Most people think they will feel better once life finally lines up.
A better routine. A better body. More time. More motivation.

But what if you have been aiming at the wrong target?

Over the last few months, we have watched a pattern in our clients and in ourselves. The days that feel the best, the days that build real momentum, have almost nothing to do with perfection or intensity.

They come from small, simple things that are completely within your control.
The kind of things you can start tomorrow morning.

“Maybe I just can’t do this anymore.”

That’s what Ashley told herself after years of pain, frustration, and workouts that left her feeling more broken than strong.

She came from CrossFit. She coached. She knew what hard work looked like.

But when her body started fighting back — shoulders, hips, back — she had to find another way.

This is the story of how she rebuilt her strength, let go of what it used to look like, and found something better than burnout: capability.

If you’re feeling pulled between enjoying the holidays and taking care of your health, I get it. We’re wired to avoid loss much more strongly than we chase small wins, and that makes this time of year feel higher stakes than it really is. But that instinct is also what keeps people stuck. It’s the same mindset that turns December into a slide and makes restarting in January feel harder than it ever needed to be.

Dan John (world-famous strength coach,) has a saying: “Any program works for about six weeks.” And he’s right. New things create progress. Novelty wakes the system up. Plus, when we start something new, we tend to put real effort into it. That combination alone can take you pretty far… at least for a while.

But eventually the program stops working the way it did at first.
You’re putting in the same effort, sometimes even more, and getting less progress in return.

Most people assume this means they need to add more. More days. More reps. More weight. More time. But that’s rarely the real issue.

There’s one component that changes the entire game.
When you have it, you shift from adding small improvements to multiplying your results.
When you don’t, you can spend months or even years spinning your wheels, convinced you just need to push harder or wait longer.