The 70:30 Rule: Finding Freedom Through Balance

You don't need to give 100% to fitness to get results. In fact, trying to give 100% all the time might be the very thing stopping you.

The fitness industry loves extremes.

You're either on track or off track. You're being “good” or you've been “bad”. You smashed every workout this week or you've failed. You hit your calories perfectly or you may as well write the whole weekend off and start again on Monday.

I don't believe fitness needs to work like that.

At Thrive & Ko, we train for life. And real life isn't perfect, predictable or particularly interested in your training plan.

That's where my 70:30 rule comes in.

So, what is 70:30?

I'll let you in on a secret: I didn't invent the idea of balance.

We've all heard of the 80:20 rule. But when I thought about how I actually want myself and my clients to live, 20% just didn't sound like enough life.

So I made it 70:30. Simple.

And before anyone starts trying to calculate whether Friday night's glass of wine has pushed them to 68:32 — it's not that literal.

70:30 isn't another set of rules to follow perfectly. It's a mindset.

The 70% is your foundation: consistent strength training, movement, nutritious food, enough protein, sleep, mobility, recovery and generally doing the things that make your body and mind feel good.

And yes, recovery belongs in the 70%. I'll scream this until I'm blue in the face: recovery is just as important as training. Rest isn't what happens when you're failing to train. It's part of training.

The 30% is flexibility.

Dinner out with your friends. A couple of glasses of wine. Holidays. Dessert because you bloody want dessert. A spontaneous plan that means you miss the gym. A weekend where you don't track a single thing.

You know... having a life.

Neither one needs guilt attached to it.

What 70:30 looks like in my own life

I'm extremely consistent with my training. At this point, it's like brushing my teeth. It's simply something I do, and I feel a bit off when I don't.

I meal prep every single week. Most of my meals are nutritious, protein-focused and support the way I train. I eat intuitively most of the time and occasionally track for a day here and there to check I'm roughly where I think I am.

But then the weekend comes.

I might cook something delicious with my partner. We might go out for dinner. I might have a glass or two of wine.

And do you know what I feel afterwards?

Absolutely no guilt whatsoever.

I'm not waking up the next morning trying to “burn it off”. I'm not skipping breakfast to compensate. I'm not doing an extra workout because I ate more than usual.

I enjoyed my life.

And then I carry on.

That's the bit I want more people to understand.

Stop turning one choice into a whole week

I see this with clients all the time.

They miss a couple of sessions. They eat differently while they're away. They go over their calories. Life gets hectic and training takes a back seat for a week.

Then they come to me with their tail between their legs, ready to confess.

And I'm like... babe, I don't care.

Not because I don't care about their progress. Of course I do.

I don't care because the thing has already happened.

Beating yourself up isn't going to change yesterday.

And being angry with yourself doesn't make your next step better.

That's where people so often get caught in the all-or-nothing cycle.

I've gone over my calories, so FUCK IT ... I'm going INNNNN.

One takeaway turns into a whole weekend. Missing Monday's workout becomes “I'll start again next week.” One choice that wasn't aligned with your goals becomes permission to abandon them completely.

But you haven't ruined anything.

You don't need to start again.

You just need to make your next choice.

Make your next choice count

This is one of the biggest things I try to teach through my coaching.

You cannot change the choice you made an hour ago, yesterday or last weekend.

But you can control what happens next.

So you ate loads of junk food?

Okay. Did you enjoy it? Lovely.

Now maybe your next meal is something nutritious because you know it'll make your body feel good.

Missed a workout?

Okay.

You don't need to punish yourself with two workouts tomorrow. Look at your week, adjust where you can and keep moving.

Had a chaotic week where everything went out the window?

Okay.

What's one thing you can do today that brings you back towards the way you want to live?

That's it.

No punishment. No shame. No dramatic Monday restart.

Just make your next choice better aligned to you.

Keep it moving, henny.

Consistency doesn't mean perfection

Somewhere along the way, we've confused consistency with doing everything perfectly.

They're not the same thing.

Consistency is being able to return.

It's training regularly over months and years, not hitting every planned session for three weeks before burning out.

It's eating in a way that supports your health most of the time without panicking when someone puts a pizza in front of you.

It's knowing when to push and knowing when your body needs recovery.

It's being able to go on holiday, enjoy yourself and come home without feeling like you need to “undo” anything.

That is a skill.

And in my experience, it's a far more valuable skill than being able to follow a perfect plan when life is perfectly convenient.

Because life rarely is.

Fitness should make your life bigger, not smaller

I love training.

I love being strong. I love learning skills. I love moving my body, looking after it and seeing what it's capable of.

But I also love food. Travelling. Going out for dinner. Spending time with people I love. Resting. Having experiences that have absolutely nothing to do with fitness.

I don't want one at the expense of the other.

And I don't want that for my clients either.

The point of getting fitter, stronger and healthier isn't to create a life where you're terrified of missing a workout or eating the “wrong” thing.

Surely the whole point is that your health allows you to live more?

That's why, at Thrive & Ko, we're not chasing perfection.

We're building bodies and habits that can handle real life.

There will be stressful periods. Holidays. Celebrations. Injuries. Busy weeks. Low motivation days. Amazing training blocks and absolutely chaotic ones.

The answer isn't to keep starting over.

It's learning how to adjust, overcome the obstacle in front of you and move forward.

That's 70:30.

Not 70% good and 30% bad.

Not 70% discipline and 30% failure.

70% foundation. 30% freedom. 100% your life.

Train with purpose. Live with freedom.

And whatever happens along the way?

Keep it moving, henny.

‍

‍