Effortless Consistency: mental models for abs for life. How my clients ditch willpower AND finally get their goals.

What if consistency were easy? We pull back the curtain on how long‑term results come from better decision design, not iron will. After years of yo‑yo attempts, I found three frameworks that made health, work, and daily choices surprisingly easy to sustain—even through parties, vacations, and stressful seasons. If you are ready to stop white‑knuckling and start designing for habits that stick, this conversation gives you the playbook to build automaticity, instead of tra...

• 0:09Speaker 00

  Hello and welcome back to another episode of Change Wired Podcast. My name is Angela Sharina, I'm your host, your partner in change, personal and collective evolution, transformation, and just someone who is passionate about human potential, unlocking more of it, using more of it, and creating a better world for all of us. Guys, today we are talking about effortless consistency. You know, when I work with my clients, that's the result that I'm looking for. I'm looking for effortless consistency in the areas where my clients have struggled before.

• 0:51Speaker 00

  But before, obviously, creating that for my clients, I had to create that for myself and to learn to understand how it actually works. And I think it evolved during my coaching certifications and work with clients and putting that in practice in my own life.

• 1:09Speaker 00

  You know, I've had my six-pack abs for a decade now, and before that, I struggled quite a lot. It was probably another decade of dieting, or going back and forth, and losing five kilos, gaining five kilos, and again, trying all these kind of different diets, and feeling like it was a struggle. And I couldn't understand, like, why did I struggle that much? Maybe, maybe it was just too hard of a thing, or it wasn't meant for me, or other people had different brain, or a different body, or, again, like, other people who were in great shape did not seem to be in any sort of struggle.

• 1:51Speaker 00

  And only once I got through these different coaching methodologies, and I read book on decision-making, and I put things in my own life, in practice, this system way of thinking and designing, I realized, huh, it's actually not about willpower, it's about systematic approach to creating better ways of deciding, of thinking, and then designing your environment. And that produces this effortless-like consistency in the areas where we

• 2:30Speaker 00

  Think that that require discipline. Whether that's going to the gym and access setting, whether that's creating eating habits that work for you for life, whether that's creating work ethic that creates business consistency, grows your career, your relationships, like whatever it is you're struggling with, realize that it has very little to do with your discipline. Yes, you might have different wiring of the brain. We all do have different wiring. They say it's like, almost like our fingerprints, our, the way our brains are wired, they are different. But better systems seem to work for everyone. And that's why you have this decision-making scientist

• 3:15Speaker 00

  and behavior design scientist. Fundamental core things seem to be quite consistent for majority of the brains. So today we are talking about these methods, just three of them, that I've been using to get six pack abs for life. And I've been keeping it for the past decade, at least through weddings and celebrations, Christmases, New Years of different parties and family vacations and picnics. And like, I can't even remember all of the occasions. So I've been doing it without having to rely on any sort of discipline. Again, it was quite effortless. And the same things I teach to my clients and they absolutely love them.

• 3:59Speaker 00

  And we create results and consistency in the areas where they struggled sometimes for decades of their life. Sometimes they would come to me in their midlife and they struggled with that for like two, three decades. And then something flips. Well, we actually just learned better decision-making models. So let's jump in. First, again, before I used to struggle a lot with my eating, for example. And I, before I used to

• 4:32Speaker 00

  See things to myself like, ah, well, next time I'll try harder, I'll be more disciplined, I'll be different. And guess what? Next time happened and nothing changed. I was the same person. So then, at some point, I started asking different questions. And not necessarily because I was so genius, but because at that point, I was going through a lot of coaching certifications and I was learning new, better strategies and I was applying it in my life. So I started asking myself, which is known as a pre-mortem practice, a very popular thing in strategy and decision making, in making your business work, or your life work, or

• 5:11Speaker 00

  your six-pack apps work. You can use it there too. Human brain is kind of works similar, no matter which area of your life or career you put it in. So pre-mortem, I started asking myself at that point, Angela, imagine yourself failing, and I didn't have to imagine, I did it many times, what would go wrong? And I would go through actually all of the instances that already happened, that went wrong, and realizing that willpower just does not work. And I will go through challenging moments and stressful situations, and when I get busy, and when I'll be low on energy, all of that will happen. So all of these wrong things will happen. So what's my plan for that? And I realized a couple of things. A,

