Putting Shoulds in Their Place

Why is it so hard to do as you know you should with healthy eating choices , regular exercise and taking better care of yourself? No doubt, you’ve wondered about this countless times. It doesn’t seem to make sense that if you know what you should do, that you don’t do it or at least not often enough. Yet whenever you don’t do something you intended, there is a good – and valid – reason.

Think for a moment of one thing you know you should do, but don’t. Does the idea of doing it feel inspiring or enjoyable? Or does it feel more like drudgery or a chore? If it doesn’t elicit desire or at the minimum some enticement, than it makes complete sense why you would avoid it. Who wants to do something they don’t enjoy or find distasteful? In fact, to follow through on doing what you aren’t inspired to do takes enormous amounts of energy to overcome the reluctance or resistance. Few people have enough extra energy in their busy and stressful lifestyle to do that. And the guilt of not measuring up to the “should” they carry around on a pedestal further depletes what energy they do have.

When you don’t follow through on a should, this is an opportunity to investigate where the should is coming from and if the rules can be changed or relaxed.

Steps to Dealing with Shoulds

• Think of something you should do that you don’t.
  
• What is it about doing it you struggle with?


• In what way is that struggle valid, and what can you learn from your reaction?


• What might work better for you that is a positive and healthy alternative or solution?


• What would you enjoy more or be inspired to do that supports your real objective?
  

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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!

Lowering Healthcare Costs by Increasing Prevention

A healthy debate is underway to determine what can be done to reduce the cost of health care spending by insurers, employers and individuals. While the primary focus is on the cost of healthcare services, not enough attention is being placed on preventive services for chronic diseases caused by unhealthy lifestyles.

The use of insurance premium discounts for nutrition, wellness and fitness programs are a great start, but these options don't work for many people. These are very often a prescribed set of guidelines with a focus on program compliance. While most people try to comply, the minority tend to succeed and the rest add the experience onto their list of been there, done that and hope not to do that again.

What is missing is a focus on funding programs that help people change their attitudes, reclaim their motivation and find things that are suited to their lives. The programs designed to do this are a blend of life coaching, fitness, nutrition, emotional eating and in some cases psycho therapy. Wellness or healthy lifestyle coaching is new to the healthcare field and understandably difficult to regulate, but it is time to offer the same discounts for coaching that are now offered for gyms, fitness programs and other wellness alternatives. Don't try to regulate coaching. Instead leave choice in the hands of those that know what works best for them. The results will speak for themselves in the reduction of chronic disease.

Welcome to the Ins and Outs of Healthy Living

Healthy Living is the phrase of the decade. Nearly every major organization that serves consumers promotes it. Most people know it is important. Yet the resources to help people adopt a healthier lifestyle is surprisingly limited. What is missing is an understanding of why behavioral change is so hard and what it takes to be motivated to stick with healthier habits for the long term.

That is why I am starting a blog about the ins and outs of healthy living. I see a gap in what is provided by healthcare practitioners, nutritionists, supplement providers and those who are focused on losing weight, fitness, diabetes, heart disease and other lifestyle related concerns.

In this blog I want to open the discussion with healthcare practitioners, psychologists, wellness coaches, organizations promoting healthy living, nutritionists, individuals and all others who see the importance of finding a way to help people choose healthier options and then stick with them as a way of living.

Join me in looking at healthy living from the inside out, with a focus on people's mindset and the options available to support them in being successful. I will share my own expertise as a Healthy Lifestyle Coach as well as my observations about healthy living programs, discussions and news.