Let’s take stock. How many things do you know you should be doing to get healthy, but aren’t?
For me, my top 3 list of things I should be doing to get healthy includes:
- taking more time off to relax and have fun
- exercising daily
- drinking enough water
What are your top 3 things? We’ve all got them. It might be eating more vegetables, reducing stress at work, spending more time meditating or deepening your spiritual practice, sleeping better, or anything else that you know will help you to get healthy.
In all of the people I’ve talked to about health and wellness, every single one of them has been able to share with me at least 2 or 3 things they know they should be doing to get healthy. And every single one of them wonders why they cannot seem to make it happen. Often, there’s a sense of guilt or shame – that if you were just better, stronger, had more willpower, you would be able to make it happen. You would finally be able to get healthy.
The trouble is that it isn’t about strength or willpower. You muster up the strength and declare that once and for all that you are going to get healthy – no more eating fast food, no more soda, running every day, and a whole long list of other things you’re going to start doing today. Sound familiar? What is also familiar then, is that you can manage to do all of this for a few days and then slowly (or not so slowly) you fall off the wagon and go back to your old habits. Your resolve to get healthy wanes and you start to feel guilty and beat yourself up for failing…again.
So, How Do I Get Healthy?
The key to get healthy is to break your goals down into small and manageable pieces and take them one by one. Getting healthy is sort of like building a puzzle – first you have to have a clear vision of what it looks like, then you separate out the pieces, getting them all into a manageable order, then build the edges and finally fill in the body of the puzzle.
To have the best chances of success when you get healthy, you need to follow a similar format. Having a clear vision and then laying out a step-by-step plan for how to get there. Use these simple steps to get healthy, one piece of the puzzle at a time.
- Spend some time writing down your vision for a healthier you. What does a healthy you look like? What will your life be like when you are truly healthy?
- What do you need to do get healthy? Write down everything you need to do on a blank index card – one task per card. Are there problems you have that you aren’t sure how to solve? Write those down on individual cards too and keep them in a separate pile.
- Once you’ve got all of your goals written down on index cards, go through them again, this time writing down each step of your goal. For example, to get healthy you might want to drink more water. The first step might be drinking 1 more glass of water a day. The next step might be drinking 1 liter of water a day. The third step might be drinking 2 liters of water a day. Do this process for each of your goals.
- By now, you’ve probably got a pretty impressive stack of index cards, each with one small and manageable step towards improving your health. The whole stack might feel a little intimidating. To stay the path and get healthy, instead of tackling the whole stack at once, what I invite you to do is to tackle one card at a time. Choose one new thing to do each week. Practice that one new thing for the whole week, before adding another healthy step from your get healthy to-do list.
As the weeks unfold, you’ll find yourself doing more and more healthy things, and actually sticking to them. You’ll notice small improvements – increased energy, weight loss, a clearer head, and a sense of pride and satisfaction with what you are accomplishing.
With these simple steps, some time, patience and dedication to yourself, you can get healthy…once and for all.
If you feel a bit overwhelmed by doing all of this on your own, I invite you to connect with me for a complimentary 30-minute health strategy session.
- Create a crystal clear vision of how improving your health can transform your life.
- Uncover hidden obstacles that are hindering your ability to get healthy on your own.
- Leave our session energized and inspired with tangible next steps to get healthy once and for all.
All you have to do to get your complimentary session is schedule an appointment. It’s as easy as that. Will you join me?
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