future, the past does not equal the present. As long as you have a good mind set and well-being, what happened in the past stays in the past. Now, there are things that could happen again, there are things that do happen again, but, again, this is a new situation and our reaction to it – goes back to another session – our reaction to it will influence how this situation is dealt with.

Daniel: Okay. We’re obviously not going to react the same way we did when it originally happened.

Life Coach Tommy: Yes and No.

Daniel: I hate it when you do the yes and no parts.

Life Coach Tommy: We could – Madeline asked about journaling and I definitely want to go into that – we could respond the same way if we’re not aware – because what our brain automatically wants to do is respond the exact same way back then – because I’ve survived this long this is what happened back then and I want to respond the same way that that happened the same. But if we can acknowledge that this is a new situation even though it’s similar to what happened in the past – it is new, just by the mere fact that it’s a different moment in time.

Daniel: Right.

Life Coach Tommy: We are different and we can control our reaction to the situation.

Daniel: Okay.

Life Coach Tommy: And more often than not we’ll have a better reaction to it.

Daniel: So since we’re on this ‘left side road’ we’ve identified what that trigger is that stimulates those feelings of – fill in the blank here – whatever’s in your life. In order to not keep repeating those, we need to confront them, correct?

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah.

Daniel: Is this where the journaling would come in? Therapy?

Life Coach Tommy: Absolutely, yeah. So, Madeline had two questions – one was about why do we hold on? And, again, I hope I answered that, Madeline. It’s essentially a survival mechanism. We hang on to those emotions, we hang on to that so that, we can we think that we’re learning from that situation – we think that we’re going to see it, because – how many times have we – something happened to us like – “I swear this is never going to happen to me ever again!” – and then it happens again.

Daniel: Right, and then it happens, yeah.

Life Coach Tommy: So, we have this ‘we’re never going to let this happen to us again’ mentality and so we see it coming and so we’re like, here it comes, that moment in the past, here it comes, but it doesn’t always end up that way, but our reaction is now primed to be read for it because of our survival mechanism. And about journaling – this is kind of off on a tangent – but the reason why journaling is so effective, especially with what we’re talking about – addiction to the past – is it just literally gets us out of our head and allows us to look at things objectively. I always encourage my clients to journal if they’re not. And to get into Philosophy of Mind or even general neuro-psychology – your thoughts, these thoughts that we’re having, they’re not real in a sense where, a doctor couldn’t open up your brain and say, “oh, look, there’s – those are the thoughts – oh, he’s thinking about pizza right now, see that? There’s pizza.” Our thoughts are literally just chemical and electrical impulses, reactions happening inside of our brain. That’s it. And because they’re not real and they stay in our brain – our brain has such a vivid imagination – and I want to talk about how that also affects the past –

Daniel: I have stories on that one.

Life Coach Tommy: Our brain has such a vivid imagination that we start thinking about stuff and we start imagining stuff – imagining things worse than they actually are, worse than they actually were, worse than they ever will be – and so the only way to make our thoughts real is to either write them down or record our voice because once we get them out and write them down, then reading – so emotions are a right brain activity whereas reading and thinking is a left brain activity .

Daniel: And, again, to put it into context – long story short, but for those of you who’ve been following me for awhile know that I had a near death experience while I was recouping from cancer so I ended up in the hospital and it still haunts me, there’s still a lot of residue there. Going to the dentist, because I have high blood pressure, whenever they have to do – which is why I’m talking funny – I have a partial in there right now – temporarily – every time they have to do anesthesia, something triggers and my high blood pressure goes up a little bit – it always does – but I immediately text Christian so that he knows where I am because if I die in the dentist chair nobody’s gonna know where I am and I start sweating and of course my pressure goes up again and then the dentist gets all worried and every time I go to the dentist I breathe in –

Life Coach Tommy: Relax. Meditate.

Daniel: But – people are going does that really happen, yes that really does happen in my head because we’re talking about thoughts and I’m sure if people could see my thoughts, there’s chaos going there. But around me everyone’s like, ‘it’s just anesthesia dude, calm down.’ Does that make sense?

Life Coach Tommy: Right. Yeah. Absolutely. And so, again, you’re having those thoughts, and I would encourage you, if you don’t already, journal – write down – reflect on that moment and journal on what your thought process was. Because once you get it out of your head and on to a piece of paper – now we drift away from the emotion and now we’re triggering the thinking side of our mind – actually this is the left side – oh no I was right – the thinking side – I naturally went there because that’s where my brain wanted to go because it knows what side it is but I can’t tell my left from my right – anyways, the thinking side of of my brain is now reading what’s happening and so now we can look at our thoughts objectively. And we can analyze – what – ‘that doesn’t make any sense, why did I react that way?’ That doesn’t make any sense – so that’s why I always encourage journaling especially when it comes to the past because if something happens and we’re triggered and the triggering comes from the past – like I mentioned – our brain has a very vivid imagination, an extremely vivid imagination and I always assure my life coach clients – I tell them: the things that happened in the past were neither as good nor as bad as you imagine. Period. We always imagine things worse than they were or better than they actually were. And, also, as far as the future is concerned, the things that are coming to you will not be as great or as bad as you imagine. So, and again, or not again, but that’s not a bad thing or a good thing, it’s just the way it is. So, journaling and writing it down will get you out of your head and really analyze the way it, not the way it really was, but just an objective view point.

Daniel: So, before we move on from the journaling part, is there a correct or incorrect way of journaling?

