How to Make Healthy Habits Stick

Welcoming a new year often comes with hopes and dreams of change. You might see new year new you! all over social media, you might be hearing a lot of chatter about new year’s resolutions, you might even be creating your own. When it comes to change and creating new habits in life that are pretty different than your current habits, it takes a lot more than dreaming about the changes we want.

You see, creating a new habit is hard. There are countless books written on this topic, all so full of great information trying to hack our human nature that so strongly pulls us to return to our set point of being. While there are many great tactics out there to create new habits and make them stick, the one thread that seems to run through them all is practicing the new desired habit long enough so that you no longer have to think about it anymore. The process up to that point can be dicey, but it is possible.

Generally our brains are fairly lazy. Once it doesn’t have to work so hard to resist the changes we are trying to make, it finally accepts the new habit and then stops resisting it. Eventually the new habit occurs unresisted, without having to think about it. When you are trying to create any change in your life, the inevitable force you are up against is just yourself and the old habit you are trying to replace. You have to constantly work towards convincing yourself that the new habit is worth keeping around through practice and consistency.

When it comes to healing from a life of chronic dieting and emotional eating, it can be tough to create a new habit of relating to food in a non-emotional way. The truth is that diets don’t work but creating new healthy habits, one small incremental step at a time does. If you want to transform your relationship with food, your body and yourself, it’s best to start small, acknowledge and accept that it will take time, effort, concentration, focus, backsliding and picking yourself back up and planning and…you get it, it just takes a lot.

It’s helpful to start the process of change and healing your relationship with food with giving up the belief that a diet or any “lifestyle” or wellness program will cure everything. It is helpful to then get really clear on why you want what you want. Having a plan, a dedicated focus and the willingness to commit to yourself and recommit to yourself over and over again will bring you closer to making this desired change.

I think one reason change and creating new habits is so hard is because we’ve been seduced by the idea that it should be easy. This idea sells a lot of diets, program and systems. So much media attention is placed on 3 simple tricks to…, or the 1 hack you need to…, or how to lose X pounds fast while still eating whatever you want. These are all sensational, get our attention and when it doesn’t provide the promised result we just get caught up into the next shiny headline.

If you can let go of the belief that it will be easy, simple and fast and then trust yourself to show up for what you want, it may not be fast and easy but it will be possible. There might be some fun hacks, and it might be interesting to learn what makes us tick, but there is nothing like starting where you are with what you have and making a choice that today is the day—every single day.

To begin, know what you want, what vision you have for yourself, make sure you are super clear on WHY you want this. It’s helpful when your why is enough to motivate you during those times when your motivation wanes. Then determine the habit you’d like to create that will help move you closer to where you’d like to be and why you want to be there.

Now consider the action steps it will take to implement this habit. For example, if you’d like to begin eating more vegetables, the action steps might be, 1. Buy a leafy green or other vegetable that you like, 2. Have a recipe ready to prepare this vegetable, 3. Plan what day you will cook/prepare this recipe, 4. Follow through on your plan, 5. Reflect on how you feel. 6. Repeat!

The process of reflecting on how you feel will help you navigate how it’s really going and what you might need to shift or change. This is how habits become sustainable, when they are doable within your current life schedule, desirable-you truly want it-and when they are not rigid. If it isn’t doable, desirable and if you feel like you have to be perfect you are setting yourself up for failure.

Once this new habit is FIRMLY in place (you no longer have to think about it anymore and you are eating vegetables every single day without resistance) choose the next habit you’d like to implement. This process is simple and yet definitely not easy. There are going to be days you don’t want to eat your veggies. There will be days you have to throw a vegetable away because you never got around to preparing it or eating it. There will be days you don’t have time… These will feel like failures and it feels terrible to fail so then we figure it’s easier to just stop and give up then it is to try again and possibly fail again. This is backsliding. Backsliding is an inevitable part of the process of change.

When backsliding occurs, please don’t get discouraged. Return to reflecting on your goals, what you want and understand why it’s not working. Find the belief in what you want to be possible so you can keep trudging forward with your plan. Return to WHY you want this and let that help to support you and motivate you to keep trying. Then one magical day you’ll just be eating your vegetables without having to think about it (or do the exercise or meditation or cleaning or stop eating when satisfied or…whatever your goal may be) and you will feel the benefits of your hard work, determination and the willingness to believe in yourself.

