6 Reasons Why Keeping The Promises You Make To Yourself Is Important

00:00Real quick, if you want to learn more about macronutrients and understand that methodology on how they can help you achieve your body composition goals of changing the way your body looks, I put together a free 15-minute training where I dive into macronutrients and how you can control your body for the rest of your life with them. That link is in the description below. Click on it after listening to the show today. I put my phone out in my living room area, forcing me to have to get up physically and go get my phone to turn the alarm off. And like, there's this little voice inside my head really quick that pops in. It's like, if you lay back in bed, you're a little bitch.

00:38What is going on, you guys? Welcome back to The WarriorBabe Show with Nikkie Stott, co-founder of WarriorBabe. And on this podcast, we talk about mindset and methodologies and tactics that will help you lose body fat, build muscle, be strong, and feel insanely confident. I am your host, Nikkie Stott, and welcome to episode number 95. And I'm really, really, really excited about this episode. I'm sure I've said that in the past about previous episode, but this one is something that I am doing for myself right now.

01:13What better way than to share my experiences live here with you on the podcast so you can take these experiences that I'm doing and intertwine them into your own experiences too as well that you see best fit. But I think this one is so freaking important, you guys. What I've been doing in the last couple of weeks to almost a few months now is this motto. So keeping the promises that I make to myself or keep the promises that I make to myself or make sure you keep the promises that you make to yourself.

01:46You know, whatever resonates with you the most, I encourage you to write it down on a piece of paper. I encourage you to say it every single morning when you wake up. I encourage you to say it all throughout the day. Whatever the promises are that you're trying to do. And mainly for me, it was like, dude, I know that I am the best throughout the rest of my day when I get my workout done in the morning. And this shift is so new. It's been like two months now. And because I've been an afternoon workout person for years.

02:20But what I've noticed is the way that I show up the rest of my day for my team, for my clients, for myself is so profound, so energized, so clear headed. When I work out in the morning, when I absolutely crush it in the morning, when I have that space to myself in the morning. So this motto unpacks, right? The ability for me to show up for myself and getting this done in that light. That's my goal.

02:50So like whatever you are trying to keep the promises for yourself around, whether it be that you get your workout in, just in general in your day. Or whether it be that you want to focus on your nutrition better. Or whether it be that, you know, you're trying to create space for yourself to show up for yourself in a way that's talking better to yourself. In a way that is, you know, getting to sleep earlier. Whatever the promises you're trying to make to yourself, this motto, say it over and over again. But most importantly, you have to get clear on what those promises are.

03:21Okay? This is a fitness podcast where I talk to fitness, right? So if it's you need to eat better, keep that promise to yourself. If it's that you need to track your macros better, you need to set yourself up for success by planning the day ahead. Keep that promise to yourself. Is it that you need to show up in the morning, get your workout done first thing in the morning? And we're going to dive into this in a second. We're going to talk about how comfortable that bed feels in the morning. But if that's the case, you've got to keep the promise to yourself, right? If it's that you need to work out no matter what throughout the day and you need to get that done for yourself, keep that promise to yourself.

03:55That is what this podcast is all about. But what I'm doing, I was like, man, I could literally make two podcasts out of this one topic. One talking about like just key examples I feel like all of you guys go through and how you can just make sure you keep the promise to yourself in those specific key experiences around fitness and nutrition. But this one, I really want to talk about two specific things. One, the psychological aspect of keeping promises. Like what goes on in our brain when we keep these promises for ourselves and when we don't.

04:30And then the second big thing that I want to talk about is the link between keeping those promises and then the mental strength that you build and the discipline that you build. There's this recent podcast, this recent IG reel that I put out and also from when I heard Venus Williams speak at an event was that discipline is freedom. And I've also heard Jocko Willock talk about that, which Jocko is my man, man.

