Discontent, to Disgusted, to Defiant: A HEALTHY Progression

Have you felt a sense of discontentment lately?

If that’s you, great! I want to show you how to channel it.

I’ll use health as my object lesson, but the principles apply to all types of goals.

How are your 2026 health goals progressing?

• Are the winter blues getting to you?

• Are you finding yourself slipping back into bad habits?

• Are your symptoms (and weight) already trending poorly?

• Even worse, are you experiencing waves of apathy or cynicism?

Sadly, over 90% of people will be further behind in their health goals at the end of the year…and reversing the trajectory of their health will only get harder next year.

This predictable problem isn’t unsolvable, but few people radically change their health because of inspiration. To overcome a health challenge, most people who succeed leverage the emotional charge of disgust and defiance.

Inspiration or discontentment can be enough to get you curious, started even, but what they lack is a palpable attitude that says “No more. I am DONE living this way.” 

Those charged emotions are what put a fire in your belly. They make you pound your fist on the table and say, “This is not who I am…and not who others need me to be. I’m over it, and I’m going to figure this out, whatever it takes.”

A QUICK, RELATED STORY

Back in the day, I worked as a personal trainer at a big corporate gym.

Like clockwork, for the first 3-4 weeks of each new year, the gym was like a freshly-disturbed anthill—people were everywhere. During peak hours, it was not uncommon to look at the gym and see every piece of equipment being used.

Then came February, and also, like clockwork, roughly half of the volume disappeared within a week. Us regular gym goers knew we just needed to survive the January crowds and all would be back to normal soon.

Seeing that predictable annual rhythm taught me something—it’s not that we don’t want to be disciplined and improve our lives, it’s that we have not learned how to bridle (or even cultivate) the emotions of disgust at the situation I find myself in, or defiance to create an outcome.

Furthermore, when we set a goal, we tend to project our most motivated selves onto our goals and we don’t have a system to fall back on when 1) life interrupts or 2) when we’re not at our emotional best.

This only serves to reinforce the self-defeating idea that “I don’t have what it takes.”

I’d argue you do have what it takes, but there’s a commensurate level of emotional maturation required before you can change your physical health in a definitive way.

Said differently,

Most people don’t realize that achieving goals isn’t just about time and financial management, it’s also about energy and emotion management.

Let’s get back to the progression from…

Discontentment --> Disgust --> Defiance

Those three emotions are the prerequisites to a successful healing journey.

• Discontentment isn’t a bad thing (unless it’s birthed from entitlement). In its healthy form, it is the nudge we all need to do something different.

• Disgust is like discontentment on steroids. It’s the tipping point where status quo becomes emotionally repugnant and change HAS to be made because too much of what is valuable is being lost.

• Defiance is the glue that holds a difficult change process together. It’s a refusal to allow your will to be broken, and it gives you the resolve necessary to avoid quitting when the road gets hard.

Meeting your health goals isn’t a caloric equation, nor is it about lowering your carbs, mustering more willpower, finding the right lab test, or picking the best wearable.

Meeting your health goals is first, an EMOTIONAL equation. Until you include THAT math in your planning, you’ll keep wondering why you “can’t get your act together.”

Here’s the point I’ve been leading to: A healthy disgust and defiance can be cultivated.

The healthy progression from discontent, to disgusted, to defiant is a path that has emotional charge and goes something like this…

“This…

• Tobacco habit

• Emotional eating

• Apathetic attitude

• Porn addiction

• Alcoholic tendency

• Excuse making

• Disease label

• Financial situation

• Relational strain

• Avoidance pattern

…is beneath me. I will not be mastered by this repulsive, avoidable shortcoming, or rudderless mediocrity any longer! NO! I deserve better. My family deserves better. My relationship with God deserves better.

The cycle ends now! I’m done being passive and lying to myself that another renewed commitment to ‘start on Monday’ will matter. Something fundamental has to change.”

Can you feel the positive change those emotions can bring?

A GOAL-ACHIEVEMENT SECRET FEW LEARN

Focusing on what you don’t want only takes you so far, you also need a clear picture of what is being lost so you can fight for it. It needs to feel like an injustice to lose it.

Put a picture of your (current or imagined) spouse, kids, family, cause, dream, adventure, career option, etc. somewhere you can see it. Rub your face in the pain of willingly walking away from that. Ask: “Am I really going to give up THAT …for THIS, or am I going to choose a more courageous path?”

That way of thinking is where emotional reserves can be found.

From there, you’ll still need to get practical.

Let me give you three things that blend the emotional with the practical so you can predictably tilt the scale in favor of success.

1. You have to be emotionally & financially invested – the pain of “NOT doing the thing” needs to be higher than the pain of “DOING the thing.” If you aren’t invested enough monetarily (it should be painful to waste the money) you’ll quit when it gets hard.*

2. You need a plan worth following – Such plans are both methodical and system-based. They create lifestyle habits you could practice indefinitely, help you evaluate trade-offs and make decisions faster, and they create motivating small wins along the way.

3. There is a minimum threshold of access to a person/group – You’ll need real people to regularly check in with, stretch your thinking, review what you’ve done, give feedback and encouragement, and help you adjust.

It’s easy to find someone who will offer you #1 (something financially painful enough), and #3 (some level of “support”). What’s hard to find is #2—a plan worth following that ALSO offers the Goldilocks version of financially painful enough, and just the right amount of support.

I have spent YEARS noodling on the best mix of 1, 2, and 3. There is no perfect fit for all people, but this model predictably gets results. Related to this post, one of our increasingly popular programs is the Mind & Body Cleanse.

In the Mind & Body Cleanse, we help people learn how to understand and bridle these kinds of strong emotions. Such skills are one of the key waypoints to the life you dream of. Few people learn them, but for those who do, the world is an amazing place of abiding joy, peace, purpose, and adventure.

If you know you’re made for more, and you need the right scenario to pull the best out of you, reflect on the above, and check out our programs.

We help people break the cycle of the 90% and get you back in the game so you can and start living a life you’ll want to write a book about.

I can’t promise you anything easy. But I CAN promise you something transformative.

You’ll have to face yourself…but you don’t have to do it alone.

If this post resonated, book a call and let's chat.

You’re not getting any younger,

Until next time...remember what is worth fighting for,

Christian

PS. I plan to write (and podcast) more frequently this year, so if you’re not on our mailing list you can subscribe at the bottom of this post.  

*While working at a gym, I learned that 67% of people never use their gym membership, but they don’t stop paying for it. It’s like a guilt-induced tax people pay as a reminder or their unmet aspiration to get in shape. They keep paying it and telling themselves they will eventually get to it. Don’t be that person. Invest wisely.