There is no simple trick, only the determination to put in the work and make it happen, even when—especially when—you don’t want to. Staying the course even when you backslide, even when it’s hard, will help you learn and grow and create the change you desire. One day it becomes not so hard, and you feel the shift and that’s when you know you can savor the changes you’ve made and even begin to look to what’s next. Consider taking yourself through this process and prepare yourself for the challenges and the delights that lie ahead.

Happy New Year!!

How to Integrate Intuitive Eating Principle 10: Honor Your Health - Gentle Nutrition

The tenth principle of Intuitive Eating is: Honor Your Health—Gentle Nutrition. When working through, integrating and processing the other nine principles of Intuitive Eating, you will find there is nothing prescriptive about what to eat. When you are immersed in the process of intuitive eating, you are the expert on what your body wants and needs.

The more you tune into your body, develop awareness and pay attention to the cues and signals from your body, the more you know what foods serve your body and your mind and what foods do not. You know how you feel when you overeat, under eat and when you’ve eaten just what your body and mind needs. The truth is that there is no one right way for everyone to eat. Foods that might make one person feel great might make another feel terrible. When you are intuitively eating you are able to make these assessments and make choices based on what is best for your body.

One of the most challenging elements of intuitive eating is developing the ability to trust yourself with food. To not just know what your body wants and needs, but to feed your body what it wants and needs. If you have a long history of dieting, most likely you feel that certain trigger foods create an automatic response to eat them or overeat them and that pulls you away from the attunement you’ve worked to create with your body. This causes uncertainty and keeps your relationship with food in a challenging space. When you let yourself eat what your body wants and needs you will listen to the subtle and the obvious cues your body sends you about the foods you eat. The key is to remain mindful and tuned into your body in order to consistently make the choices that serve your body.

When you are fully in tune with your body’s wants and needs you know what makes you feel good in mind body and spirit. This is where the gentle nutrition element comes in within this process of intuitive eating. Our bodies are designed to assimilate the nutrients from whole foods. We need protein, vitamins, minerals, fats, fiber and carbohydrates to be well, feel well and live well. Your body is literally made up of the food that you eat. Your food becomes your cells, tissues and organs, the more nutrient dense your diet, the more these cells, tissues and organs will thrive. The more that your body thrives the more energy, vitality and mental wellbeing you will experience.

When you honor your health, you begin to focus on what to eat, not what not to eat. When you live in a mindset of nourishment and honoring your health, you focus on ensuring that you provide your body with the nutrients it needs on a daily basis—through the foods that you eat—so that you can truly feel vital and healthy in mind, body and spirit.

When you consider what you typically eat in a day, you might note where the nutrients that your body needs to thrive are coming from? How many servings of vegetables, fruits and plant-based foods are you taking in every single day? When you construct a way of eating that focuses on what to eat versus what not to eat, you can ensure that you satisfy your taste buds and your body. When you consider how you will nourish yourself and feel well daily and follow through with how you want to feel, you will create a sense of accomplishment and feel the difference in how your body functions and feels every day. 

When you are eating plenty of veggies, fruits, seeds, nuts, proteins and making them taste delicious with lively herbs and spices, you will feel satisfied and satiated. When you feel satisfied and satiated you experience fewer cravings and notice when cravings are emotionally driven more easily. When you focus on what to eat and not what not to eat, naturally you will fill your plate with more nutrient dense foods and there just won’t be the same space for less nutrient dense foods.

This is not about perfection or feeling guilty if some of the things you choose to eat are not super nutrient dense. You will not become nutritionally deficient from one meal or snack; the focus is more about the daily choices you make over time. This process is about focusing on nourishing your body. There may be room for snacks and treats that are not super nutrient dense, however, if you know that you are feeding your body what it needs to thrive, you will begin to create more balance and feel in tune and make choices based on what your body wants versus what you might be craving.

When you are eating well you will feel well. When you are eating mostly junky processed foods devoid of nutrients you most likely will feel junky. When you are eating in a balanced and nonrestrictive manner you will feel more balanced. When you focus on how you want to feel the choices become more and more evident when you are considering what to eat, how to construct a meal and how each choice you make when it comes to food can reflect and support how you want to feel in mind, body and spirit.

Why Diets Don't Work: Creating a Personalized Approach to Wellness

There is no one-size-fits-all diet, lifestyle, medical treatment, article of clothing…because there is no one-size-fits-all anything! We are all dynamically unique and have different needs in all areas of our lives as individuals. Imagine that there was a survey taken of bike helmet, shoe or other article of clothing sizes. Once an average was determined, helmet, shoe and clothing makers began only making the average size and sold that ONE size to everyone.