05:02You read his books, guys. Oh, so good. He was a Navy SEAL. But anyway, I digress. I don't want to get sidetracked here. But Venus Williams said discipline is freedom, right? When you have discipline, you get what you want. When you don't have discipline, you don't get what you want. And so my big thing for that second part of this podcast, the link between keeping promises and mental strength, is that when you do keep these promises to yourself and, you know, you understand what's going on mentally, which we're going to talk about first. When you keep those promises to yourself, you develop this insane mental strength.

05:35You develop. And I can speak to this so confidently because if there's something that I pride myself on, you guys, it is that mental fortitude that I have. It is a discipline that I've built for myself. It is that self-worth, that self-respect that I have for myself, for my body, and for doing these things and making sure that I'm staying in alignment with my words. My words are the most important things that come out of my mouth, okay? So when you guys understand the link between keeping the promises to yourself and the mental strength that you have that you can build, dude, these things are just absolute, you know, they're key elements to you getting what you want out of your fitness goals, out of the results that you're seeking, out of, you know, just again, what I said to my own personal thing, which is self-worth and self-respect.

06:27So let's dive into the first big component here, which is the psychological aspect of keeping promises to yourself. So the first and foremost that is so freaking important is you're building trust with yourself. So just you keeping the consistent action and the kept promises builds trust internally in yourself. Now, it also builds trust when you do this interpersonal relationships too as well, but the same dynamic applies internally with you.

07:02Those consistent actions, those kept promises, they build trust within yourself. So every time you fulfill a commitment made to yourself, like going to the gym, eating better, tracking your macros, setting yourself up for success, you reinforce the idea that you can rely on your own word. And what I just said again, guys, a couple minutes ago is that the biggest thing to me that is so important to me is my word. If I stick to my word, and I do for at least 90% of the time, I'm human, I make mistakes, I'm imperfect, but that my word is the most important thing to myself.

07:39So when you do these things and you fulfill commitments to yourself, you reinforce the idea that you can rely on your own words. And over time, over time, this builds a reservoir of self-trust. And when you tell yourself that you'll do something and you follow through, you prove to yourself that you are dependable.

08:19Okay, so most important, the first thing that popped in my mind there that I just need to say out loud right now is when you tell yourself you're going to do something, most of you guys listening is like, well, I'm going to tell myself that I'm going to, you know, start my fitness routine and eat better starting tomorrow. And then some of you guys will follow through, but majority of you guys will not follow through. And when you do not follow through, you prove to yourself that you are not dependable. You're going against your own words. Some of you buy into fitness programs. Some of you are warrior babes that are listening to me right now that you tell yourself that you're going to follow through with the warrior babe program.

08:54And it is on you, my friends. Warrior babes, if you're listening and you're not following through, it is on you. It is not the program. It is not your coach. It is you. And when you don't follow through, you prove to yourself that you are not dependable. So you're breaking this trust with yourself. If you follow through with some of you do, right? Some of you were a warrior babes listening. You're like, man, I got a few in my head right now. I could call out and I could give self, I could give acknowledgement to. Y'all crush it. Y'all follow through. You prove to yourself when you follow through, you don't prove it to the program.

09:25You don't prove it to the coach. You prove to yourself that you are dependable. You've kept your word. You've taken consistent actions. You've built trust. Over time, you're building this reservoir of trust. Like, hey, I can do this. And this self-trust is fundamental. It serves as a bedrock for self-confidence, for courage, and for resilience. Okay? It is huge to say if you are going to do something, that you do it and you follow through.

09:57Because you build this self-confidence with yourself. You build this trust with yourself. You build, hey, I can do this with yourself. And the reverse is true too. You don't do any of that. You don't have self-confidence. You think that you just, it's just this internal battle of like, well, I said this in the past and I didn't do it. So I'm probably not going to do it again. Right? Okay? So the first and most important thing with understanding this psychological aspect of keeping promises is that it builds trust.