Life Coach Tommy: I would say no. Well…

Daniel: Yes and No, here we go!

Life Coach Tommy: I would say there’s no correct way to journal as long as you’re honest with yourself.

Daniel: Ah.

Life Coach Tommy: Sometimes my clients, and I’m really good at calling them out because I can see when they’re ‘kidding themselves’ you know and – I had one client recently that – she was saying she was okay, she was okay – “Yeah, I’m okay, things are good. I’m okay.” But because I’m a trained Life Coach I know when people are bullshitting themselves and I asked her, “Are you really okay?” I mean, you’re saying you’re okay, but are you really okay? And then, she literally broke down in tears and it was just like finally I was able to get some honesty out of her, some authenticity. She wanted to be okay, like we always want to be okay.

Daniel: Right.

Life Coach Tommy: But, most of the time, especially when we’re in a Life Coach situation, when we’re in a session, we’re not okay. So I was able to get that out of her.

Daniel: Is that a situation, is that an example of thinking that things were better than they really were? Like, again, I’m a survivor – I almost died. Five more minutes I wouldn’t have made it to the hospital, but I will joke about it, I’ll make fun of it, I’ve used it in my stand-up, but it does trigger. I mean, I get sick or I get hurt or something happens and it automatically comes back to me, but you’ll ask me and I’ll be like oh no no, everything’s cool. I’m Garza. I’m Daniel Garza, nothing affects me. In the moment I’m alone, I’m all tears. So, we can exaggerate things and make them worse but we can also down play things and make them better.

Life Coach Tommy: The other way around. We can down play things and make them worse and we can exaggerate things and make them better. Mentally.

Daniel: Ha, oh you just warped my brain there for a minute.

Life Coach Tommy: So, because if we’re down playing and this goes into and drifting away from our main topic and there’s nothing wrong with that – if we down play something then we’re not addressing it, we’re not – we’re kind of pushing it away – and I always tell my clients: “Well, wait a minute, let’s talk about that.” Because I think it’s very important for someone to own the way they’re feeling and own whatever’s happening to them because when you do that, then you can deal with it. If someone is suicidal and they’re depressed, they need to acknowledge that they’re suicidal and depressed, because if they don’t, if they think “Oh, I’m okay, I’m okay.” If they down play that they’re suicidal or depressed then, this is cliché, not cliché it’s actually very powerful, it’s in Narcotics Anonymous and Alcoholics Anonymous: the first step to solving a problem is admitting you have one. It’s cliché because it’s used a lot but the reason it’s so important is that you can’t – you should avoid down playing anything as far as any sort of difficulties because down playing them, psychologists would call it suppression, is that you’re suppressing it and it needs to be addressed. Once you bring the beast out into the open, you can finally fight it and conquer it…

Daniel: Right.

Life Coach Tommy: Because if you don’t bring the beast out, then the beast is just going to lurk around and F everything up everything around you. It’ll F up your foundation, essentially. But once you bring it out and you can see it, and you can visualize it, then you can – because of our survival mechanism – sort of, we can figure out how to defeat it. But we’re never going to get there if we keep down playing it.

Daniel: Right. For those of you joining us, this is Put It Together Conversations spin off of the podcast. On today’s show my guest/co-host is Life Coach Tommy and we’re talking about Addiction to the Past. We kinda like expanded a little more because I always bring my problems – I want Tommy to fix me and he’s not doing it!

Life Coach Tommy: This is all a trick, free life coaching.

Daniel: He keeps bringing me back. But the original conversation was ‘how we are addicted to our past’ and mainly how it controls our present. Again, one of those cliches, but, there are people who say, I think we talked about it a little bit, but, ‘don’t look into the past, stop looking into the past –

Life Coach Tommy: Let the past go.

Daniel: Look into the future, because it’s holding you back. But, I always feeling like I don’t know where I’m going unless I know where I came from. I need to check in and go, okay, I was really screwed up in my 20s – I was a drug addict, an alcoholic, I’m not now, I’m in a better situation, but if I don’t keep – not if I don’t keep looking back, but if I don’t take a peak every once in a while to remind me that I am moving forward professionally, personally, then I don’t know, I feel like I’m not assessing myself – does that make sense?

Life Coach Tommy – Yes, absolutely. And there’s – what I tell my clients is that there are three reasons to use the past, because the past is an extremely effective tool – what I tell my clients is that, yeah it’s okay to look back but when we’re walking forward – because we’re always moving, we’re always time traveling into the future no matter what you do there’s nothing you can do that will prevent you from moving forward second by second – so we’re always going forward no matter what whether we like it or not – and, what happens when you walk forward – let’s say you’re walking ahead and you’re looking behind you while you’re walking, you have no idea what’s coming.

Daniel: Right.

Life Coach Tommy: So you could trip. You could fall. So what I teach my clients is how to build a rear-view mirror. So that when you need to look into the past, you still have your eyes on the road, but you can look in the rear view mirror, not turn completely around. Because once we’ve turned completely around we’ve lost sight of this entire field in front of us. And that’s where people get trapped, is they turn completely around and look into the past and they stop moving forward – psychologically – their body moves forward but they’re not moving forward psychologically. And so I help my clients build a rear view mirror so, like I said, they can keep their eyes on the road, but I also tell them, there are only three reasons to look into the past 1) is use it as a teacher – learn from all your mistakes. Like what you were mentioning is learn from stuff, there’s, the past is the most valuable teacher ever. And that’s how we move forward that’s how we grow is making mistakes and learning from them. The second reason is just like what you said, using it as a barometer to show ourselves how far we’ve come because a lot of my clients, they think their life sucks and I ask, well, where were you five years ago – they didn’t have a place to live, some clients weren’t doing what they wanted to do with their life and now they are – other clients were single, lonely, and depressed and now they’re with somebody – so I show my clients that use the past how far you’ve come and the third reason is that: Kinda use it as a picture because there are beautiful memories from your past.

