How to Adopt a Healthier Lifestyle
Adopting a healthy lifestyle is a behavior change, starting with frame of mind. Everyone can exercise, and does at one point or another, but few, less than 20% of the American population, commit to an active life style. You may be asking yourself, why? But deep down you already know the answer: it is too hard to maintain. Just like anything, health has to be a priority, but we already have an overwhelming number of competing priorities that are, at the time, WAY more important than jumping on a treadmill for 30 minutes. How do we make time for one more thing we would rather not do? The answer is simple: we need to be prepared.
Every January we see it everywhere: “New year, New You.” And for the majority of us that equates to three solid weeks of living our idealized selves. Equate that to quitting cold turkey. Does it work for an incredibly small part of the population? Yes, but is it realistic? No. Think of all of the time it has taken you to this point to become you. Now, take all of that away and rebuild yourself in three weeks. Sounds ridiculous, right? But this is what we do EVERY. SINGLE. YEAR.
A better way to approach becoming healthier is to set small obtainable goals. I tell all of my clients, “To be successful you have to start small.” Do something that you know you can do, i.e., trade fries for baked potatoes. Do that one small change for a week or until you do not feel like you are sacrificing anything. Then make another change, i.e., change that baked potato for a baked sweet potato. This is where health gets really individualized because we all have different goals and needs to achieve those goals. I recommend downloading any of those SMART goal worksheets like the one I found HERE. It does not matter how you choose to write out your goals as long as they are realistic because that will give you a starting place. For weight loss, a realistic goal to keep the weight off is 1-2 lbs per week, FYI.
After you have your goals written out, you will have a realistic place to start on how to achieve those goals. I am now going to ask you to download this Barriers to a Healthy Lifestyle Worksheet. Write down all of your perceived barriers to accomplishing your goals and then directly across from the barrier to the healthier you, I want you to write how you can overcome each perceived barrier. If you are getting stuck and would like some more one-on-one help go HERE to set up an online consultation. If you are having trouble of thinking of ways to overcome a barrier it can be beneficial to talk through the process.
Your body is your most precious possession. It is beautiful and amazing, able to do so many things on a daily basis that is hard to comprehend. You owe it to yourself to make your health your top priority. That way you can put your best self forward to help others. Start small and become your idealized self.