The simplest tool to become consistent with your healthy habits

Whenever we start a new eating plan or start to work on our fitness we always have that initial burst of commitment and excitement and then we slowly seems to slide back into old habits and before we know it, we are back where we started.

And worse still, there's always that little voice in our head blaming our lack of willpower or questioning whether or not we can even get to our goal at all.

But what if it has nothing to do with willpower and everything to do with what you're thinking when you start to struggle?

Starting to doubt yourself or getting overwhelmed when making lifestyle changes is incredibly common and is the most common reason why people give up. It's also the number 1 thing I tackle when working with a new client because it's actually surprisingly easy to change.

You just have to change what you're paying attention to.

Often when people are starting their plan I get asked things like "What am I going to do when I go on vacation in a few months time?!" or "I can't start now because I have a cruise/baby shower/birthday coming up next month!!"

And I generally tell them.. "so what".

You cant put your life and your health on hold for something that's going to happen in the future. when we think that way its all too easy to just put the healthy choices we could be making on the back burner and delay doing anything at all until we get to the point where we are in a worse situation than we are in now.

Start right now. This moment. And ONLY focus on this moment. Don't worry about this weekend or your cousin's graduation party that's a month away. Forget about the half a box of Oreos you ate without thinking in front of the TV last night. Neither of those things are here today, let them go. Bring your focus and your attention to right now.

What can you do right now that will be a positive step towards better health?

What are you willing and able to do today to prioritize feeling good?

What can you adjust in your next meal to help give you more energy and reduce bloating?

It's really that simple. If you always just focus on what you're doing in this moment, today, you get better at making good choices in more moments and before you know it, your goal will be in reach and your healthier lifestyle will have become automatic.

Where resolutions go to die

Good heavens! It's almost halfway through March!

So…. How are your resolutions coming along?

I’m not a huge fan of resolutions, only because I think that the whole “new year’s resolutions” concept piles on entirely too much unhelpful pressure and expectation. It also gets people to try the DO ALL THE THINGS AT ONCE approach which in itself can cause you to fail.

Because making changes to your life is a process and can be frustrating as hell.

The most common thing that people seem to struggle with is motivation, procrastination, and feeling like they aren’t getting closer to their goals. It’s quite dispiriting to decide that you’ve been doing this for 4 weeks now and still aren’t achieving what you thought you would. And when you aren’t seeing the results you hoped for, the lack of motivation starts to rear its feet dragging self, and soon, it’s easier to give in to old habits and comforts.

Luckily, a change of focus can really help nip this in the bud.

It’s not going to be a long-term and sustainable change if you absolutely hate it. If you’re honestly feeling like dragging yourself to the gym every day is soul destroying and there’s not a single moment where you think “that was good!” then find another way. Experiment until you find an enjoyable way of achieving your goal. You’ll be much happier, and it will be a lot easier to stick with. Have fun with your goals! Otherwise, you’re swapping one misery for another, and that sounds like a crappy idea to me!

Focus on your progress, not your achievement. Embracing the fact that progress IS happening can be incredibly motivating. Just because you had a difficult day and let a whole host of negative thoughts rush through your head, doesn’t mean you’ve blown your chances of reaching your goal to have a more positive outlook. Just like one poor workout doesn’t mean you’re never going to get fit.  It’s a blip. It happens. To everyone!

What’s important is the overall progress. Every single time you are choosing a more positive reaction or to say no to another brownie, or yes to lacing up your shoes and going for a jog, you are progressing.

You are better off than you were before. And THAT is a whole lot better than nothing!

Our culture is so obsessed with the end result that we tend to forget that any kind of achievement comes from many many smaller wins. Focus on how far you have already come. Focus on the win of making the better choice every time you do.  Each time you acknowledge your progress, you help make the action a habit and as we know habits very quickly add up to bigger things.

Longer term, it’s the little wins and the habits that make the biggest difference. (And it’s easier!)

And finally, I like to ask myself two questions.

1-     What will my life be like if I don’t make the effort to do this?

2-    What will my life be like if I do?

Remind yourself of why you’re doing this in the first place. Our motivation tends to wane because we get sucked back into the day to day business of living our busy lives and instead of renewing our motivation; we beat ourselves up for having lost it in the first place.

