Here’s your #truthbomb…if reaching your goals were simply about robotically following a set of instructions I’d be out of a job real fast and your journey would be found in a 90 day shred infomercial or a 21 day food fix! Reinventing how you live, habit change, is one of the most humanizing experiences to go through!
We have emotions, wants, needs, likes, and dislikes. Therefore, restructuring your habits REQUIRES the use of your MIND!
What I want you to do TODAY, RIGHT THIS MOMENT is embrace this concept and work WITH what we know to be true about human psychology- ONE habit change at a time ensures an about an 85% success rate in incorporating that behavior into your life. Overhauling-your-life-type-diets have a 5% success rate. With that type of a statistic, isn’t it absolutely insane that we repeatedly choose overhauls to create healthier lifestyles.
Of course, we do it because ONE is NOT a sexy number. Who’s going to be impressed that we are struggling with one mundane quirk? No one. Not even you. But yo-yo dieting is as unhealthy for the body as it is for the mind so let’s get to work in picking the ONE thing you can work on today, right now.
1. GET THE BIGGEST BANG FOR YOUR BUCK:
We already established that one is not a sexy number, however, if you pick the “right” habit for yourself you’d be surprised what changing one thing can do for your body.
As you may know, the first habit I purposefully chose 8 years ago was giving up drinking two (GIGANTIC) wine glasses/night after my son went to bed. Wine drinking only happened on Fridays and Saturdays after that. It was not an “all and never” type of goal. It was simply a reduction in consumption with clear cut boundaries.
That one habit reduced my daily caloric intake by 300-400. THAT is no joke…I could see and feel my results within 3 weeks therefore my motivation to continue stayed high!
So get out your pen and paper RIGHT NOW…
Think about who you are and what you do on a daily/weekly basis.
Make a list of unhealthy habits that have creeped into your routine to help you deal with stress? What healthy habits do you no longer practice because of a hectic schedule?
2. HARD WORK:
ONE may not be sexy but make no bones about it…This shit is hard…period and point blank. I swear the first two weeks of not drinking Monday through Thursday you would have thought my glasses of wine had been laced with heroine. I may have broken out into a cold sweat at some point.
Hindsight is 20/20 however. Today I know, I didn’t NEED the glass of wine physically. What I needed was the EMOTIONAL CRUTCH! What my body craved was the feeling of unwinding, relaxing, letting my mind rest after tremendously busy days. Wine was my coping mechanism. Giving up wine during the week was as traumatic for me as when we ask our children to give up their pacifiers at night. It’s their source of comfort in the dark. Many kids don’t give up those pacies willingly. My body went into full on trantrum mode.
Don’t be surprised if you do too!!
3. CONSISTENCY > PERFECTION
REALITY check. You will have good days. There will be bad days. At some point, you WILL FAIL! Get over it. Move on. Start over.
I remember being so strung out for sugar one evening with no wine in the house that I went into the pantry and at 8pm and made myself a bowl of flavored oatmeal. It was delicious…in fact…it was down right the most amazing bowl of oatmeal I have ever had in my life because I can still remember it. Ideally, I would never have caved and I would have “saved” myself the 150 calories that evening and felt like a winner. I didn’t. I had my hit of sugar and I didn’t beat myself over it. New day. Back on the wagon. Still got results because CONSISTENCY TRUMPS PERFECTION!!
YOUR TAKEAWAY:
The frustration of being on and off a program takes it’s toll physically and mentally. Manuals don’t work in the long run. The short cut is actually the long cut and it requires you do a tremendous amount of mental work. Throw the manual away. Sit down, reflect, dig deep, and be as honest with yourself as you possibly can. With that comes action, hard work, and failure followed by more action. The perfect plan is the one you learn to design for yourself!
