LIVING A HEALTHY LIFESTYLE IS HARD!

Yes, I said it! If you are not used to living a lifestyle where nutrition, movement, and stress management are a regular and routine part of your life, it’s hard to get there.

That’s why it’s so important to build a health and wellness routine that fits your current situation.

But you have to be ready. It will be that much harder if you’re not prepared.

It’s important to start with a few essential questions.

What’s Important to You RIGHT NOW? Is it losing weight? Longevity? Treating a medical condition? Improving your body composition? Strength or Flexibility? Better nutrition?

The things that are most important to you will determine what you’re willing to put the most effort into.

For me, I’m more interested in improving my nutrition and eating habits. I know I will be putting food into my body at least 3 times per day, and it’s more important to me to work on my eating habits than it is to focus on fitness. I’m already fairly active, and even though another area I want to work on is stretching and flexibility, I would prioritize nutrition over exercise if I HAD to choose.

What Has Worked for You in the Past? Think back to a time when you felt successful in your health and wellness. What were you doing on a consistent basis? Cooking at home more? Eating more fruits and vegetables? Exercising regularly? Getting plenty of sleep? Knowing what worked for you before can help you consider where the best place to start might be now.

Before children, I used to walk most evenings when the weather was nice. Now that my kids are older, I’m working on getting back into the habit of walking in the evenings. Evenings are my preferred time, but when my work schedule conflicts, I also need to work on an action plan that will allow me to get my walk in earlier in the day.

What is it You Need Now? You know what’s important to you. You know what has worked in the past. Now it’s time to think about what you need to create a health and wellness routine that WORKS for your current life circumstances.

What does your daily routine look like and where can your important healthy habits fit into that routine? Is your physical environment set up to help you succeed? Junk food out of the house, or at least hidden in the back of the pantry where it’s out of sight and out of mind. Fruits and vegetables prepped and ready to go. Workout clothes set out as a reminder to exercise, go to the gym, take your walk.

Do you have actual reminders set, on your phone or on your calendar, to help you out?

Have you planned out your action steps to make your healthy routine flow? Grocery shopping, meal planning, and prepping ahead of time. Time blocked for the gym, childcare arranged or plans with the kids to get some activity in.

What kind of support and accountability do you have? Significant Other, friends, other family or co-workers. A coach or trainer to guide and encourage. Anyone who can help you stay on track and work through possible setbacks.

What can you add to your current routine or schedule to make the new habits stick better? Habit stacking, where you anchor a new habit to an old one in order to wire it into your routine. Walking while talking on the phone. Prepping fruits and vegetables as snacks for the week while prepping for dinner.

And the last thing I will say about trying to create, or re-create, a healthy living routine is that it is important to EXPERIMENT. If you don’t have an Experimental Mindset, it’s time to develop one. I am a FIRM believer in experimenting when trying something new, whether it’s a recipe, stress management techniques, or exercising.

You never know what’s going to click that you hadn’t really considered before.

I also believe that viewing changes as experiments takes the pressure off you. If you’re experimenting with a new recipe and it’s a complete and utter failure, do you just give up on cooking altogether? No. You either try again to make the recipe work, or you scrap it and find another recipe to try.

Same thing with creating a Healthy Lifestyle. You experiment with different ideas, scrap what doesn’t work, and try again until you find what DOES work!

Happy Experimenting and Good Luck!