New Season Challenge: Step 1 Health Goals

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Time For Change

I don’t know about you but every time it comes around to a new season I feel like it’s time to create myself anew. Of course that doesn’t mean I always get it together. Because it seems that when it comes to health goals, somehow life seems to get in the way, right?

We know our health goals should be a priority, but that doesn’t meant they always are!

Usually I’m pretty good at keeping myself on track, but this year has been like a stampede of ‘life’ events for me and I haven’t followed through on all the health goals that I had in mind.

Like exercise for example, I had an aim to get super fit but so far I have to admit I’ve probably had a decline in fitness rather than an incline. It’s just been one of those things that stupidly got pushed down the priority line. And the fact that I sit at a desk too much really doesn’t help anything.

Even though I have been eating well, I’ve still seen some unwanted pounds find their way back onto my hips, and I’ve observed that my energy has dropped. A combination of stress and lack of activity will do that – and a bit too much nibbling here and there adds to it as well.

Along with that I’ve also seen aches and pains appear (mainly in my hips – no doubt thanks to sitting too much) that I can only put down to increased inflammation. My son has just been here doing an ‘assessment’ on me – he’s almost finished his podiatry degree, so he’s testing out his new found skills!

As I share this story with you I feel disappointed because I’m meant to be the role model here. But I want to be honest, I’m definitely not perfect, and as you can see, losing your way, getting off track, falling off the wagon, or what ever you’d like to call it, happens to the best of us – even when we know better!

Life is always going to be a bit of a roller coaster. But the key along our journey is if we can observe ourselves and find what these ‘symptoms’ are, then anytime we can turn them around.

I’ll share the changes I’m making every week, and you can share what you’re doing too. I’ll share resources and tips, and we’ll work on changing a few habits.

Sound good to you?

I’ll be doing it regardless of what you do, but if you want to make a few changes, which I’m guessing you do, then get involved and let’s do it together.

Step 1: Set Your Health Goals

We’ve got 4 months left of the year, that’s enough time to change quite a few things. But if we don’t know where we’re going how are we going to get there? We won’t.

So the first place to start is by working out what your health goals are. I’m a big believer in working from where you are right now because your starting point will be different to mine, and that’s okay.

1. Write Down Your Goals

First sit down and write your goals down.

My goals are:

• Exercise more to increase fitness and reduce aches and pains – and get those hips moving. 😉
• Lose 10 pounds/ 5 kg
• Put more focus on diet – cleaning it up, cutting the extra nibbling, and making sure I’m eating anti-inflammatory foods – following my own advice.

Why do I want to achieve my health goals?

I want to feel full of energy and life like I normally do. I want to share my joy for life and feel inspired and motivated. Most importantly, I want to inspire others to feel great too – my daughter, my partner, my family, and of course, YOU.

And this is a great exercise to show you that by chunking things down into smaller pieces, you can make great changes in a small amount of time.

What are your health goals? Write them down, and write down why you want to achieve them.

So now that we have our goals, HOW are we going to make them happen. Just thinking about it isn’t going to get us that, so we have to put an action plan in place.

2. Set An Action Plan

Here’s a simple exercise to help get you started on what to work on.

The Good For Me/ Bad For Me List

I love this exercise that I learned off Dr. James Wilson, it’s a great way to chunk things down, so to speak. I’ve put an example of what that list might look like in that image below.

• Take a piece of paper and divide it into 2 columns like in the picture above
• Label one column ‘Good for me’
• Label the other column ‘Bad for me’
• In the good for me column list the things that make you feel good, things that are good for you, things that you enjoy and that give you pleasure
• In the ‘Bad for me’ column list all the things that are bad for you, things that rob you of your energy, things that create negative thinking or feelings
• After you get your lists down, circle the top 3 in each category
• Now list them in order of 1-3 of importance
• Next take number 1 from each list and make a written plan of exactly what you are going to put into place in the next 2 days to get more of positive number 1 and less of negative number 1
• Next you have to put your number one goal and action plan into place, so you will be working on getting more fulfillment by focusing on your number one ‘Good for me’ priority. And at the same time you will be working to reduce number 1 on the ‘Bad for me’ list
• Do this for 3 weeks, then move to number 2 on the list.
• Now make an action plan for number 2, write it down
• For the next 3 weeks you will do both number one and number 2
• Then after another 3 weeks do the same for number 3 on your list

As you can see from the list above we’d normally do this process every 3 weeks, bringing in something new. But if you’re like me right now and want to see more rapid improvements, you can try doing this process to introduce at least one new thing every week – or even better aim for 2 things.

It will require a bit of commitment to do this, but we’re going to chunk things down here as we go, so for now just focus on one thing and we can go from there.

What Are Your Top 3 Targets Right Now?

The key with achieving goals is to make them into small chunks, so note down what your top 3 targets are right now and HOW you will put them into action.

My top 3 goals are:

The first thing on my list is more movement. I know that by moving more I will be helping to tackle a few issues at once.

Moving more helps improve energy, will reduce aches, pains, and inflammation, and helps with mental clarity too. So starting TODAY I will be going for a swim and will introduce some other things over the next few weeks as well.

The next thing on my list is quit coffee. I LOVE green tea, dandelion root (a great herbal coffee substitute), peppermint, and cinnamon tea – all of which are anti-inflammatory. But somehow this year coffee has become a regular feature. Sure it’s okay to drink a cup a day but some days I’ve been drinking 4 cups a day and I know that many is inflammatory – not anti-inflammatory. So the coffee is getting the cut and the good stuff is being brought back in.

I have an effective technique for quitting coffee without getting headaches, so I’ve just ordered some more supplements and will tackle the coffee in the next few days when they arrive.

I usually drink a lot of water. But since the coffee has become habitual, the water intake has definitely declined. This is not good because I could potentially be slightly dehydrated, which also effects energy levels and increases inflammation. Thankfully, by cutting out the coffee I will naturally start drinking more water, so I’ll be tackling 2 birds with one stone here – and you might find that happens with your goals too.

3. Get It Done

Today – swim. Next few days (when supplements arrive) – quit coffee. Today and this week – drink more water.

These are my 3 main mini health goals this week.

What are yours? Let’s use the next few months to really bring things back on track. Share your struggles or what you want to work on, I’ve got lots of ideas and resources that can help.

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