Tired of setting unrealistic New Year goals?
Going to the gym for 2-a-days and eliminating all your favorite foods? Only to find yourself completely beat down and dragging 2 weeks in. Seeing this as unsustainable, you slowly dial the workouts back to eventually falling out of the routine. You start to incorporate your favorite foods back in, only to go right back to where you started.
Sound familiar?
As you start to game plan for 2020 and strategize how you will flip the motivation switch from the Holiday, “I don’t care” attitude, to “it’s the New Year and I’ve got to kick my butt into gear mode”; here are some of my favorite tips to kickstart into a new healthy and sustainable life style.
5 tips to kickstart a healthier lifestyle:
1. Shift your mindset
- If you are not mentally ready for change, it will not stick. It takes 90 days to form a habit, or to break an old habit and replace with a new. Mindset and emotional health is the foundation to your success in achieving your health and wellness goals.
- FOOD is usually the focus during the holidays! Everyone is enamored with holiday parties, Thanksgiving or Christmas feasts, cookie exchanges and candy bowls around the office. But if we can shift the mindset to something more meaningful and fulfilling – like what we’re most thankful for – we may be able to avoid all those excess calories…and guilt that quickly follows. One of the best mindsets we can have going into the holidays is to remember this is the time of year you get to spend with loved ones. So the first step to a healthier holiday is putting the focus on quality time with friends and family. Of course, the food will still be there. So we need a plan to tackle all those tasty temptations. Do you have a plan ready?
2. Learn how to read labels
- There are 61 different names of sugar. There are even more names of chemicals and ‘food-like substances’ that are put into what we eat everyday.
- If it’s on a label, but not in your cupboard, don’t eat it! If you don’t have glyphosate in your cupboard to sprinkle on your dinner, then don’t eat it you pre-packaged foods!
3. Track 100% of the food you eat for at least 2 weeks using MyFitnessPal. It will help teach you the following
- Awareness
- Watch out for the SUGAR
- Many processed foods have hidden sugars. Beware of these foods that are marketed as healthy
- Examples: cereal & granola bars, ”all natural” fruit juice, yogurts
- Shop the perimeter of the grocery store, which includes fruits, veggies, lean cuts of meats, and unprocessed foods. This should be 90% of your groceries.
- Avoid the processed junk
- Consistency
- Meal prep with your MACRONUTRIENTS in mind
- Carbohydrates – are our body’s main source of fuel.
- Proteins – regulate body function and aid hormone regulation.
- Healthy fats – in moderation is a component of our membranes, aids in the absorption of fat-soluble vitamins, and are used as a source of energy.
4. 30/780 rule. “You don’t stop playing because you grow old, you grow old because you stop playing.” ~ Benjamin Franklin
- :30 Find an activity that keeps you moving while having fun for :30+ minutes per day
- 7 + hours of sleep each night
- Sleep is important to achieving a healthy mindset
- Try to aim for 7-9 hours of sleep a night
- Good amounts of sleep can improve your health and reduce your stress throughout the day
- Hormones reset at night!
- Lack of sleep
- Ghrelin -> increased (more hungry)
- Leptin -> decreased (less satisfied)
- Cortisol -> increased (more stressed
- 80 + oz of water per day.
- Hunger can be mistaken as thirst
- Drinking water can prevent excess snacking
- To stay motivated:
- Log your water in a journal or food journal app
- Carry a water bottle around with you
- Stay away from sodas, juices, sweet tea – they have as much as 18g of added sugar.
- Start you day with a cup of water and pink Himalayan sea salt. Flavor it up with some fresh squeeze lemon juice.
5. Eat the rainbow…….not skittles… but veggies. Should consist of at least 50% of your plate every meal.
Choosing to eat well could be the most revolutionary decision you can make
It’s not as simple as eat less calories lose more weight. That hasn’t been working out for us very well. 70% of the nations causes of death are from chronic related diseases.Let’s be our best selves as we wrap up 2019!
Don’t wait until 2020 to make your health and wellness goals a priority!Resolve to get a plan for these next 210 days to end 2019 on a good note, and start 2020 off with a healthier foundation!
Coach Hudson