You didn’t lose it, it got tangled up in the “to do” list.

Your food can make you miserable.

I have for many many years treated my nutrition as a cornerstone of my own health, both mental and physical, in fact for me it was a huge turning point, and yet, I hesitate to share that side of my passion because of how intensely people can respond if you have an opinion on it.  But considering how important to my overall approach it is, it seems more and more ridiculous not to talk about it.

Perhaps a little background to explain where I’m going with this.

My most deeply experienced period of depression coincided with my greatest period of poor nutrition, starting with a weight loss that was achieved and maintained by living on a pathetic diet of french fries and aioli sauce, the occasional burger and regular amounts of chocolate.

Its honestly not hard to be thin on junk if your calories are low and you’re an active 17-year-old, but I became a very different person, dysfunctional and deeply depressed. My eating was most assuredly disordered, but even when my weight normalized and I was placed on antidepressants, nothing changed. In fact, things got worse. A lot worse.

Something that I don’t often share is the fact that I was housebound for two years due to depression and intense anxiety. I was like a hollow shell of a person, a ghost that floated endlessly around the house. A nonliving being that was somehow still alive. A pretty horrific existence I can assure you.

And then is seemed that suddenly one day a switch was flipped and I was recovering. On the road back to being ME. It wasn’t a new drug or a new counselor and I wouldn’t start to really understand the working of my own mind for a few years, what started off in the direction of recovering ME was finding a book on nutrition.

This was the first exposure I had to the concept of your diet having an impact how you feel and the regulation of your emotional and mental health.

It was a mind-blowing revelation that triggered a passion for understanding the science behind nutrition and to this day I spend far more time than I really have wading through the incredible amounts of research that’s out there.

Which is why nutrition is such a hugely vital part of my personal practice and why I advocate for all my clients to consider a holistic approach to their coaching experience that includes their nutrition. I’ve found that people make progress faster when their physical health is supporting their mindset changes. And it's easier to make positive changes when you aren’t being dragged down by a poor diet.

The problems, however, are the diet marketing and hysteria, the ways in which we punish and abuse our bodies with food regardless of the impact on our emotions, and how we learn about nutrition.

If the only place that you get nutrition information from is advertising, magazines or blogs then you’re in trouble. There are almost zero places where the information is unbiased. Almost every single article you read will be either paid for by someone with an agenda, like selling products (the latest “green” cokes and pepsi come to mind) or by someone who is dead set on a particular belief, whether they profit from it, or simply define themselves by it.

My overall eating approach is simply to eat whole foods, whether I'm cooking or eating out. And I supplement with good quality products when I know I'm not going to have time to prepare something or when I simply don't want to.

But once your body is healthy, its a lot easier for it to deal with treats.

Every now and then, I want more cheesecake than is reasonable for a sane person, and I drink coffee like its water from the spring of life.  I also take supplements because I don’t always get it right (and I find it supports my health better than just my diet) Does this make me some kind of dishonest foodie?

No, it makes me human.

But I know damn well that if I have bread and pasta on the same day (or even a couple days in a row) my stomach will hate me and my mood will be dull and apathetic. If I have sugar in my coffee or eat too many sweet treats, the quality of my sleep deteriorates and I start feeling anxious.

I am deliberately flexible but aware when it comes to my diet and as a result, I am in perfect physical and mental health. Even did my first triathlon recently and have not had a relapse of depression in almost 9 years.

My health is the result of educated choices, and deciding what my priorities are.

And as part of my approach, I focus on these 4 principals.

1 – Remember, what you eat is the building blocks that your body is built out of. You are literally what you eat, so always prioritize quality over quantity.

2 – Don’t underestimate the mind/body link. Your mental state and mood are absolutely affected by your nutrition, there is good solid science to back this up. And let's be honest, you didn’t really believe that eating utter junk was going to be good for you anyway.

3 – Look at all nutritional evidence and articles critically and without emotion or getting caught up in the hype. Educate yourself, rather than allowing people to push their message on to you.

4 – Experiment. And be honest with yourself.

Beyond that, I heard a great expression recently. Eat 80% for your body and 20% for your soul.