• 5:53Speaker 00

  my environment needs to match my goals, my aspirations. It's so much easier to be disciplined when you don't have junk food around, or anything that you can overeat than when you do. The second thing, I needed to sleep well, because sleep changes your hunger after even one night. So you get hungrier and less satisfied with boring quote-unquote foods, like the regular whole foods. So sleep had to become a non-negotiable for many other reasons that I lately, that I also after that learned. But sleep is still a non-negotiable for me. And then the third part was creating different pattern interrupters, like taking

• 6:36Speaker 00

  a shower, listening to the music, going for a walk, and learning how to Just sit with discomfort, breathing and realizing that actually urges and cravings come and go really fast. As long as you just sit with it for a bit and allow it to pass through, just like any emotion or sensation. Or like, imagine you hurt your elbow, like, I don't know, table or some cupboard door or your toe, right? And it hurts, but then you you sit with it and it dissipates. So cravings and urges are a lot like that. They dissipate. If you just allow this painful sensation to to be there for a little bit. And again, also pattern interrupts help and also creating more barriers

• 7:20Speaker 00

  towards things I didn't want to do, like again, eliminating certain foods from my environment and not looking at them or exposing myself to them too much. Or also having good options available, lowering the barriers for the right things, like having the rice crackers and some protein-rich foods and fruit ready to eat. Something that when I'm genuinely hungry, I could just eat that and that removes all the urges even faster. So pre-mortems, asking yourself, like, imagine yourself failing. Angela, you failed. Like, why did it happen? And creating systems and behaviors and plans to deal with that in advance.

• 8:05Speaker 00

  It works really well for human psychology. It's also called mental contrasting. You can also look it up. And mental contrasting is basically the same idea. You imagine, when you set a goal, you imagine all the obstacles that can get in the way and you deal with those obstacles in advance. Either put the systems in place, so when they do happen, those obstacles, the damage is minimum. Or you if make, put systems in place that make these obstacles le- less likely to happen in the first place. Or you just redesign your path to so you can just walk around, so to speak, those obstacles. So this is pre-mortems.

• 8:47Speaker 00

  Then another practice, let me actually, I blogged today about that and.

• 8:54Speaker 00

  Let me see, what's the next one? Category decisions, yes, that is a good one. And I have a really good anecdote here. So it was, I think, a couple of weeks ago when I was at this Padel tournament for founders and investors. And yeah, we were out there, I was in my T-shirt and everybody could see my abs, which I don't have any shame showing off. And somebody asked me, what do you eat to get abs? Like, I used to have them, but now I don't. And I have jokingly said, I just don't eat sugar or gluten. What I, what I actually meant is, most foods that wreck my willpower

• 9:39Speaker 00

  contain one or both, gluten or sugar. So I stopped negotiating. I don't seek out gluten-free options either. And my life got objectively better without bread, pasta and sweets. I did not need to scan menus anymore, or just, or negotiating just this once, or there was no inner debate after that. Automatic no. And not because those foods are some evil, or I don't know, they're super bad for you, or you can't have great physique with them. No, but because decision fatigue is deadly to a lot of our goals. No willpower stands a chance against decision fatigue. And so I eliminated that.

• 10:23Speaker 00

  And also, that single rule eliminated what is called also in decision-making science, decision-making creep. When you start saying things like, uh, this, this one time doesn't matter, it won't change anything. But then repeated enough time, like, let's say, one donut won't change anything. But if you repeat that every day, every other day, uh, on top of, you know, your regular nutrition, that changes everything. That steals your dreams, that kills your dreams. And the upside, I feel and look great every day with no felt effort. And the best part, after enough repetitions,

• 11:06Speaker 00

  the whole, like, idea and urge disappears. It's like your body forgets what it even tastes like. So when I look at bread now, I have no sensation whatsoever. And so no restraint or willpower or discipline is needed.

• 11:20Speaker 00

  And then another one that that is one is one of the most favorite by my clients because it allows this real life flexibility.

