|Decisive Moments: healthy habits for life|
Six months. No change.
The realization of this fact made me want to curl into a ball and cry. It made me angry and it made me sad, and quite frankly, it made me want to throw my hands in the air and scream “I QUIT.”
After joining a great gym that I loved and working really hard on establishing healthy habits for 6 months (like always sore kind of hard), I was excited to start a new challenge and to compare these starting results with the numbers taken when I first stepped foot in the doors the previous summer. I was weighed and measured, and body fat tested. I completed a fitness test. Push-up, squats, burpees (I actually don’t hate them anymore. Seriously, don’t roll your eyes!), and flexibility assessments were all required.
When I returned home that afternoon, I dug out my initial paper with all those numbers that had made me initially cringe, sure that I was going to be impressed by my progress. I was definitely stronger. I had more endurance than before. Surely, I would see the most incredible transformation. Ok, so the number on my scale hadn’t really budged, but I was somehow confident it would show up in my body fat percentages or my inches lost. It never occurred to me that it would be any other way. But…
Nope. Nada. Nothing.
My heart sunk when I realized that not a single number had really moved. I was devastated. My mind began to spiral into all the negativity that hides inside. “You should just give up.” “This is pointless.” “You’re never going to be thin.” “Something’s wrong with you.”
I couldn’t shake this feeling of failure. I dwelled on it and stewed in it for days, and then in a moment of clarity and personal honesty, I realized that I was at a decisive moment. Right here, right now, I had two options. I could quit and spend the rest of my life in a hateful relationship with my body, waxing and waning my way into old age, or I could decide to fight it. I could choose right now to give up these healthy habits I had been trying to build or I could double down on them instead.
In that very moment I had to make a choice – one that would seemingly affect not only me, but also truly affect my family as a whole. This decision would set the precedence for how my children would see me, and what lessons they would learn from me. So, I had to ask myself, am I the type of person who gives up when things seem hopeless and frustrating, or the kind of person who perseveres and looks for a better way?
At that moment, that very hard day, I chose me.
I chose my health. I pushed back against those feelings of failure and decided that I wanted to model a new way, these new habits, to my daughters and my son. I decided my body, inside and out, was a gift that I wanted to honor, and a puzzle I wanted to solve. So instead of giving up, I leaned in. I cleaned up my eating, and I kept going to the gym. I even decided to remove the element of distraction by getting up at the unholy hour of 4:30 a.m. to workout at 5 so that a sick kid or a “late from work” husband couldn’t derail my goals. I’ve been at this early morning routine for over a month now, and it’s amazing to me how much of a habit it’s already become.
Sound a little intense? Yeah. Maybe.
But here’s the deal, friend, if YOU don’t decide you’re worth the intense decision to make a difference in your own life, no one else will. No one else will give you permission to choose you. We’ve all been given one life. One body. One mind.
Your family, who loves you, probably doesn’t have the intense desire for you to honor your health. Your friends, who adore you and want to see you succeed, can’t make choices for you that allow you to live a fuller, healthier life. Your parents, your siblings, your co-workers – they all have their own decisive moments and struggles going on each day.
If you’re ready to make yourself a priority and commit to some new healthy habits here are a few practical tips to get started:
Plan ahead.
Decide what your fitness schedule will look like each week. And be honest and practical. If you can’t get to bed until 11 pm, don’t plan on working out before the sun is up. Because sleep is important. Enough said. Find a time that works in your day and is the least likely to get interrupted.
Put it on the calendar.
My husband and I share a google calendar that we add our commitments to. If it’s on there, the other person knows to not schedule over it if at all possible.
Decide which kind of discomfort you want.
Here’s the truth. I’m uncomfortable when I eat bad foods. My stomach hurts and I feel bloated and miserable. I’m uncomfortable when I am overweight and out of shape. I’m tired and less likely to want to do fun things with my friends and family. But, I’m also uncomfortable pushing myself through a hard workout or turning down that cupcake. So I have to decide – which ‘uncomfortable’ do I want? I’m getting it either way. So I can choose the healthy habits that better me or the unhealthy ones that leave me more uncomfortable every day.
Learn to say NO.
Say no to commitments that drain you and take away your chance to do something healthy for yourself. Say no to foods that make you feel crummy, not because they are “bad”, but because they make you feel bad.
Find support.
Whether it’s friends who will build you up and cheer you on or an online community that will help you through the tough times, finding support in your journey to be a better you is 100% necessary. Your spouse or family might not be those people, and that is ok. You do you girl! If your support team isn’t built in at home, go out and find them. My husband is ‘quietly supportive’ of my health journey, but he’s going to eat ice cream next to me! Instead, I found a group of friends to encourage me and a gym family (I go to this one) that supports and educates me on how to be better.
Be a GPS system and ‘recalculate’.
I used to think that when I came up with a plan to do something healthy for my body or my emotional wellbeing, I had to know exactly what was right the first time. I’ve grown to learn recently that it’s really more of a ‘trial and error’ system. My body might not respond to one method, but taking the time to figure out what ‘next’ healthy method to try counts as self-care. Also, hear me on this, that doesn’t mean bouncing from diet to diet, (like I used to do) but it might mean figuring out if a food isn’t working for you, if you need to change your protein intake, or increase or decrease your workouts. But try one thing at a time, reassess and then be a GPS and recalculate.
It’s up to you.
We have been gifted this one life. A life we often overcomplicate. A life we often hand over to everyone else first. More often than not, we come last. We are willing to break all our promises we made to ourselves while tripping over everything to honor the commitments we’ve made to everyone else.
A mentor of mine told me the other day, “You need to decide to be the type of person who keeps the promises you make to yourself. If you say you’re going to do it, then do it.”
So, I could let the lack of results shut me down. I could follow the easier path. I could give up on myself and find excuses all day long. But in THIS decisive moment, I choose me, and I am giving you, my sweet friend, permission to choose you. Even when it’s hard. Even when others don’t get it. It’s not being self-centered; it’s simply being centered.
You’ve got this.
(If part of your self-care journey is learning to simplify your life, be sure to follow Your Reclaimed Life on Facebook and Instagram and download your free “getting started guide“)
