Jumpstart Your Healthy Habits
We like to think that the choices we are making now is only linked to now. But in reality, it is linked to the next hour, the next day, week, and so on. Not only that, usually by looking at our yesterdays, we can very clearly visualize our tomorrows. What do I mean by this? Imagine you are a tree with 7 main roots. One root for each category in Finances, Mental Health, Physical Health, Relationships, Spirituality, Personal Growth, and Career/Life’s Work. Every time we make a decision it is either making the root grow bigger and stronger or it is making it shrivel and die off. If we look at our health like this, we can hopefully see the urgency in choosing wisely more times than not. Our overall health encompasses more than just the 2 obvious mental health and physical health roots. Each category in our life affects the other, and that is why we need to take the time to put in the work and care for ourselves in every way possible. For now we will just focus on the Physical and Mental roots.
In many cases one small choice doesn’t seem like it will do much harm. Eating the cookie, skipping the workout, staying up later than we should all seem pretty harmless in the moment. And in most cases, it is harmless. What happens with these decisions is they can very quickly merge themselves with our habits. One cookie today becomes, 3 cookies tomorrow, becomes skipping lunch and just having desert. Staying up late today, turns into every night, turns into brain fog and drinking multiple energy drinks to get through the work day. If we really sat down and made a list of all the new healthy habits, we want to start it can feel overwhelming. But as important as it is to make “start doing lists” it is just as important to make “stop doing lists”.
Starting with your most obvious areas pick 2 or 3. As awesome as it would be to go from never doing anything physical to working out for an hour every day, or going from eating out 10 times a week to only cooking from scratch, this is not sustainable. We want to make sure that whatever habits we start doing or stop doing we can maintain it forever. Will you do it forever or just until you reach whatever milestone you have? Only you can decide. But, if we know that lasting change is easier when we plan to do it forever, we will choose steps that we can stick to and enjoy. Maybe it’s walking 15 minutes every day, maybe it’s going from your daily 5 soda drinks down to 1. Choose your “minimum no excuses allowed” level and then track it on a big paper chart. I will give you an example in my own life.
I have discovered that when I stay up too late and don’t get enough sleep, I get tired. After a couple days of tired headaches then the brain fog sets in, then my immune system drags and I feel like I am fighting off a cold. If I force myself to go to bed early for the next 3-4 days I am back to my clear headed healthy feeling self. If this is such an obvious pattern why would I allow myself to stay up too late? I don’t have an answer for that yet. For now I use the excuse “The kids are in bed, this is my time now”. Any excuse will work, but what we need to do is find is the reason that is bigger than the excuse. 10 months ago I started a commitment. I would do some form of challenging exercise every day. This was my minimum bar.
On the days I had extra time or energy I would do 30 minutes of a Hiit cardio workout, on days I had little time or zero energy I would go for a walk or do a 10 min ab workout. In all of the last 10 months I had about 5 days of being sick and unable to do anything, and about 3 days of being too sore or mentally fatigued to do anything more than stretching. It all falls in my goal of “some form of challenging exercise everyday”. Sometimes getting your mat out and doing 15 minutes of stretching yoga is challenging. Sometimes you feel terrible for the first 10 minutes in and then it shifts and you find yourself feeling better and keep going. The most important thing is to start. 10 months is a long time of varied commitments, activities, weather, monthly “lady cycle visits” and through it all I have been able to stay committed by giving myself a few “habits” to help me stay on track.
Habit 1- It is easier for me to workout as soon as I get out of bed. I get up, lay out my mat and don’t get dressed for the day until my workout is done.
Habit 2- Plan my tomorrow today. I have several saved workout videos on my Youtube list that I cycle through. This keeps me from getting distracted searching for a new one and there is enough variety on my list that covers every type of time frame, muscle group, and workout style I could ever want to rotate through. If I have to get up earlier than normal for some activity or work, I set my alarm 20 minutes earlier to get in my short but sweet workout too.
Habit 3- Keep a big paper chart in a well trafficked area. Every day I log on a big calendar what type of workout I did and how long. This helps me keep motivated by seeing the workouts piling up over the days. I also could add to this drinking a certain amount of water in a day, going to bed at a certain time, or anything else I want to keep track of. I don’t want it to feel cluttered looking, and keeping it in the dining room for me ensures I see it all the time and that anyone else in my family or people visiting see it too. That is good motivation in itself. How long do I plan to keep this up? I don’t know, but for now it is such an engrained habit in my day that I find it has made me sleep better, feel better mentally, stronger and feel more confident.
The saying “Starting is the hardest part” is so very true. The dread we pile up in our mind is always bigger and worse than the actual event. Just press play on that video, just put on your walking shoes, just start preparing that home cooked meal, just start. Then see the amazing results compound.