Mindset

This is the overview page on mindset. “Mindset” is general term to encompass topics such as psychology, motivation, thought pattens, and more. Essentially, mindset is the mental piece of the puzzle that guides so many of our actions. It is hard to get our body right if our mind isn’t. Establishing a mindset that is God-focused and faith-powered is of paramount importance.

Mindset

For many of us, past failures dictate our future actions, whether we are aware of it or not. A spiritually healthy mindset, however, can change all that and revolutionize our fitness at the same time.

On the flipside, your fitness could be on point. This does not mean your mindset is. Vanity and pride are sneaky. If not careful, “you” become the focus of your fitness, not your Father. This is a product of a faulty mindset.

Game Plan

We want to pray daily for the mind of Christ. This will require taking every thought captive. To take it captive, you have to be aware of it. Your thought life and decision-making processes needs to be intentional and habitual. This requires daily surrender, as well as staying connected to our true source of wisdom.

Result

If we are not careful, we live our lives on autopilot, giving no thought to why we do what we do. If we want to be transformed, it will require the renewal of our mind. A shift in awareness and intention can help change all that. Building habits and guidelines that help us stay rooted in Christ mentally will have a profound effect on enabling us to fill our calling to love the Lord with all of our mind. From there, our fitness can follow.

Great Books on Mindset

Your Future Self Will Thank You by Drew Dick
Winning the War of Your Mind by Craig Groeschel
Atomic Habits by James Clear
Don’t Give the Enemy a Seat at Your Table by Louie Giglio
Ask It by Andy Stanley
Think Ahead by Craig Groeschel

Here are some great books that can help you build a strong mental foundation. This list is constantly growing.

All Mindset Articles

Here is a growing list of articles I’ve written on mindset and decision making. Hope they help!

Do You Have “Rooftop” Friends?

It should be no secret that having accountability can make a huge difference with your health and fitness. In fact, there are studies that prove it: • Healthy partners influence their partner to be healthier. • Those who share progress on social media lose more...

The Nutrition Tithe

For you church-goers out there, you know that basket they pass around during service? Some call it offering. Others call it giving or donations. Still others refer to it as a tithe. It's when you give some money to the church to help the church fulfill it's mission....

Your Kids And Your Fitness

I couldn't believe it. There's no way it could be right. So I double-checked the math. 9 + 2 + 11 + 3 ... plus ... carry the ... divide by 4.2 ... equals... 15. FIFTEEN! I was right the first time... but I wished I wasn't. We had completed a little sugar experiment...

Ignoring Your Fitness Is Selfish

Ignoring your fitness is selfish. There… I said it. I know it’s not easy to hear. I know I just lost some friends on social media. I know it doesn’t seem compassionate. I also know it’s the truth. Before I tell you why ignoring your fitness is selfish, let me throw...

Fitness Journey Phase 1: The Fire Phase

A few weeks back, I mentioned that there are six phases to a fitness journey. Taking some of the content from my book The Body Tithe Devotional, I gave an overview of each of the six phases. Today, I want to go a little more in depth on Phase 1: The Fire Phase. Here's...

Is Your Sleep Making You Fat?

When trying to lose fat, people rarely think about their sleep. They think about needing to exercise more or eat healthier. These are both good things, but they're not the complete picture. Since the beginning, I've been trying to teach people this equation: EXERCISE...

The 6 Phases of a Fitness Journey

NOTE: This post was adapted from the "Introduction" of the book The Body Tithe Devotional: Spiritual Encouragement for Your Fitness Journey. Whenever somebody starts a new fitness regimen, be it a running program, rehab, home fitness workouts, you name it, they are...

Facing Fitness Struggles

Sometimes life gets busy and we just stop making time for the goals we have set. Our nutrition goes out the window along with our workout plans. Before long you have lost sight of your goal or you realize that you haven’t done anything to work toward your goal. How do...

Setting Fitness Goals – Part II

You will recall from “Setting Fitness Goals Part I”, that I was in quite the dilemma with my exercise lifestyle. Things felt like they were going well, and then they suddenly seemed to be going poorly. Truth be told, I had no tangible way to prove either outcome. It...

Setting Fitness Goals – Part 1

Without ever setting fitness goals, I had been working out for over a year and thought it was going well. I felt like I was getting stronger. I didn’t seem quite as winded at the end of Insanity’s Full Cardio workouts. Playing sports with friends was going a bit...

Healthy weight… what should it be for me?

I don’t normally tell people when I first meet them that I am a registered dietitian. It makes me feel uncomfortable, especially if they catch me indulging in my beloved McDonald’s triple thick chocolate milkshake. However, if it does come up in conversation, the one...

Fitness at 40…

All my life I've been told to wait until ___________, then I'd understand. Wait until you can drive, wait until you are in college, wait until you're legal, wait until you're married, wait until you have kids, wait until you're past your prime, wait until you're 30,...

My Fitness Hero

There are so many people to look up to in the world of exercise and nutrition. You have icons such as Jack LaLanne, the godfather of fitness. Or Dr. Kenneth Cooper, credited for inventing aerobics and bringing the importance of cholesterol and antioxidants into...