• 11:33Speaker 00

  Although I must admit, it still does require a little bit more decision making power than automatic no, but it allows a lot of flexibility, which my clients also appreciate. That everyone is a yes no fanatic like myself in certain things. So what is it? Pre-commitment contracts, sometimes they're also called commitment devices in decision making literature. And it's all about deciding in advance, especially before what you think is going to be a tricky situation that in other cases would require some willpower or discipline. So for example, you are going to a birthday party or a wedding or whatever.

• 12:15Speaker 00

  Two, you decide two drinks and then sparkling water or maybe non-alcoholic drinks. And maybe also two or three of them, whatever works. No starches, one dessert, maybe no pasta, but I'm gonna have one dessert because maybe there will be really great dessert or it's your favorite, your grandma's favorite cake that you just can't miss, right? Or or whatever feeds your goals and the social occasion. And so when the moment gets hot, meaning you are confronted by this thing that might challenge your willpower, your brain does not improvise well. It will never work in your favor, almost in 100% of the cases.

• 12:58Speaker 00

  Your brain executes the plan, so make one. It actually works really, really well, not just in decision making science and experiments and practice, but also I can tell you from the practice of my clients all across the board. They confirm making decision in advance. It's often all it takes to make the right decision every single time. Pre-decided behavior beats in the moment willpower every single time.

• 13:29Speaker 00

  And these frameworks, guys, pre-mortem category decisions, when you say yes or no to certain things in advance, and then pre-commitment contracts, also known sometimes commitment devices. These frameworks didn't just give me apps for life. They gave me and my clients effortless consistency, where before there were years of willpower struggle. And that's what most people are missing about this whole strategy. It's not about discipline. It's not about willpower. It's about better mental models, better decision-making models, because every single action is a byproduct of your decision.

• 14:12Speaker 00

  Everything you do, build and become is a product of your decisions. And just like with eating, guys, you eat every day. Just because you eat every day, just because you've been deciding your whole life, it doesn't mean you have a good decision-making process. Just like it means people have been eating their whole lives and they often don't have it figured out their whole life either. And because of that, you get a lot of not so well-intended or positive consequences, right? So over to you, dear listener on the other side. What are you still trying to willpower your way through when a better decision-making model,

• 14:56Speaker 00

  where a better mental model would make it effortless? Mental model and some system thinking, system design, redesigning your environment around you. So redesigning your path around you. So what you want to do is almost effortless. And then, once you do it many, many times, it becomes so automatic that you put yourself into any environment. You put myself in a bakery, I'm just not bothered anymore. And that happens once you make those decisions, those frameworks a part of your life. At some point, it becomes so automatic that...

• 15:41Speaker 00

  You just don't even, it doesn't even come to your mind to make any other decision. It's like also with drinking. I drank alcohol once in my life. And so no matter what I'm confronted with, it just never crosses my mind to have a drink. Like no matter how difficult my life gets, it's just not something that I do or engage with. And it's been, yeah, since I had this drink, it's what, twenty five years? So, yeah, during my, you know, teenage years, I got to experiment a little bit, probably like most teenagers. And I couldn't understand alcohol then and never tried it again.

• 16:19Speaker 00

  But that just shows you, it's not about the thing, it's about your habits, automaticity. And a much better way to create that automaticity is to use better mental models and decision making frameworks, not your willpower, which is a subject to your energy, to your mood, to your stress levels, to your sleep. So many things can screw your willpower up. And also the more decisions you have to make, the less of that willpower you also have. So pre-mortem category decisions, pre-commitment contracts, use them. Choose, I suggest, choose an area of your life, one habit where you've been struggling for a long time.

• 17:04Speaker 00

  And think how you can apply pre-mortem or pre-commitment device, devices or contracts, or category decisions to make it decisionless situation. And if you need any help, feel free to schedule a session with me, executive coaching session. I always give a trial one to anyone, it is linked in the show notes. Try it out, bring your most struggling habit to me and we'll break it down, create a great process. And then you put it into practice and you'll see how powerful that can be for creating effortless consistency, for where you've had struggles for years before.

• 17:47Speaker 00

  Thank you guys for tuning in, thank you for listening. Hope you enjoyed this podcast and learned a lot and eager to put what you learned, one thing, just choose one thing, guys, into practice. And don't forget to share this podcast, read, review, share it with your friends, give, do something to help this podcast to reach more ears. So we all get to practice better decision making models to improve our life and the world around us. Thank you, guys, and till next time, keep growing.