Stop Skipping Workouts: A Simple NLP Tool for Midlife Motivation

Skipping workouts in midlife often feels like a motivation problem, but it’s usually something deeper. In this episode, you’ll learn a simple NLP tool called DIMES that helps you move from resistance to action without forcing yourself.

When you don’t feel like working out, most women turn to guilt or discipline. This conversation shows a different approach. You’ll discover how to calm your nervous system, name what’s really going on underneath the resistance, and take one small step that builds momentum instead of burnout.

If you’ve ever planned a workout and then talked yourself out of it, this episode will give you a practical, brain-based way to get moving again with more kindness and less inner fighting.

Get the free step-by-step DIMES guide-https://www.camoyler.com/dimes-pdf

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Chapters:
00:00 Understanding Intentions and Self-Care
06:06 Move Emotions, Shift State
08:16 Midlife Fitness & Mindset Guide

Transcript

It's 2: 0:00

51 in the afternoon and your workout's on the calendar. The weights are waiting. Your plan is clear and you absolutely do not want to do it. Every part of you is negotiating. Maybe later, maybe tomorrow. I just really need a rest day. All that stuff that we say to ourselves right now, somewhere in the world, a woman is arguing with herself about a workout. She planned it. She knows she needs it. And she still doesn't want to do it. If that woman has ever been you, stay with me. Hey there, I'm Cam Allen. Welcome back to The Midlife Method. You kind of start wondering if your motivation just disappears in midlife. What if that moment isn't actually about discipline at all? What if it's actually about your nervous system asking for a different kind of support? Today I'm going to show you a very simple NLP tool called Dimes, where you can move from, I don't feel like it, to clear action in just a few minutes. First of all, NLP stands for neuro-linguistic programming, and it's literally the language of your mind, and then it gets your body into action. And as a master practitioner, I'm here to bring these tools to you so you can get your mind and your body on the same page and move towards your goals faster. Isn't that amazing? So if you've ever skipped a workout before because you have this internal resistance and it was louder than your goals, stay with me. This process is going to give you a way to work with your brain instead of trying to bully yourself into cooperation. But let's get real. Let's do a real everyday example. You plan to do a workout after work and work ends and the time arrives for you to actually do your workout. Maybe your body feels heavy, maybe your mind feels tired, and chips on the couch actually sound and look better than going down and doing a workout in your gym. And this is how Dimes works in that exact moment. So Dimes, we're going to start with D. D stands for discover the intention. Most women start with negative criticism, negative self-talk. I'm just being lazy. I should be more committed. I just need to push harder. Hey, I've said all of those things to myself. But Dimes starts with something else. You get curious and you ask yourself, what is the intention for me right now? What am I hoping will happen? What am I hoping to get? Or what am I avoiding? How does this really impact me? Is there a story about what I need?

