Tips for Sticking to Your Health Goals

This is the time of year where many people are making resolutions and agreeing to do ALL THE THINGS. Right?! But how many years in a row have you promised yourself that you’d “lose 20 pounds” and “workout every day”? Please be honest.

This year will be different. This is because we are going to tackle this in small, manageable steps, and that is going to make a difference.

This year, we are going to take a top goal of many resolutioners to get healthy and AIM SMART. This method ensures that you first, set the “right” strategic goal for you (AIM) and then, gives you a process by which to achieve it (SMART).

. So, how can make sure that this gets accomplished? Take a moment to answer the following questions:

1) What is the LEAST that you’d be willing to do? Getting exercise in Every. Day. can be a lofty goal if you are just starting out or if you have a condition that makes movement hard sometimes, like an autoimmune condition or fibromyalgia. Or even if you’re just busy! So, what might still feel good, but would at least get you started in the direction of daily movement?

This is the “A” for Acceptable. Choose an acceptable minimum, say for example, you will get exercise once a week at a minimum.

2) What is possible? You could go on a strict diet and workout (almost daily)… But then, you have a meal out and you miss a few workouts and now that “ideal” wasn’t ideal for you. It was unreasonable and you couldn’t carry it out.

Get healthier wasn’t necessarily the “I” for Ideal for you.

3) So, we need to figure what can you do that is somewhere between the minimum and the maximum you can do that will push you toward your ultimate goal? This is the Middle. or “M.” Let’s say that you can stick with your healthy eating plan within the good old 80/20 rule and you can workout three times a week.

Whew! See, that wasn’t so hard. We now know that we will feel good about our progress when we eat better most of the time and we move our bodies at least three days a week. Now, the real work begins and we develop the action plan using S.M.A.R.T.

S- specific. What is the first step in the new healthier you plan? We decided in the AIM process that we will stick to a healthy eating plan most of the time and we will workout/move 3 days a week. So the mini-goal could be to choose a diet theory and sign up for a Beachbody account.

M- measurable. Really think about what would be a quantifiable measure of success. This means you can measure it and you know how to measure it. So, the diet theory will you plan for is the Autoimmune Protocol and you have your log in information for your Beachbody account.

A- achievable. Is this initial first step possible to achieve? This is a yes or no question. If yes, then bravo! It’s possible. If no, the loop back and ask yourself what part IS possible and start again with this smaller piece.

R-reasonable. How reasonable is it that what you say you’re going to do can be done right now? Think about what could get in your way from the metaview. After that, decide if your mini-goal is reasonable or if you need to modify it. Maybe you will even decide you need a new first step. Be honest with yourself.

T-time-oriented. Choose the date by when you will have the mini-goal completed. Can you choose a diet plan and get your account set up by the end of the week?

You cannot fail with this plan! Isn’t that fantastic. We use this process often in coaching and working with your coach is super helpful because they can help you stay accountable and work with you on making adjustments without judgment.