First Steps toward a Healthy Lifestyle – New You 2010 Contest

Contestants and Groups Selected
This week, four groups began the two-year journey together that will change their lifestyles. I received nearly 100 applications for participation in the contest, and of those I narrowed the applicants down to 40 and then talked with each of them at length last week. Each of them was ready, motivated and committed to making healthy lifestyle changes to reclaim their health, fitness and wellbeing. They all recognized that rapid weight loss and dieting was no longer the answer, and they wanted to finally take good care of themselves.

It was challenging to pick just eight for the contest, so I decided to create three more groups of eight to experience the same two-year program in order to support at least thirty-two of them.

Read more to learn who became contestants.

Getting Started
In our first sessions together, the group participants talked about what led them to apply for a spot in the contest. They shared the struggles they’ve had to exercise regularly, make healthy food choices and make themselves more of a priority. These struggles and the associated frustration, disappointment and pain they created are what motivated them to finally take action. Being inspired to change because of what is no longer tolerable, from a wake-up call or an opportunity to be in a life-changing contest, is often the motivating catalyst that puts people into action, yet that motivator has a short fuse and can disappear as quickly as it appears. The catalyst can get you to make a change, but it won’t keep you motivated to stick with that change or to make long-term changes. For that you need to create long-term motivators based on what it is you will be able to do, feel or experience as a result of the healthy lifestyle changes. These positive outcomes are what keep you motivated to stay on track.

Read more to learn how they selected their motivators and their first week's goals.

See What Contestants Have to Say
I’ve asked the contestants to comment on their experience each week here on this blog. In that way, you will get a birds-eye view of what they are discovering for themselves, which will help you in following the contest and participating on your own. You are also free to comment on your own experience.

Have a healthy and active week.

Follow the New You 2010 Healthy Lifestyle Contestants

I’m pleased to announce the New You 2010 Healthy Lifestyle Contest for Greater Newburyport – a group of towns along the Northshore coast of Massachusetts. This contest is designed for people who want to finally become a health, fitness or weight loss success story like you read about in magazines. This isn’t a weight loss contest but a contest for greatest improvements in health, fitness and healthy lifestyle behaviors which is the key to sustainable weight loss and finally being free of worrying about weight gain.

I know, because that is how I became a success story. Nine years ago on January 1, 2001, I began exercising and eating better in a way that changed my whole attitude and mindset about fitness and taking care of myself. For the first time in my life I didn’t quit and give up. Instead I stuck with it, and two years later I had dropped from a size 16 to a size 4. It took longer than if I had done a quick weight loss diet or extreme fitness program, but I had succeeded to stick with my new healthy and active lifestyle. More importantly I was discovering a love for fitness and wanting to be even more fit. For a gal who hated exercise and had a long history of yo-yo exercise and dieting, this was miraculous. Yet I discovered a way to get and stay fit that was motivating, so I no longer had to worry I would get off track or gain all the weight back. Nine years later, after going through menopause, I am still fit and wearing size 4s or 6s.

My discovery led to a shift in careers and a passion for helping others create and maintain a healthy lifestyle that feels so good they too can succeed for the long-term. I’ve since become an expert in overcoming the sabotage that keeps us from meeting our goals, staying on track and feeling motivated to exercise, eat well and make ourselves the priority. While I’ve helped hundreds of people individually make changes for long-term success, I realized recently that I could do more by creating a contest here in the Newburyport area where I live.

There are eight contestants who are committed to successfully creating and maintaining a healthy and active lifestyle so they can be in control of their weight and be free of their issues with food and exercise. During the next two years, they will be sharing their experience of creating and then maintaining their new healthy lifestyles on a Newburyport community blog, http://www.newburyport-today.com/ .

At the same time, three other groups will start the same two-year program, and they will be sharing their experience here on this blog, by commenting on my weekly New You 2010 post about the program theme for the week.

Follow the contestants each week on this blog.

You can also participate in the program on your own or in a group with the guidelines I post each week on the contest site at www.aHealthyLifestyleWorks.com/contest.

Here’s to a healthy and active new you!