10:28The second thing is huge. And what I've personally experienced over the last couple of months with just keeping the promise to myself to work out in the morning is this insane dopamine reward. Our brains, you guys, are wired to reward achievement. So completing a task as simple as me waking up in the morning, putting on my, and I'm going to talk about this in linking, the keeping the promises and the mental strength, but just the power of me putting on my clothes in the morning, right? And me going to work out, completing this task or sticking to this personal commitment that I have triggers the release of dopamine, which is a neurotransmitter associated with pleasure, reward, and motivation in my brain.

11:11Okay? This dopamine hit that a lot of you guys have heard or maybe have seen in the fitness space or you've seen on social media or you've heard before, this dopamine hit gives a feeling of accomplishment and satisfaction. It's this internal pat on the back that makes us feel so good about ourselves. And over time, when you're consistently doing this, what I'm experiencing, right? I'm so proud of myself. I feel good. I'm giving my pat myself on the back every morning. I'm getting these dopamine hits when I'm done my workout.

11:44Over time, we consistently meet these personal promises of ourselves. This dopamine-driven reinforcement can help create a positive feedback loop in your brain, motivating us, motivating you, motivating me to keep pushing forward and sticking to those commitments. Hey, guys. Love so much that you guys are listening to this podcast. If you ever want to have the video version of this, which usually has more effects and all that good stuff for those of you who are visual learners, check it out.

12:15YouTube channel, Warrior Babe, if that's what you like. Either way, keep enjoying the show. Guys, I can't express or explain, but I'm going to try with you as much as I possibly can through words. My personal experience of these dopamine hits every single morning that I get done my workout. I feel so damn good. But most importantly is because I kept to my word. I kept to my promise. I kept to fulfilling and getting this accomplishment of satisfaction after my workout because I've kept those because I've done it and kept to my word.

12:50And this dopamine reward is true. And it feels so damn good for those of you guys that keep to your promises. And you go to whatever, whenever you do your workout, you do it in the morning, you do it at night, you do it in the middle of the day, whatever. The second you're done, and I'm going to talk about this in a second. We don't always feel it doing it. But the second that you do it, you release this dopamine hit. You have this sense of feeling of accomplishment and satisfaction that you've just now stuck to your word and followed through.

13:21And then you consistently keep doing this. It creates this positive feedback loop in your brain to keep motivating you to want to do more of that thing. Right? Knowing how I feel after I hit my morning workout, regardless of the feelings that I feel when I wake up in the morning, that's not always like, oh, God, I don't feel like that. It happened to me this morning. It happens to me a lot of the time, you guys. I don't feel like working out. But I know that what I'm going to feel like afterwards and what I'm going to feel like afterwards drives me to go and get my workout done.

13:53Okay? So that's number two, the dopamine reward. Number three is, which is the psychological, let me bring it back, the psychological aspect of keeping promises is avoiding that guilt or that mental turmoil that you may feel. Because on the flip side, when you break a promise made to yourselves, and I've kind of touched on this already a little bit, it often leads to you feeling guilt. It often leads to you feeling disappointment and like almost like a decrease in your self-worth. Right? This mental turmoil, it can be extremely distressing.

14:26Right? We might like ruminate on, let's say that for a week now, you didn't do the, I didn't do the workouts. I didn't stick to my word. I didn't get up in the morning. I didn't do what I said that I was going to do. So I may ruminate on that as a perceived failure. Right? And I may question like, do I really have discipline? Do I really have the willpower? And you may be doing those same things with yourself and those negative emotions can cause you to go down this spiral, cause you to go down this rabbit hole.

14:59So it can dampen your motivation and even lead to like, feel like, you know, I can't, like almost like a feeling of defeat. Like I, I can't do these things. This is the promise that I made. I can't do it. Right? But understanding you guys, if you understand the emotional toll that breaking yourself promises can have, we underscore the importance of staying true to our word. Not just for like a tangible achievement, but for our psychological wellbeing. So if you understand that, if you understand that, I would rather reap the rewards of staying true to my word, of having this dopamine hit, rather than breaking the self-promise myself, rather than feeling that pain of the self-promise that I, that I made and broke.

