What would you say is the biggest reason that new year’s resolutions fold by around mid January?
Unclear goal?
Not enough accountability?
Desire-factor too low?
Nope. The clear feedback, from coaching and mentoring people to excel for over 20 years, is that there wasn’t a habit in place.
Healthy LifeStyle habits are where it’s at, when it comes to going beyond the initial lift we feel from setting a goal. To adjust things so we experience more energy, reach our ideal shape, burn our ‘fuel’ more efficiently, increase our fitness, eat good food, and generally feel well takes practice.
Research shows that we can only process a certain amount of info at once, so once we have a new habit in place (by doing something again & again), we no longer need to use up thinking energy – and we can do it automatically.
Just like driving a car…clunky, awkward and seemingly impossible at first – once we’ve practiced it many times, all the motor coordination and processing of perceptual input become unconscious. We even end up not noticing our foot on the accelerator or looking in all the mirrors at once! Our unconscious brain can get on with the basics, and we can get on with the rest of living.
Once we’ve practiced them, our new Healthy LifeStyle habits have their own neuronal super-highways in our brains as I call them (literally!) and we no longer even need to think about them.
Sound too good to be true? Trial it for yourself. Pop a reminder in your phone, or program your fitbit, to drink filtered water each hour during the day, and watch the new automatic habit begin for yourself.
Take away – Grab your diary now (Yes! Right now!) and schedule in ‘YOU’ time. Pick a time where you can see you can fit something, and just plonk it in there. You can think about it in more detail later. When it’s in your diary – it’s real, and it will happen. It’s as simple as that.
Fi Jamieson-Folland D.O, is a Lifestyle Consultant, with over 26 years experience in Europe, Asia and New Zealand as a qualified osteopath, educator, writer, certified raw vegan gluten-free chef, speaker, health mentor, LifeStyle and Health Ambassador. She lives in NZ and Indonesia with her husband Chris, relishing an outdoor lifestyle and time with family and friends.