Daniel: Right.

Life Coach Tommy: And so, you don’t want to live because you can’t re-live the past because, again, that takes you out of the present, but you can look at the past as a picture and say, ‘oh wow there was that cruise we went on and it was amazing, it helped our relationship grow.’ They can look at that trip to Europe or even the bad stuff it’s like, oh there was that relationship six months of – it went up and then it crashed that sucked but I grew from it and again you’re not reliving, you’re not re-experiencing that moment, you’re just looking at that picture. It’s almost like looking at a picture of an ex-girlfriend it’s like what the F was I thinking?

Daniel: Haven’t we all done that.

Life Coach Tommy: Right. So those are the three reasons you can use the past, but notice that, know that those three elements are robbing you of the present moment – they’re just showing you how to enjoy the present.

Daniel: And for those who are watching can you say the three reasons one more time.

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah, the first reason is using it as a teacher, learning from your mistakes. Second reason is using it as a barometer to show yourself how far you’ve come because today is much different than yesterday. Today is much different than five years ago. And the third reason is just look at it as a picture, don’t relive the moment, but look at it like you would – the bad moments, like I said, looking at a picture of an ex-girlfriend and thinking what the F was I thinking? But you can look at the good moments too. Again, don’t relive it, when you relive it we kinda yearn for that again and it’s just not going to happen the way it happened again.

Daniel: So for those of you watching, again, joining us, this is Conversations with Life Coach Tommy today we’re talking about addiction to the past and so far what we’ve covered – the importance of remembering things so that if something is triggered or if something comes back and stimulates, positively or negatively, you can identify better – things won’t go away automatically – you can’t just say, ‘Oh, I’m triggered because my mom spanked me when I was five years old, I’m all better!’ It doesn’t work that way. How does it work?

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah, I mean, if you’re mom spanked you and that’s what you want to focus on essentially I would encourage people – there’s a very powerful book, in fact I think I have it right here. I don’t get paid to promote his book, but it’s called “The Subtle Art of Not Giving A Fuck” I highly recommend this book, it connected with me on a level that was very profound. He’s very honest, some people are not, they’re kinda turned off by – it’s an anti-self help book – they’re kind a turned off by some of the stuff – essentially what he talks about is what to give your Fs about, what to give a F about, and so what to focus on, what brings value and what doesn’t bring value – if focusing on your mom spanking you as a kid, if that’s what’s bringing value to your present moment, okay, let’s talk about that. How is that bringing value, what are you learning from it? Is it teaching you to be a better parent so as not to spank your kid? Is it, showing you some deep seeded emotion that maybe turned into, maybe you have some sort of Electra complex or Oedipal complex, if that’s bringing you value, then let’s talk about it. Let’s focus on it. But, if it’s destroying you, and hurting your present relationship with your mom because your holding that animosity against her? Then we have a problem then you’re addicted to the past.

Daniel: Got it. For those of you if you have any questions whether you’re on Instagram or on Facebook make sure you send in your questions and we will answer those on the air. We still have about fifteen minutes to go so we still have some time. It sounds to me and I wrote it down so I wouldn’t forget it, it sounds like life experience hoarding.

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah.

Daniel: Like, we want to hold on to all of these memories because they have some value whether good or bad but the good ones we expect them to be good, we want them to be there but when the bad one’s show up, call chaos breaks out and you feel like the world’s coming to an end, does that sound about right?

Life Coach Tommy: Absolutely. And, my clients will they probably get tired of me talking about this but it’s so true in all aspects of life is that there has to be balance. There has to be balance in everything you do in your life and there are some aspects of the past that are helpful to you, there are some aspects of the past that are not helpful. But you don’t have to, again, you don’t have to focus on letting the past go, mainly because you can’t. But secondly, the effort of trying to let the past go just makes the past want to stay alive more. It’s almost like trying to, talking about the beast, like trying to kill a beast that loves being beat up because it makes it stronger. That’s what the past is doing. But, to talk about the good stuff and the bad stuff – it’s a bit ironic because you would think that you shouldn’t focus on the negative and that you should always focus on the positive – but the irony is that you should actually see what lessons can be learned from the negativity – relish the good memories, but don’t focus too much on the good memories – because, again, it’ll rob you of the present because people get into the ‘good ole days, syndrome.

Daniel: Ah, yes, we’ve been through that the past couple of years, haven’t we?

Life Coach Tommy: So, I always advise my clients okay, well are you focusing on that positive memory because those were the “good ole days”? Right now in this moment, to get really philosophical, we’re living in the past. In that right this moment, when you achieve your successes and I achieve my successes, we’re going to meet each other at some cast party or some wrap party or some awards party and there’s like remember those times where we used to do these life coaching sessions? These Facebook sessions? So this is even the past – but what happens is when we do that we’re talking about the past, we’re talking about all this stuff, we’re at a Fing award ceremony, let’s enjoy the awards ceremony you know relish – I mean this is all positive but let’s not relish on it because let’s enjoy the awards ceremony.