Another primary motivation for getting fit

A few years back, we needed some bedroom furniture for our oldest son. Being a fan of financial fitness, we decided we'd get the best bang for our buck at IKEA. But the closest one is an hour and a half from us and I didn't want to get there and not be able to fit the...

One of my primary motivations for getting fit

Everyone has their motivations for getting fit. Ranging from looking good and feeling better to recovering from injuries and preventing them, there are no shortage of reasons to get fit. I certainly have my motivations: I want to honor God with my body. I want to be...

Should I weigh myself? Yes… and no.

If you're wondering, "Should I weigh myself?" the answer may not be a simple "yes" or "no." Let's take a look at both sides of the argument. Before deciding, "Should I weigh myself?" Before deciding "Should I weigh myself?" it's important to understand that trimming...

Of horses and fitness accountability

There's a parable that motivational speakers like to use. The speaker will ask the audience: "If a draft horse can pull between one to three tons, what would you expect two draft horses to be able to pull?" After posing the question, he'll give the audience time to do...

Kids exercise when you exercise

Kids exercise when you exercise. Don't believe me? I got the best call from my wife the other day regarding Gigi, our four-year-old. Kim said... I just wanted to let you know that your daughter asked if she could do the [product_referral...

Healthy eating can be an illusion

Quick guess of where the photos were taken ... Subway? Wrong. Whole Foods? Wrong again. Last chance. Google Cafe? (Insert loud buzzer noise here) No my friend, that's the picture on the wall of the Thornton's Gas Station near...

Want to be an encourager? Then don’t be a Barone!

In spite of my frequent Seinfeld references (like my Organize your kitchen pantry and Fitness goals can easily be sabotaged by “special” occasions posts), I actually think Everybody Loves Raymond was better (yeah, I said it). In fact, the day-in day-out...

HALT before you make a fitness decision!

How do you make fitness decisions? Do you really pay attention to your thought process before you decide on something, or do you just go with your gut, so to speak. Here’s a concept I heard in a sermon that I am going to borrow to apply to your health. I would like...

Setting Fitness Goals – Part II

How do you go about skinning a cat? You wouldn’t, that’d be mean. Just because you don’t like pets doesn’t mean you have to be violent toward them. And what’s with you and your animosity towards animals anyway? If you asked how to skin or peel a clove of garlic, that...

Setting Fitness Goals – Part I

How do you go about eating an elephant? You wouldn't, that'd be mean. Elephants are smart, rare, and cute in their giant-nose-kind-of-way. Besides, what'd an elephant ever do to you? Furthermore, you don’t want to get on an elephant’s bad side... they remember...

Getting fit means you are already an athlete

Why is it that we tend to only think of people who are famous as ______________. Picasso was a famous artist. But do you paint? I'd say you're an artist. Aretha Franklin is a famous singer. Do you have a good voice and ever perform for others? I'd say you're a singer....

What does “Act of Valor” have to do with fitness?

This past week, I went to see the movie Act of Valor with my father. The story is about a Navy SEAL team doing an extraction of a kidnapped CIA agent, and then following the intelligence the mission uncovers. This movie is based on real life events and the roles of...

Fitness goals can be ruined by “special” occasions

So it's February and many of you have gotten a month's worth of New Year's health and fitness resolutions under your belt. You track your workouts Seinfeld style. You stop eating before you're full. You have tried new kinds of workouts. And from this, perhaps you've...

Avoid fitness plateaus by being like Bill Murray

Been doing the same thing over and over and getting nowhere? That's one definition of insanity: doing the same thing repeatedly but expecting different results. I'm going to let you in on the secret to breaking through fitness plateaus... simply model yourself after...

Is timing really everything when getting fit?

They say timing is everything. But can timing make a difference with your fitness and nutrition goals? The article How to Lose Weight All Day Long would sure have you believe so. The piece starts off by saying, "It's not just what you eat or how much you exercise that...

Fitness tracking! What’s the deal with fitness tracking?

When I say Seinfeld, you probably think of comedian Jerry Seinfeld and his TV show or stand-up comedy. But from hence point forward, I want you to think about progress... better yet, I want you to think, "Don't break the chain." Years ago, so the story goes, when...

Cheat on your diet with these 5 tips.

Yep, you read correctly, "How to cheat on your diet." If you're going to break some rules, there are some good better ways to go about it, and I'm going to tell you about them. First though, I want to clarify something: I don't really like the word "cheat" if the...

Getting fit? The media isn’t helping

Is it just me or does it seem like every year, we hear of some kind of food study that "proves" the opposite of what we thought to be true. Here are some examples of what I'm talking about: Fat is bad for you. Did I say fat? I mean carbohydrates are bad. Actually,...

Exercise Excuse #1: I am going to hate it

At the bottom of the homepage, I have listed 11 lies we tell ourselves to avoid taking control of our health. The first excuse is that you will hate it. You know this ahead of time. You've done every form of exercise imaginable and you hate every one of them. And you...

The 80-20 Rule and Your Fitness

You know who that handsome devil is to the left? Why that's Vilfredo Pareto. What? You've never heard of him? Okay, I hadn't either. But I was very familiar with the rule named after him, The Pareto Principle (also known as the 80-20 rule, the law of the vital few,...

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