Last weekend I was back in PA to visit family and was having a conversation with my cousin, who is doing a trial on my app.

“Yeah I used it once, but then I just couldn’t keep it going.”

I asked if she was working out at home or in the gym, and she said she was trying to make it work at home.

Not getting up to work out because Vinnie is on my lap is an excuse…no matter what I tell myself.

“But my bedroom is too small, the basement is freezing and my husband is home all of the time right now and I don’t want to work out in the living room in front of him,” she said. Then, without me saying anything, she continued. “I know, I know – just a bunch of excuses.”

Our conversation was cut a bit short, but this is my answer (I know you’re reading this cuz…)

I don’t think any of the things mentioned above are excuses. I really don’t.

I think they’re limiting factors.

What’s the difference?

A quick google search gives the definition of excuse as: an attempt to defend or justify.

Explaining that you’re late for work for the 33rd day in a row because your dog wouldn’t get off your lap is an excuse (though in our house, it’s reason enough to get out of doing certain things….)

I never want to shove Angelo off my lap, but I absolutely can.

Limiting factors are things in our environment that can get in our way, or add a layer to the execution of a task.

For instance, let’s say that your goal is to walk 5k steps every day (click here if you want to join this week’s challenge in the Kim Lloyd Fitness Neighborhood on that one). If you live in an area with well-maintained sidewalks, then it’s likely a matter of putting on your shoes and going.

If you don’t have sidewalks and live on a busy road with no room to walk, then you need to:

A. Choose a place to walk – local gym treadmill? Mall? Trails?

B. Negotiate the weather – if you live in the Northeast, it’s been pouring lately.

C. Have a means to get to the place to walk. Do you have a car?

D. Factor in the time to drive to the place, get your walk in, and drive back.

The thing about physical fitness is that it doesn’t occur in a vacuum, but the industry makes it feel that way. Our environment, social situation, emotional health, and mental health all affect each other.

So what does that mean?

I think it's the difference between feeling shame for not executing on a task and realizing that in order to make a physical change, it might mean making some environmental changes first.

If you want to workout at home but are struggling, can you create a space that feels comfortable? Get heat in the basement, kick the hubby out for a few hours, find a different space where you can put down an exercise mat, put on some music and make it yours for 20 minutes? (I'm not just talking to my cousin here..)

If the answer is no, can you join a gym?

The thing is, when it comes to making behavior change, nothing is too small to feel like a big deal.

Depending on how old you are, you likely remember the Trapper Keeper, an organizational tool from Mead for school aged kids that was popular in the 80’s and 90’s.

Before they were banned (I know, right?? Google it), you weren’t cool unless you had a one. I remember very distinctly when I was got my first Trapper Keeper before fifth grade. It was tan and had a lovely mountain scene on the front.

While other students organized the inside folders by subject and put the corresponding assignments and papers in each, it wasn’t very long before I was blindly shoving every paper into the front of the Trapper Keeper and then shutting it.

Within a few months, my Trapper Keeper had a broken spine and the papers spilled out every time I pulled it out of my backpack, where half eaten pencils, loose papers, and book covers, sans books, ate up most of the space.

I was 10 years old when I recognized on some level that those things just weren’t for me.

Fast forward to my forties….

When I first started working full time at a gym, I was impressed by my boss’s productivity. He used a planner daily and had a knack for cranking out tasks in a way that I admired. So, after chatting with him about his system, I ordered my first planner.

I was like, yes! Systems! This is the thing that will solve all my disorganization problems! I shall create systems with a planner and some to do lists and there will be color coding and people will want to be like me.

But, because I didn’t want to feel too hemmed in by a planner, I bought one that was specific to people who kept a blog. It was designed to help you cultivate blog posts throughout the week, and so allowed for a little creativity.

I had all the enthusiasm on day one. By day five, I was remembering to check the planner, but wasn’t writing in it like I had the first two days.

I spent the next 25 days carrying the planner around, opening it occasionally, writing in it some, but mostly I just felt shame every time I looked at it. By day 30, I ditched it completely, but kept watching my boss, opening his planner every day, and executing his tasks and moving the business forward and was like ugh - why can't I do that?

A few months later, I came across another type of planner, and I was sure that this would be the one that stuck. This one revolved around meditation and being present and I thought ah – yes – this is the one that will finally unlock my productivity.

It was also expensive, so I figured if I spent enough on it, the financial investment would be a motivating factor.

A month later, I was shoving the leather-bound book into the trash, this time with a seemingly insurmountable amount of shame. Why couldn’t I make these things work for me?

Early last summer, I got my answer.

I was listening to a podcast about coaching clients with ADHD and had the experience that many women my age have when they hear about ADHD as an adult.

Oh my God. That's me.

I was blown away, and said something to one of my clients. She laughed.

"I could have told you that years ago."

I just thought I was a hot mess. I really did. But why was I always calling myself that? Well, because I struggled with:

· Organizing and Prioritizing

· Time management

· Focusing on a task

· Multi-tasking (shifting focus from one thing to another was really hard)

· Restlessness

· Planning

When I looked up some of the symptoms of adult ADHD, specifically in women, you might not be shocked to find that those symptoms included struggles with:

· Organizing and Prioritizing

· Time management

· Focusing on a task

· Multi-tasking

· Restlessness

· Planning

The challenge, I realized, is that I was perpetually trying, in my use of planners, to jam a square peg into a round hole. A lot of traditional systems don't work with my brain.

Every time I tried to follow a system, like using a planner, it always felt like putting on shoes that didn’t fit quite right..

Instead of ordering another planner, I decided to take a different approach. There was something that I learned in one of my coaching programs that stuck with me.

Every night, I make a list of the top three things I want to do the next day.

That's it.

That? Simplifying the whole planning process down to one task that involved a pen and a post it note? Or scrap of paper? That made a huge difference for me. Within 30 days, I was in the habit of ending each day by writing down my top three tasks for the next day.

Planners be damned. At least for me.

I'll have more to say about ADHD in the future. I just received an official diagnosis a few weeks ago, something I had put on hold while I negotiated my cancer.

But if this rings familiar for you, just know you’re not alone.

Greetings from soggy and wet Maine, where it's raining so hard that both of my dogs are still wet from being outside three hours ago...(Their ears are doing a good job mopping the floor though.)

These two are decidedly unmotivated…

If I had to name the number one challenge I hear most often when people find out that I'm a fitness coach, it's motivation.

"I just can't seem to get myself motivated to start anything," they say.

As I've written before, motivation is your unreliable friend. The one who, if you asked them to pick you up from the airport would forget to show up.

Most of us have the motivation formula backwards. We think that we need to feel like doing something before we do it. But how often do you feel like doing almost anything that you need to do?

I had been in a pretty good workout groove since December, but after spending two weeks in Texas for a workshop, I've struggled to get my mojo back.

We all have natural breaks in our routines, and more often than not, it's those breaks that can really do us in. We miss one week of workouts, and then before we know it it's been a month.

This is when I lean heavy on small actions. As any of you who have worked with me know, I'm a huge fan of tiny habits and small changes.

Because action breeds motivation.

Read that again, even if you've heard it before.

Action breeds motivation.

A tiny action of any kind busts us out of procrastination and feeling stuck and creates momentum. Last week in my private Facebook group, I decided to hold a 1 minute of action per day challenge.

Virtually everyone who participated in the challenge did more than one minute, because action is empowering and satisfying.

Taking an action - any kind of action - also provides us with evidence that we can do a thing, whatever that thing might be.

If you're looking for a little help, click here to join the Kim Lloyd Fitness Neighborhood, where we'll be doing a two-minute per day challenge this week.