Daniel: There is such a thing as too much reminiscing.

Life Coach Tommy: Exactly, and I call it the “good ole days” syndrome because a lot of people and this is a terrible image but I envision this old man sitting on his front lawn drinking a beer – his life is miserable, he has chosen to make his life miserable because right now, based on his perception, is not as good as thirty years ago. And so, he has chosen to wear his tank top, his shorts, and drinking that beer on his front porch always complaining about today and how much it sucks.

Daniel: Got it, there’s one thing you touched on, before we kinda wrap it up a little bit, but the balance on my spiritual job, for those of you who know I’m a Reiki master, my job with my clients, I always talk about balance and I’m glad we agree on that because I tell them all the time ‘life is a balance and the universe is balance, it’s good and bad there’s no such thing as balance if everything is good, there has to be some bad things that happen to put things in perspective. If you’re going to laugh you’re going to cry, there’s birth and there’s death. And that’s the balance of life – so I’m glad we both agree on that part. We have about ten minutes is there something we haven’t touched on yet that you have in your notes?

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah, the last thing is, essentially, there are a lot of people – I hate saying ‘a lot of people’ there are people, people who have hired me as a life coach, who they put so much focus on the past – so much focus on the past – and what I want to say as sort of not really a subject but sort of a message: if we, myself, you, the people who focus on the past – if they could re-align their focus and put as much energy as they do on the past and just pull that energy away and focus on the present and enhancing the present and bringing into the present attributes that will make the present more enjoyable – crazy things will happen, amazing things will happen and they can move their life forward. Because again if we’re focused so much on the past it’s robbing us of the present. And we have the energy to focus on the present but we’re so past focused or future focused and that could be a topic ‘addicted to the future’ something completely different – but we’re so past focused so future focused that we lose sight of this present that’s happening until this becomes the past and then in our new present, we’re looking at the past wishing we had been more present.

Daniel: If you’re as confused with that part as I am, then you might want to rewind this and check it out again. But yeah, it makes sense. When, again myself, when I have issues right now with something that’s triggered or feeling an emotion I will go to the past and wonder why it happened, how it happened, what I could have done and then I jump over to the future – how’s it going to affect me, why are people doing more than me, why am I not as successful – and then it’s a jump between back and forth – if I had done this when I was fifteen I would be more successful now and I would be doing better by next year but I’m not focusing on what I can do right now to make things better, is that what –

Life Coach Tommy: Exactly. There is absolutely nothing we can do with the past, there is absolutely nothing we can do to change the past – it is what it is…

Daniel: Unless you’re Stewie Griffin and we’re…Family Guy reference….

Life Coach Tommy: Unless someone figures out time travel, just be careful because there’s that whole space-time continuum thing…

Daniel: If you find me in the past – tell me to go to acting school –

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah.

Daniel: So we have about ten more minutes, again we have ten more minutes if you have a question or comment on what we’re talking about please post it, we’ll read it – but we’re talking about addiction to the past and the concept that Life Coach Tommy is pushing out is the rear view concept – and that is using the rear view mirror as a teacher, a barometer, and a photo memory of the past, but that’s it. Don’t live in the past – you can want to bring it back as much as you can but it’s not going to be of any use unless – – unless – – – I’m trying to find the right word but I lost it right now – if you’re using the past to make today better – whether it’s a good memory or a bad memory, then that’s a good focus but if you’re using it for resentments or shaming or self-belittling then the past is doing you no good – we’re good?

Life Coach Tommy: Yes. And a good exercise is to just – and this is something that you have to train yourself to do — it’s not something where someone watches this video and then tomorrow they’re going to be like ‘Oh, I can do it now.’ It’s maintaining self-awareness and asking yourself the questions in the moment learning how to ask yourself the difficult questions: “is this bringing value to my life?” “Is this bringing value?” “Should I give a fuck about this or is this a waste of time?”

Daniel: That sounds like this whole new concept of hoarding – –

Life Coach Tommy: Not a new concept but yeah.

Daniel: The whole thing, no, the one where does this bring you joy and if not throw it away – so memories can be bad – like do I give a fuck about what happened in 1985 and is it really doing me any good – nope – stop worrying about it. Madeline says, this conversation reminds me of the Blackbird episode where they can rewind their memories, but it ends up destroying their life in present.

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah, I haven’t – I’m not familiar with that, but I can see that being written…I actually would like to see that show but, so my explanation of what I think where they got with that is a bit uneducated because I haven’t seen that show but I could imagine somebody spending all that time rewinding and looking at the past and looking at how they dealt with situations and looking at themselves in general and how they reacted they’re probably going to be very constantly disappointed in the way they reacted and the way they did things. And also just not – I mean I can imagine there’s a situation where they want to – because it doesn’t sound like it’s a time travel situation it sounds like it’s just a memory thing and because it’s not time travel there’s nothing they can do to fix it so I mean again I don’t know what they did but imagine you know not going to some event where you could have prevented your loved one from passing away or dying in an auto accident and you have to relive that moment and rewind that moment that’s gotta be treacherous. And that’s gotta be treacherous to their present existence.

Daniel: Yeah, because I had a lot of – for several years I would go back and remember the first time I tried coke and I would constantly relive that moment thinking had I done something different but I did it and I went on a sixteen year drug journey but that got me to where I am now had I not had that experience and everything that came with it, I would not be the person I am today. So, I found the lesson, that’s what we’re talking about, and what it was.