15:42I would rather understand more the importance of what staying true to my word does for myself. It does for my wellbeing, which are those two specific things that I just talked on. But speaking to that point, which I'm going to talk about at the end of the link between keeping promises and mental strength. Ladies, are you feeling frustrated with body changes you're experiencing during menopause?

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16:44Take charge of your health and join our community of strong, empowered women. Visit warriorbabe.com forward slash apply today to start your transformation. That's warriorbabe.com forward slash apply. All right, let's get back to the show. That we are not perfect. Okay. And so you will not may you will experience that breaking a promise to yourself. I think there was like in the last two months, there was like a week that I moved all of my workouts to the afternoon.

17:22I still kept the promise to myself, but I but I didn't feel as mentally prime as I did keeping my workouts in the morning. So you will make shifts and change and alterations. But it's not like what I'm gonna talk about. It's not like a landsat a landslide that like your entire journey is not messed up. So I just want to put that pin that there and I'm going to circle back to it towards the end of the podcast. So those are the things it's more of the psychological aspect key in the promise to yourself. What happens mentally? There's no tangible reward other than like your satisfaction of feeling really good.

17:55More of the things are happening here in your mental state. Right. You're building the trust with yourself. You're hitting this dopamine reward. And then also by really honing in on the importance of those two, you avoid you feeling this emotional toll of what it feels like to break promises to yourself. Now, what I want to do is talk about the link between keeping promises and mental strength, that link. So like the link between the brain and then like the mental strength and the fortitude and the discipline, the things that you can carry on more tangibly, more actionably throughout your days.

18:32So the first one is mental resilience. Okay. Well, first, before I dive into the first one, it's the strength of our character, you guys, is mirrored by the consistency and of our actions. So if you understand the connection between keeping personal promises and fostering mental fortitude, you can better navigate the challenges of your life with resilience, with grace, with like, yo, I'm a badass. I got this. And like the power of your word and following through. Right. So the first one is mental resilience.

19:04You train the brain through discipline and through consistency. So just like we train our bodies. Right. For example, our minds, too, can be conditioned to handle psychological and emotional stressors. Okay. But every time you keep a promise to yourself, you are essentially flexing that mental muscle and reinforcing your capacity to stay committed and remain disciplined. And over time, this consistent behavior strengthens your mental resilience, making you better equipped to handle challenges that you're going to face, which I'm going to use the example in a second.

19:42And it shapes your character through discipline and consistency. You literally cultivate this unstoppable kind of force around yourself. So with this example, what I want to break it down so you guys can understand a little bit better. Mental resilience comes from all the things that I just said. Right. But for example, like let's use a challenge of hitting the gym on the lazy days. So I totally feel this. Right. We've all been there. First and foremost, especially for you morning workouters and for what I've experienced in the last couple of weeks, some days is that the alarm goes off.

20:15Right. And for me, guys, I had to set two alarms. I put my phone out in my living room area throughout the night. And so I set the alarm there, forcing me to have to get up physically and go get my phone to turn the alarm off. And like there's a little bout of time that I have laid back down. I've gone to bed. But there's this little more majority of the time. There's a little voice inside my head really quick that pops in. It's like, if you lay back in bed, you're a little bitch. It's just personally for me. OK. And that right there is like, dude, I got to keep my word.

20:45I got to get up. I got to do what I need to do so I can go get my workout done. But we've all been there. The alarm goes off. And then, yo, the way that your bed feels in the morning, like you are hella comfortable. You're warm. You're under the blankets. Right. And that is that, you know, that environment is far more enticing than the idea of going down to the gym, sweating it out, putting your body through physical exertion. Right. However, these are the days that truly test your commitment to yourself.

21:16And so pushing through the inertia on such days not only gives us a sense of accomplishment, but it also builds mental fortitude, you guys. Like I always say that there's motivation versus discipline. Right. Motivation ebbs and flows. It's a feeling that'll come and go. But when you have discipline, regardless of how you feel in that specific moment, if you push through, regardless of the feeling that you feel, regardless of how comfortable you are, if you push through that and you go and work out, it not only gives you a sense of accomplishment, but it builds that discipline inside of your.

