Emotional regulation is an overlooked factor when reaching towards your goal

Emotional regulation is the ability to identify one's emotions and respond rationally in a flexible way, it is often an overlooked factor when reaching towards your goals.

We all know how to eat, what to eat but what is often overlooked when people starting their fitness journey is the emphasis on emotional regulation.

Some of the key factors to people who stop working towards their goals are:

• Boredom
• Stress eating
• Overwhelm
• The need to be doing something
• Overwork
• Poor Time management
• Emotional eating
• Lack of self-worth or self-belief

We have limiting beliefs that hold us back and our actions reaffirm our beliefs rather than problem solving to work out what we are needing to work on to achieve our goal.

EG say that you constantly struggle to stick to something, your belief becomes “I can’t stick to this, I will never reach my goal”. Which keeps you stuck in the same place.

You can instead notice that you are struggling to stick to something, and ask yourself why. Are you being to rigid? Do you have unrealistic expectations? Are you doing it for the approval of others? Do you need to work on time management?

This gives you the power to change something, rather than your first reaction of feeling powerless.

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If you struggle with a high stress job and you constantly reach for drink or food, then you can notice this and start to find solutions to navigate through this. Instead of being caught in the same cycle

Two Questions to ask yourself:

• What pattern do I notice reoccurring?
• How can I navigate through this?

Actionable tasks

• When this occurs next I will.... (call a friend/journal/run/walk)
• Name the emotions that you are feeling with a feelings wheel

*Disclaimer, please seek help from a licensed health professional if emotions are unsafe to sit with
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