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah.

Daniel: So we’re running out of time, we have about five more minutes to go. Thank you for joining us I know we were running a little late but thank you for following us even in the set up session. Life Coach Tommy, my guest co-host today on Put It Together Conversations – the subject: Addiction To The Past. If you want to go back and rewatch this you can see some of the lessons that I will post on there lessons. You can also follow us on YouTube – go find me Daniel Garza – please share this with your friends, where can they find you?

Life Coach Tommy: Instagram tommyleekirby and https://lifecoachtommy.com is my website. Speaking of sharing with friends, I’d like to make a little announcement if it’s okay.

Daniel: Please.

Life Coach Tommy: So I’ve been wanting – I can’t find anybody to help me with this – but I’ve been wanting to do a research project – it’s a research project on social psychology. I literally just want to hang out with a bunch of people I don’t know, at a bar or restaurant and watch them talk to each other. Basically I’d just be that creepy guy in the corner at the table. So, if you, it’s for research, but I can’t – it can’t be someone that I know it has to be something that I’m not familiar with like I couldn’t do it with you because I know you. If you know anybody who’d be interested in just having me literally just sit there and watch people talk to each other while I take notes – I do have goals and questions that I would want to answer on this social psychology research project and it is to help me be a better actor and be a better life coach.

Daniel: So if you’re in the Los Angeles area and you wouldn’t mind Life Coach Tommy watching you drink and talk –

Life Coach Tommy: Right. Everybody has to be in on it.

Daniel: Yeah, so, which – creepy in Los Angeles, do we really know what creepy is in Los Angeles. Do you have time for one more questions?

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah. Absolutely, so, if one lives in the now how can one draw from favorite memories? Really good question, we covered that and I’ll go over it again – it’s essentially the three reasons that the past is used for, one – to teach yourself, second one is a barometer to show yourself how far you’ve come in life and the third one, and this is answering your question, David, is that, use the past as a picture – not to relive the memories because that causes a yearning situation that because we want to go back to that moment we can’t go back to – but use it as a picture so your favorite memories if you have a cruise, or just a really nice vacation or a moment that brought you so much joy maybe a child’s laughter or whatever it was, look at it as a picture and as long as it’s not robbing you of enjoying the present then absolutely – enjoy those favorite memories – you can draw from favorite memories all the time as do I – the problem comes is when we’re suffering from ‘good ole days’ syndrome that those favorite memories are the good ole days because right now can be the good ole days you just have to re-align your focus.

Daniel: Is that like, literally, looking at yourself when you were thinner or more active or when you thought you were more successful are those good memories to go, ‘oh man, I remember when I did that.’ And regaining that confidence or regaining that stimulation or –

Life Coach Tommy: Well, yeah, absolutely if it helps you because one of the things that I do with people who want to lose weight – I’ll give you a very specific example – for people who want to lose weight – I get them to take a picture of them now and then I’ll have them take a picture of them when they’ve loss however much weight they want to lose because what happens with life is that we do get side tracked and so what we can is that we can look at those pictures and say ‘I’ve done this before, I can do this again.’

Daniel: Right.

Life Coach Tommy: So not necessarily reminiscing of ‘oh I was so much thinner’ ‘I was so much more successful’ I was so much… that’s a waste – because that’s good ole day syndrome.

Daniel: Right.

Life Coach Tommy: But if you’re using it being like ‘okay how did I do that back then and how can I do that now.’Because now could be different, like you could have a health issue. Like for me for example, I have sciatica, so there are certain exercises I’m never going to be able to do when I was eighteen.

Daniel: Right.

Life Coach Tommy: But it doesn’t mean I can’t exercise. Because now, I’ve lost 25 pounds, I did something.

Daniel: Yeah, he had to throw that in there. By the way if you saw the poster for the ad for the episode today you might have seen that the picture changed – he changed his picture because he lost some weight, so I had to change my picture because I was like well –

Life Coach Tommy: We’re kinda wearing the same shirt – have the same color scheme –

Daniel: Well, I want to look better.

Life Coach Tommy: And, you’re welcome.

Daniel: David, by the way, is a long time follower of Put It Together Podcast – thank you, David, for chiming in. So, guys, we are out of time again, thank you for coming back on the show. We were off the air for awhile, there was a lot of things going on in my life. But we’re back, stay tuned at 4 o’clock from here I’m going to another guest co-host Patesh Shaw will be on the show in a little while at 4 o’clock we’ll be back with another episode of Conversations. We’re kinda catching up on stuff. The topic of that is “victimization” so how to avoid that which is kind of a continuation of this is oddly enough, both of my guest co-hosts who picked their own topics are kinda like this follow up to one another.

Life Coach Tommy: Yes, very cool.

Daniel: So here we’re talking about addiction to the past. And in the next episode, 4 o’clock, chime in we’re talking about victimization and how that affects your life. Which, again, for me this is a really important week again on Friday I’m celebrating thirteen years clean and sober. I want to send out a big hello to all the brothers in Dickinson, Texas. Bay Area Recovery Center where I got sober – I was there for rehab, thank you. I guess my lifetime sponsor who was my first sponsor, Tim, thank you for still – he still to this day, thirteen years later, sends me a message daily on text.

Life Coach Tommy: Oh wow, that’s good.