While the helmets, shoes or clothes may fit some people just fine, for many others it may be potentially harmful and most definitely uncomfortable! There just is no one-size-fits-all! The same is true with how you care for yourself. If you try to stuff yourself into a theory, exercise routine, meditation practice or even sleep schedule that does not suit you, you will be uncomfortable and it could even be potentially harmful for you.

This same concept is true for nearly everything. However, we are bombarded with messages from media, the medical community and other sources that there is only ONE best way to eat, to live, to love and to be. Not to mention that the headlines surrounding that ONE best way to eat, lose weight, live, love and be etc… changes all the time creating constant confusion about health and wellness.

This is precisely why diets don’t work for long term weight loss and living a healthy lifestyle. Studies show that long-term and yo-yo dieting actually cause weight gain. With a diet there is always an end point, so what happens when it’s over? First there is a sense of relief that you don’t have to starve yourself any longer and your metabolic functions may be out of whack after imposing excessive restriction sending you into an overeating frenzy.

Dietary theories, which are less about being on a diet and more about eating within a specific dietary plan also don’t work long term as they tend to have a higher level of restriction. These theories also often have a dogmatic view of food—such as this food is good, this food is bad—which instills a sense of fear around certain foods and creates extremes and confusion. Living in fear is never a good thing. 

A personalized approach to nutrition and wellness may include choosing to stay away from certain foods, however, you want that decision to be because that is your choice based on how that food makes you feel rather than being fearful of that particular food. When you are free and able to make a choice based on your health and how you want to feel, you create a mindset of empowerment. The more empowered you feel, the more you will begin to develop a healthy relationship with your intuition and your choices will be guided by your ability to truly listen to your body.

So you might be wondering, how do I create a personalized wellness plan? It can be extremely useful to do this in conjunction with a (w)holistic health and wellness coach, especially if you feel confused and overwhelmed by all the conflicting information out there. I recommend finding someone who works from a mindful and intuitive eating approach and encourages YOU to be the expert on YOUR body and a uses a highly individualized perspective.

But really, the thing is, YOU are the expert on YOUR body! You can become your own coach and can learn to tune in, listen and determine for yourself what your body needs, how to feed it, how to move it and how to best care for it. You are the only one who can determine what combination of foods makes you feel your best, what portions, combination of nutrients and timing of eating allows you to feel full, satisfied as well as the ability to maintain energy and overall wellness. Only you can determine what exercise—and really what anything—is best for you because YOU are the expert on YOU!

Becoming intuitively connected to your body by understanding its needs. You will recognize intuitively how food, supplements, medications, exercise plans, meditations and so on make you feel and this will give you valuable feedback that will inform your choices. If it is recommended that you go on a high protein diet and you feel disgusted by having yet another protein whatever, that is valuable information from your body. If it is recommended that you go on a plant-based diet and you are constantly starving and have low energy, that is valuable information from your body as well.

The thing is, some people will feel amazing on a plant-based foods only lifestyle—while others will feel miserable. The same is true that some will feel amazing on a higher protein, lower carbohydrate diet and others will feel horrible. We are all dynamically unique and have needs that are very specific to our own individual make up—mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually and energetically.

The process of becoming more in tune with your body is all about mindfulness, self-awareness, emotional awareness and learning to pay close attention. The process is about truly listening to your body which often speaks in soft whispers and subtle messages. Adapting a mindful approach encourages that when you eat, eat—when you drink, drink. Notice the impact of what you are eating and drinking on your body. While you do not want to be restrictive in your dietary choices due to the tendency to over-eat after a period of restricting, understanding the difference between emotional and general food cravings allows you to intuitively check in with how your choices make you feel.

When you are truly intuitive and mindful you will be diligent and practical with your choices. Having your health become your focus will allow you to make empowered decisions. This helps take away the fear of food as well as the feeling of being deprived or restricted. The middle road is really the most sustainable, the most effective and the most realistic. The moderate path, mindful eating and tuning into your intuitive wisdom surrounding your food and lifestyle choices will help you heal your relationship with food as well as with yourself.

If you are interested in immersing yourself in a journey to heal your relationship with food using these practices and principles, Finding Freedom From Emotional Eating is designed just for you. You can read more on my courses page!