And when you answer these questions honestly, it sounds like this: 2:37

I really need some rest, or I need comfort. I'm looking for comfort, or I'm avoiding a feeling that feels uncomfortable. And I just want the day to feel easier. And listen, none of those things are bad intentions, but another question helps me even more. What am I hoping to get, or what am I hoping to avoid? And the answer might be something like, I don't want to feel exhausted after my workout. I'm actually just trying to protect my energy. I want relief from the pressure I'm putting on myself. Now the resistance towards your workouts make a whole bunch of sense. Part of you is trying to take care of you. Moving on to I. I stands for interrupt the pattern. Trying to solve this argument in your head rarely works. Calming the body will change absolutely everything. So you can pause and ask yourself, what parasympathetic tools can I use right now? Parasympathetic is the calm side of our nervous system. When we are in a stressed-out mode, we don't make good decisions. Being in a calm state changes everything. So there's a ton of parasympathetic tools. Here are just a few ideas for you. Take 5 slow breaths, pull those shoulders down and away from your ears and breathe. Try to make the exhale a little bit longer than the inhale. It's amazing. Maybe you need to stand up and stretch for 30 seconds, literally get out of your chair and move. Or you could do the yoga pose legs up the wall. Where you lay down on the ground and you have your legs up against the wall and just rest and breathe. Maybe it's putting your hands on your heart and breathing. Another one of my favorites is soften your eyes into peripheral vision. To do this, you look up where the ceiling and the wall match. You're wiggling your fingers to the side to get into peripheral. Really, one of my favorite things is to get outside. Whatever you choose, One small nervous system reset can completely lower the volume of the resistance. And clear thinking returns when your body feels safe. M stands for monitor and name the emotions. And honestly, I struggled with this. And the women in my group also were like, I don't know what emotion it is. I think maybe as a culture, we were taught to stuff our emotions or not feel our emotions. I know I grew up in a household like that. Now I'm asking you to check in. So check beneath the surface. What am I actually feeling? At first, you may like, I don't know, I don't feel like it. But I'm going to ask you to go a layer deeper. You might really discover that you're feeling really drained. Maybe the pressure of work. Maybe it's overwhelmed. Maybe it's discouraged because you don't like what you see in the mirror. Or maybe when you got dressed in the morning, you don't like the way your clothes fit. Maybe it's like mentally full just from the day. You feel pressure, but naming these emotions really matter. Language takes a vague heaviness and turns it into something you can actually work with. Oh, I'm feeling overwhelmed. Oh, my brain feels busy. E stands for emotional processing. So once you've named the emotion, we got to move the emotion. If you look carefully, the word emotion has the word motion in it. Emotions are supposed to move in your body. They are not supposed to be stuck. In fact, I believe that stuck emotions actually lead to dis-ease in your body. So what tool do you have available to actually help this emotion move? Some possibilities include like journaling, maybe you like to journal, or a short grounding exercise, or maybe like shake it out and pull those shoulders down. Or maybe turning on your favorite song and dancing. Get those emotions in motion and move. Listen, you don't need a full therapy session. Literally in 2 minutes of intentionally processing the emotions that you're feeling, you can completely shift your state. That's like how you feel on the inside. And then we're moving on to S. S is solidify your new identity. Now you get to look forward. What do I want instead? Maybe the answer is, I want to be the woman who keeps small promises to myself. Or another powerful question that follows could be, what would the ideal version of me do right now? Thinking from your future self, she wouldn't wait for perfect energy and she wouldn't demand to be a hero. She would take one small doable action. So you get to choose a task and prove that new identity. We call it tasking in the NLP world. Maybe you put on some workout shoes and instead of doing an hour-long exhausting workout, you commit to 5 minutes, do a set of squats. That tiny action becomes evidence of the new you. And momentum often follows once the first step happens. You're putting on that new identity of saying, I am, into your physical body. So bringing it all together, without Dimes, this moment can feel like a character flaw and you can use negative self-talk around yourself. However, when you use Dimes, the same moment becomes a simple process. You get to understand the intention of what's like underneath what's going on. You get to calm your nervous system to make a calm, cool decision. You get to name the emotion, which is gonna be hard at the beginning, but I promise it gets easier. Then you get to process what's underneath, like what's the real reason why you're resisting whatever you're resisting. And finally, you choose one action that matches who you want to be. Who is that future self? What would that future woman do? This turns that internal battle, that internal tug of war, into clear, kind decisions. And honestly, when we're in midlife, it's time for us to be kinder to ourselves. So next time that workout resistance shows up, or any resistance actually, when it comes to midlife, walk yourself through Dimes before you decide anything. Notice how differently your body responds. And if you want more tools like this for midlife fitness and mindset, I've put a few ways to work with me in the description below. Plus, I have a Dimes guide for you to help you practice these shorter workouts, smarter recovery, practical brain-based strategies all live inside my programs. So I'm curious about you. When resistance shows up around exercise or something in health, what emotion is usually underneath it? Tired? Is it overwhelmed? Anxious? Or maybe something else? Tell me in the comments so I can support you better. I know you don't need tougher discipline. You just need some better tools to create better follow-through. And dimes is one of the simplest tools I know. Thanks for being here, and I'll see you next week.