Daniel: And then I respond to those. I feel obligated every time, I’m like uh yes I got it. Before we go that’s one of those things about memories – I remember about going into rehab and how great I felt and every time I don’t feel well for some reason I go back to that memory and how awesome I felt, so I can recapture – not as a ‘oh I’ll never be there again…” Before we go, and this might be a good topic for next time – we’ll never be who we were before.

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah.

Daniel: And I think that’s one thing that people – when we hold on to those memories or thoughts it’s like I want to recapture – I want to go back – but we’ll never be back to that correct.

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah, never, it’s psychologically impossible – it’s on a brain science level it’s impossible – but yeah, just on the way time grows and time moves it’s never going to happen – just something I’ve had to accept obviously I’m thankful that you’re so persistent to be a part of my life these days, but I’ve had to accept – because there was something that depressed me awhile ago because I had left college and I tried to stay in touch with everyone but then I just started losing touch with people and I was kinda getting caught up in the good ole day syndrome where you know I want to be back with my fraternity brothers and hang out and have drinks and then I came to the conclusion that I had to accept that that will never happen again because I’m not that person anymore. And I never will be that person again, I’m not going to be the – for one I’m not going to be in Houston, I’m not going to be in college, and I’m not going to be the heavy drinker that I was – not that it was a bad thing I’m just not there anymore. And so, all those things had to happen for me to hang out with the high volume of fraternity brother I hung out with – and so because of that that’s just not who I am anymore and I never will be and I’ve had to accept that.

Daniel: So he gets to sit here with me every once in a while.

Life Coach Tommy: Yeah.

END OF TRANSCRIPT

Next up is a video of Life Coach Tommy explaining Self Empowerment and how to take responsibility without blaming others:

Life Coach Tommy: Hey guys, today I am coming to you as a Life Coach. This is a life coaching vlog so the content of that vlog will surround life coaching. Mainly, what I’m going to talk about is ‘Self-Empowerment’ that is my focus as a life coach and while the term ‘self-empowerment’ is so – it seems kind of obvious but it’s also a little vague, I just want to define it and talk about what that means when it comes to the life coaching process.

Self-Empowerment is basically without getting too literal or too vague it’s basically taking responsibility for your own self and using that responsibility to empower your actions. And what I mean by that is – there is this common common attitude to point fingers at all of the things that happen to us and not take responsibility for our own actions. And, what that means is, basically, when something happens to us, instead of owning how we react to what’s happening, we will completely blame that thing and then give up. I’ll give you a specific example. I work out, at the gym, fitness is a very important part of my life, I’m on the path for bodybuilding, I do a lot of strength training and one day a couple weeks ago, I actually injured the tricep and so, if you don’t take responsibility for that, and you blame the weights, or you blame your genetics, you’re not going to get very far. And I could have given up, I could have been like, oh this is always going to happen to me, this is – anytime I try to do something, something bad’s going to happen. Instead, my reaction to injuring my tricep had nothing to do with the weights, had nothing to do with genetics, had nothing to do with the weather or any traffic situation – it was a natural reaction to me lifting too much. I did too many reps that day. And so what I did is I took a step back and said, ‘okay, what do I need to do – don’t give up on strength training suddenly because you’ve injured your triceps – what do I need to do to A) make my tricep better so it doesn’t hurt anymore B) how do I not do that again and C) ultimately what do I need to do to get back in the gym. So, I took two weeks off, I didn’t go to the gym for two weeks and it got better. And now I’m back in the gym and I’m careful with how I do certain tricep exercises being aware that if I life too much and do too many reps – and I’m not ready for that, then, I could get injured.

So, that’s an example of self-empowerment. You want to ask yourself, how many times have you completely blamed someone else. Completely put blame on your partner, the guy who cut you off. You know, you wake up, you get in your car, you have your cappuccino or your latte, you’re feeling great, you’re like, “I’m going to have a wonderful day!” And suddenly, somebody cuts you off – suddenly because he decided to cut you off – he decided to not use his signal when changing lanes – suddenly you choose to have that person ruin your entire day. So you’re letting an external force control your actions. Where you can see this as a secluded action – this person made a decision – this person screwed up, cut me off, didn’t use his lane to show that he was signaling – or didn’t use his signal to show that he was changing lanes – that has nothing to do with me. It ruined that moment because suddenly I’m jerked alive and I’m cautious and I’m on alert which I should be while I’m driving – and then it’s gone, it’s done – it’s not going to ruin the rest of my day.

So, that’s my focus and also, self empowerment also comes with the relationship you have with yourself – I say this a lot in my life coaching blog which you can go to lifecoachtommy.com – if we have a negative relationship with ourself then it’s really really easy to play the blame game on the rest of the world. You walk outside, you had an outdoor event plan – and it rains, you can blame the gods all you want, but you have to find another way. Maybe the outdoor event is brought inside, or maybe you don’t have it that day, but you cannot allow that external force to ruin your life. Figure it out, figure out a better way. Our brains are extremely capable of solving problems and identifying patterns it’s why we’ve survived as long as we have. That is in our genetics.

So, the communication you want to have is, with yourself, should always be positive. And there’s a very very very important equation that I learned a long time ago that I hope that, if you don’t take anything from this video that you take this equation at least – and the equation is E plus R equals O. I’ll say that again and I’ll have it in the description of this video. E + R = O – and what those letters stand for: Event plus Response equals the Outcome. There are a plethora of external forces that do affect your life. But you can control your response to those external affects. So that when an Event happens to you, be self-aware of your Response to that Event and the Outcome will be a sum of that. So if something happens and your Response is negative the Outcome is going to be negative. But if something happens to you and your Response is positive – and positive doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to be happy all the time – positive means that, you can also say another P – productive, that your response is productive to that event to create a positive or satisfying outcome.