21:55It builds that mental fortitude, it builds that mental resilience, right? It's so critical to remember that consistency and fitness is way more about showing up even on days that you don't feel a hundred percent rather than only on the days where you are bursting with freaking energy. That is the most important thing that I need you guys to understand. Consistency and fitness is more about showing up for yourself, even on the days that you don't feel a hundred percent rather than only showing up for yourself on the days that you are bursting with energy.

22:31Okay. So that, and by doing that, that's a more tangible thing. The more that you do that, the more that you are strengthening your discipline, you are building, you are flexing that discipline muscle. So you are building mental resistance and you are forcing yourself, making yourself better equipped to handle any type of challenge that you may feel in the future. That's huge.

23:01That's huge. And with those challenges, you guys, I can say even two things that I've experienced in my life. You will handle them at almost a sense of just calmness. I swear to God. Hands to God. You will have a challenge in front of you. And because you have this mental resilience, this mental forward to the mental discipline, mainly speaking for myself, a challenge arises. Okay. What's the solution? And that's literally like, that's the, that's the beauty of like, just the kind of like the whole thing that transpires when you do all the things I'm talking about in this podcast right now.

23:40Okay. Okay. Now, two more things, two more things. This one is so important, which is building a habit loop. Okay. So this is, again, the link between keep the promises. So keeping the understanding it and then the link is to like the mental strength and like the tangible things that you do on a daily basis. Another one is building the habit loop. This is huge. If you guys have read like the power of habit by Charles Dewey. And then atomic habits, like I have a book fundamentals of habits is around Q reward or Q routine and reward.

24:17Okay. So the loop or no, I'm sorry. The building habit loop, right? Yeah. So building the habit loop has the Q routine reward. The Q, the loop comprises a Q, right? So trigger for the behavior, a routine, the behavior, the action itself, and then a reward, right? So the Q is a trigger. The root, the routine is a behavior, the action itself. And then the reward is a positive reinforcement received after the behavior, the trigger to do the behavior.

24:52So to break it down, by you keeping promises consistently, consistently to yourself, you establish these positive habit loops. For instance, for example, right? The Q for me in the last couple of months, weeks is setting out my workout clothes the night before the morning of I'm going to go work out, right? And then the routine is doing the morning exercise. And the reward, right, for me specifically is, man, I look so forward to my protein shake afterwards just because it tastes so damn good.

25:28And your reward could just be how you, and also to mine, is the way I feel afterwards. I feel good endorphins, like all these chemicals, a dopamine hit, like this, I feel so good. And then another one could be for you. It's like just simply like checking off in your like workout journal on your workout app, but like checkmark done, right? I just completed that workout. And over time, you guys, these loops solidify our desired behaviors and transition from being deliberate efforts to automatic habits.

25:59And that's how you build a habit loop. And then it reinforces your mental strength without, right, without your conscious push. So like for me, like a lot of people at the beginning of their journey, they have just conscious push. Like they just have to force themselves to do these things. But because I've been doing this for so freaking long, these things are now just a part. Like I don't have to, they're automatic habits. They just happen. Now, I'm not perfect, and I'm going to share this in the last one.

26:29But more often than not, than somebody just starting their journey who has to do conscious pushes, I mean, I have these automatic habits. And so I don't, I don't, I can, I've transitioned from like deliberately having effort into like all of these things I have to do to like, they are automatically a part of my routine. And that is a liberating feeling. My friends who are just like starting out or trying to build all these habits, just keep going. The payoff is so worth, so worth it.

27:00Okay, and then the last one, because I said I'm not perfect, and even the other thing that I said is like, you know, you, for you to avoid the guilt or the mental turmoil that you may experience or you don't give the promises to yourself. The last one I want to touch on, the one you experience and put these things into play, like building the mental fortitude, the resistance, building these habit loops. Understanding that and overcoming setbacks and not letting one slip up become a landslide. Okay, nobody is perfect.

