January is over, and so are most of our ambitions to carry out our New Year’s Resolutions. The first few days of the “New Year, New You” were great, but then reality kicked in. You realized that it is impractical to spend hours at the gym every day, and that no one really has the time to meal prep every single week. Now you’re starting to feel guilty because you haven’t even made it half a year.
Don’t stress, this happens to everyone. If you still have some motivation to make a change in your life, use that to make smaller alterations. Don’t give up on your dreams just yet. Hang on to your goals, there is still most of the year to achieve them.
Dreams and goals get set aside to focus on other parts of life. However, you shouldn’t give up on your goals completely. Making small changes that move you closer to your goals can be easier. It’s like taking baby steps before running. You gradually build up to the lifestyle or goals that you want. Let’s face it, you can’t do a complete and total lifestyle change within a few days.
Lifestyle changes take time. That’s why New Year Resolutions don’t always work out. You have to start building a habit for several weeks until it becomes a lifestyle change. Just like you can’t expect to lose ten pounds over night, you can’t expect to change your life overnight. Typically a habit is formed after two weeks. For example, if you continuously drink a glass of water every morning for two weeks straight, it should become a habit, though that doesn’t make them permanent. Habits can still be broken and changed.
Some small changes that you can start making right now to improve your overall health include:
• Start your days with protein
• Get moving
• Focus on can, not can’t
• Drink more water
• Be your greatest cheerleader
• Forget the scale
• Sit down to eat
• Cut out unhealthy choices gradually
These small changes were inspired from RealSimple.com, a website dedicated to helping people live a happy life. Each suggested tip might help you take steps towards your healthy goals. Once you start improving your health with these small steps you’ll start to see big change.