So, anyways, hope this has been educational. Subscribe, like, comment – if you have any questions please ask and do visit https://lifecoachtommy.com to get more information about my services as well as more information about self-empowerment and I blog a lot about the communication and relationship that you have with yourself. Thanks for watching!

END OF TRANSCRIPT

This next video covers not only how to lose weight, but how to keep it off.

Life Coach Tommy: Hey guys, Life Coach Tommy here. This personal vlog is more for Life Coaching and it’s basically ‘How to Lose Weight’ but not only how to lose weight but also how to keep that weight off. The very first step in losing weight, like I said, not only losing weight but keeping the weight off because it’s great that you want to lose weight but we’ve got to commit to a lifestyle here of staying fit, staying thin, keeping, you know, there’s so many things that happen that keep it on so we want to keep it off for the rest of our lives. Not just until the summer’s over, not just after the, you know, until holiday gets here. We want to keep it off for the rest of our lives. This is focused on that.

The very first step in establishing, the very first step in losing weight though is establishing a deep and painful ‘Why’ and for those who want to know about that, go back to my other video, ‘The Power of Why’ that’s where I focus on how to really garner – visualize – a powerful why. So that, you’ll stay focused, you’ll commit and never lose sight of why you’re doing what you’re doing. Watch that video first then come back – this video focuses on the more granular elements of weight loss. I’m going to talk about macronutrients, strength training – I’m going to talk about a lot of things, but the very first thing in order to do weight loss is to establish a deep and painful why.

Now, for the people who are focusing on weight loss itself here are some tips and tricks to really stay committed and really focus on watching your weight just fall off – for lack of a better phrase.

First thing is, look at what you’re eating right now – really have a log from – try to remember what you ate yesterday all day – look at what you ate yesterday all day and look at what you ate today and take one more day and look at what you’re eating tomorrow – just write it all down. And, when you’re doing that, pay attention to four critical elements that are probably you’re consuming way too much of. Look at Dairy, Salt, Carbs, and Sugar. Those four elements are the four critical elements that are in your diet right now that you need to decrease. Now, notice I said DECREASE, I didn’t say eliminate. There are a lot of diets out there, and I’m going to talk about that word ‘diet’ because it’s got a weird connotation to it. But there are a lot of diets out there that are depriving your body of necessary nutrients. So, we don’t have to deprive your body – also depriving your body – deprivation traumatizes your body so that you’re body doesn’t know what’s going on and it’s going to latch on to things just to survive. Our bodies are built for survival and that’s what you’re bodies going to do in reaction to those deprivation techniques.

So, no deprivation. Decrease the amount of dairy, salt, sugar, and carbs you’re consuming. So look at how much cheese, look at how much – and I’m not just – when it comes to sugar we’ll focus more on that, but look at the processed sugars. The processed sugars that are in your candies or cakes, your juices, your fruit juices that you think should be healthy – those juices have 53g of sugar on average. 53 grams of sugar. A glass of orange juice if you think you’re consuming Vitamin C and helping yourself stay healthy, a glass of orange juice has probably a bowl the size of this hand amount of sugar. You can get the same amount of Vitamin C and a healthy source of sugar, from an orange. So, just think about stuff like that. You want to eliminate as much processed sugar as you can, but don’t eliminate sugar altogether. And if that doesn’t make sense, please comment below, I will discuss anything that’s not clear.

And, here’s the overall picture, something you’ll have to really focus on is, the way you are eating and how active you are influences the weight that you carry. So I’m going to say that again: the way that you are eating and how active you are, influences the weight you carry around. So if you’re eating a lot of pizza, cheeseburgers, and tacos and you’re not doing anything else, active – you know, if you’re not jogging, if you’re not running, if you’re not strength training, all of that stuff is going to stay on your body in the image of fat. So, think about that, visualize that first, the way you are eating and how active you are influences your weight.

Now let’s talk about diet and exercise. Because diet and exercise, those two things have to be happening in your body in order for you to lose weight. Now, the word diet, when my clients, when my life coaching clients and for you – DON’T EVER GO ON A DIET – STOP DOING THAT – STOP GOING ON DIETS. Because when you go on a diet, you’re telling your mind that it’s temporary. But when we talk about the definition of a diet, a diet is just the way that you eat. So you need to change your diet, don’t go on a diet, change your diet, change what you’re consuming.

Here’s another thing, this is a cliché phrase but I don’t think it’s been given a lot of attention when it comes to diet and exercise but it kinda goes back to what I was saying about the way you’re eating and how active you are influences your weight: You are what you eat. Think about that, you are what you eat. Now, if you’re eating beef you don’t suddenly become beef you are what you eat. You are what you eat. Beef, if you consume a lot of chicken you don’t suddenly become a chicken – but the elements of that chicken, the nutrients, the proteins of that chicken – becomes you. It gets injected into your muscles, it gets injected into your pectoral muscles, it goes through your system. It goes through your circulatory system. That’s what that means, you are what you eat. If you’re eating pizza, cheeseburgers, and tacos every other day – that’s all your body has to work with. So, and let’s look at what these things – at least one of them – pizza – that’s a ton of carbs. And it takes a long time for your stomach to break those down so the longer that carbs stay in your stomach, the more likely they’re going to switch into sugar. And sugar that will then turn into fat. So, on top of that, on top of the sugar, the processed sugar that’s in the carbs, there is a ton of saturated fat that your body just doesn’t need. So, you’ve got carbs and sugar and saturated fat. All this stuff is going through your system. You are becoming the carbs, and the saturated fat, and the processed sugars that are in the pizza.