27:31I am not perfect. You are not perfect. And there will be instances where we waver in our commitments. Okay, there will be instances where we waver with our word. There will be instances where we may have a day where we break a promise to ourself. Right? What defines our mental strength, you guys, is not the absence of the setbacks, but better yet, our response to them. It's crucial here in these moments you have these setbacks to develop a growth mindset.

28:03View setbacks as learning opportunities rather than failures. Keeping promises to yourselves fosters this perspective, right? When we falter, instead of spiraling into self-criticism, instead of spiraling into this mental landslide, into a rabbit hole, into spiraling like I cannot do this, we can assess that what led to this slip up? What led to me not keeping this promise to myself?

28:34And then you can recalibrate and you continue forward. This approach prevents, you guys, minor missteps from snowballing into significant setbacks. Meaning if you have a little bit of a hiccup one day, if you have a growth mindset over it and you can just sit back and reassess what causes slip, recalibrate and just move forward on with the rest of your day and into the next day, that will prevent you from snowballing into, fuck it, I can't do this, fuck this journey.

29:05I'm not equipped to do my fitness journey. I can't get into shape. I can't eat right. And then you snowball out of control. Foster a growth mindset around these things. It's about realizing that one bad meal doesn't ruin your diet. Nor does one missed workout spell the end of your fitness regime, okay? It's the overarching commitment to getting back on track that showcases genuine mental fortitude.

29:37For those of you guys that recognize that maybe you, even, let's just use a small window sample of a day. Let's say that you maybe had breakfast, you were on point, you worked out, but then like your friends were like, man, I want to go out to lunch today, right? And then you go out to lunch, you kind of like try and eat right, but you're unsure of what you eat, especially if you're tracking your macros. It's like, maybe I didn't have time to pre-prem with the menu and things like that.

30:07Or even if you're just trying to eat healthy outside of macros, you're just trying to eat healthy, but like you slept up and you had some fries and, you know, maybe you had a little bit of a dessert or you had a beer with your friends. It doesn't mean that the whole rest of the day you spiral into a snowball and you eat whatever the hell you want to or you don't eat at all, okay? It doesn't mean that that happens. It's like, okay, awesome. Cool. Fostering a growth mindset here. I had a great time with my friends. I had this lunch, but now the rest of my day, I probably overloaded with carbs and fats in this meal.

30:41So the rest of the day, I'm just going to prioritize having protein with minimal carbs and minimal fats. That is a growth mindset. That is getting back to the commitments you've made to yourself, which showcases genuine mental fortitude, genuine mental discipline, genuine mental resilience. Game changer, you guys, when you can get to that point. And trust me, if you just keep at it with your journey, you can get to that point. Trust me, trust me, trust me.

31:13I am living proof that you can get there. You just have to go through these things. But most importantly, you have to keep these promises to yourself and you have to build this mental fortitude. Okay. So in conclusion of this podcast, you guys, keeping the promises to yourself emphasizes this profound, profound relationship between your actions, your internal reward mechanisms, your emotional, your mental health. And keeping promises to oneself is not just a matter of discipline, but it's an essential component of your self-care and self-respect to yourself.

31:49As I said at the beginning of the podcast, that is something that I pride myself on. And it's mainly because of this entire freaking podcast. This may not be like workout or like here are macros, here's a workout. Like let's talk more about the science of things. But this aspect of what I just talked about today is so freaking important for you to be extremely successful on your fitness journey and turn this into a lifestyle that you just live.

32:21I am living proof. So I hope that you guys enjoyed this podcast. If you did, please, if there's just a golden nugget of this podcast, screenshot it, write that golden nugget, tag me on Instagram. And share it to your story so I can see that this podcast resonate with you guys. That's all I love to see. I love the positive impact that this podcast makes for you guys. So do that for me, please. Appreciate you guys. And I'll see you in the next podcast. Hey guys, real quick. If you're interested in taking your body to the next level, lose body fat, build more muscle, feel more confident.

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This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors.