Trying to make healthy lifestyle changes?

You’ll need a fun goal.

Is Your Healthy Lifestyle List Complete?

• Restore healthy body weight – check!
• Eat 8 + a Balanced Plate – check!
• Move More – check!
• Always be prepared for my next meal before it’s time to eat – check!
• Define my ‘fun goal’ – Feel good enough to {fill in the blank} each day – check??

“Fun goal” – huh? Everyday I get to ask people who are trying to make healthy change ‘Why do you want to be healthy?’.  The common response is to ‘feel better’.  Okay, we’re getting closer.  But why do you want to feel better?  What would you do when you feel better or have more energy? And I mean really do, contribute, or create (hopefully the goal is beyond having more energy at night just to clean the house; although, that does need to get done).

The answer to this question is what will help motivate you for a lifetime.  Yet, sadly, many of us can no longer answer this question.  Having the energy and creativity, let alone time, to reacquaint ourselves with a hobby seems almost incomprehensible. So my recommendation is to start slower. Just look at today.  What would you do if you had more energy today?  This is the first step to defining your fun goals.

A fun goal should be just that, something that provides fun while working towards more challenging goal.  It’s a mini goal.  A mini-goal that’s obtainable – each day – while you achieve the bigger goals over several months and years.  It’s what you would enjoy – each day – as you benefited from making positive health changes.  It’s how you will enjoy the journey to health.

Here are some real examples from my clients:

• “I would like to feel good enough to read for even a half hour before bed each night.”
• “I want to start writing again – even just 20 minutes a day to get started again.”
• “I want to really be with my grandchildren – full attention, be creative with them.”

It’s all about enjoying the journey

Not many people want to be healthy just so that they can dedicate more time to meal planning and prep.  But, unfortunately, this is as far ahead as many look. I get that a great part (and a huge motivator) of losing weight is to wear a smaller jean size.  And, yup, you will. But my hope for you is that you find a daily motivator – a little fun – to keep you on that journey for a beautiful, sustainable lifetime.

~Teri  

P.S.  One of my fun goals was taking ballet. I took my first ever ballet class (dance class of any kind) this past year (that’s me on the right above with my instructor). Ballet challenges me in all the right ways. Most importantly it reminds me – each day – how beautiful and capable the body is when we support it (and how much we compromise it when we don’t).