Also, there’s a ton of sodium. You know when you have a ton of extra sodium in your body, that sodium latches on to your fat and says, “Don’t leave me!” And the fat will listen. So, your fat will stay in there. So, I hope you’re noticing a theme here that you know this processed sugar that’s in both the crust and the sauce, combined with the sodium, combined with the carbs – it all, your body cannot digest all of it so guess what it turns into? Fat, that you’re wearing on your body. So when you look at yourself in the mirror and you see a little belly, or you see stuff going on. It’s what you’re eating and again, this is all without doing anything with your life. This is you sitting on the couch. This is you going to work, not going to the gym, not taking a jog around the neighborhood, this is all just sedentary.

And, I mentioned before about sugar, and a quick note on sugar. Sugar is hidden everywhere. Like I mentioned, it’s hidden in the fruit juices. You want to try to limit your sugar intake to just fruits and vegetables. So, when you’re buying something, look at the nutrition facts – if there’s more than 8 grams of sugar per serving in whatever product you’re buying – you should avoid it because you just don’t need that much sugar in one sitting.

Also, while you’re looking at the nutritional facts, look at the ingredients. You know, the first three ingredients that are listed there – that’s what the product mostly is. So, if you’re looking at like peanut butter, for example, if the first ingredient listed is fructose corn syrup, avoid it. You’re peanut butter should say, ‘Peanuts’ and maybe a little salt. So, when you’re consuming things and you’re looking at the ingredients make sure that the ingredients list what you’re actually buying. Because, that, again, you are what you eat. You’re injecting high fructose corn syrup into your body and your body has problems digesting it. So, anything your body has problems digesting, usually turns into fat that you wear. You’re noticing a theme here, I hope.

So, also when you’re looking at this, when you’re decreasing – as your’e decreasing the dairy, the carbs, the sugar, and the salt. How much fruit and veggies are you eating? Look at that, because what you want to do – typically on average people aren’t eating enough fruit and veggies so you want to amp up, especially vegetables but definitely amp up the fruit as well, but not so much fruit because again it does have a lot of sugar which – healthy sort of sugar – but too much of anything turns into fat. So, don’t go crazy with the fruit, but replace the candy, and the Starbucks, where you drink the iced drinks and the shakes and the crappuccinos. Stop doing that – replace that with fruit. Like I said, amp the vegetables. Vegetables is a great source of many vitamins and minerals, nutrients and one of the most important things, fiber. It helps push all the stuff through your system so it’s not staying in your stomach.

So, again, that’s eating habits, but with eating habits, once that’s altered, you must also increase your activity and that should include both cardio and strength training. If all you want to do is shred fat, do a little more cardio than you do strength training. If all you want to do is build muscle, then of course do a little bit more strength training than cardio. But an ideal situation for your body is a healthy mix of both. And I’m going to lend you a secret. When you work your muscles, here’s what happens. That pain and that soreness that you’re feeling during and after a work out, that is telling you that your muscles are growing. When you’re muscles are growing, fat is burning. So when you’re feeling that pain and that soreness, you’re burning fat. And, typically, especially for men, when we start working out, we’ll focus on the biceps and the chest mainly because those are the most visual muscles. And it, essentially, shows the world, “Hey, look at me, we’re working out!”

Here’s the tip: DON’T SKIP LEG DAY. It’s a very popular meme for a reason and it’s not just about avoiding chicken legs. DON’T SKIP LEG DAY. Focus more energy on your legs than you do on your biceps and your chest and here’s why, here’s the actual secret tip: Your thighs are the largest muscle in your body and when they’re growing, more fat is burning. So think about it like this, increasing muscle mass in your thighs, that helps burn fat, more so than increasing the biceps and the chest. Still focusing on everything else. But, put a lot – as much energy in the thighs as you can because when they’re growing and they’re big, they need all the stuff that’s in your body, more so than your biceps and your chest. DON’T SKIP LEG DAY. Because remember, when they’re growing, fat is burning. So if you want those pecs and those biceps to really be ripped and not you know covered in fat, focus on the thighs. Focus on the legs, really just everything – calf’s, thighs, but your thighs – just feel your thighs they’re the biggest muscle in your body biologically it just makes sense.

One last thing – never underestimate the power of water. Water is extremely important it does so many things – I’m not going into it all here, but you can’t progress with weight loss unless your consistently hydrating. You should take your current body weight, divide it by 2 and whatever number you have that’s how many ounces you should consume every day. Guess what, you’re going to pee a lot. But, just visualize it this way, every time you’re in the restroom peeing, that’s waste and fat going down the toilet.

If you like what you hear and you want to hear more of this subscribe, like this video, if you have any questions, anything that wasn’t clear, any discussion topics, please comment below ask me questions I will indulge conversation.

This has been Tommy Lee Kirby also known as Life Coach Tommy. And also go to https://lifecoachtommy.com if you want to see blogs about other things. Thank you very much, thanks for watching, bye bye.

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Life Coach Tommy is based out of Los Angeles, California, namely the Sherman Oaks or Valley area, but has coached clients from all over the world.