At the beginning of each year, whether we make specific resolutions or are maybe just inspired to start some new habits, a problem we all seem to come up against is our ability to stick to whatever we’ve set our mind to.
To see change, we need to make a change, but the good news is that small moves can lead to big results. Whether we want to reduce stress by sleeping more, feel more energised by moving more, or maybe improve our mood and minds by nourishing our bodies, we don’t need to shift heaven and earth to feel good and well, every day. All we need is a plan, plus a simple way to keep up with it.
Set a specific goal that has a deadline
Let’s use a simple example, perhaps “I want to exercise more, so I will walk to work three days a week until April”. There’s an overall goal (to exercise more) , a plan (to walk to work), and a timeframe (three days a week until April).
If our goal is vague or can’t be measured, then it’s hard to know if what we’re doing is working or for us to feel the gratification of having achieved it. Have measurable plans and a date in mind that you want to have achieved it by.
Understand your ‘why’
If you want to walk to work to boost your energy, or feel better about yourself, or maybe keep the carbon footprint low, knowing that means you’ll have a deeper understanding of why you’re doing what you’re doing, which keeps motivation high. If ‘why’ is not top of mind when you’re starting new habits, it’s easy to just…not do it. To truly understand your ‘why’ ask yourself these questions:
- What motivates you to choose this plan?
- What will life look like while doing it or after you’ve reached your goal?
- How will you feel while carrying out your new plan or habit, and once it’s completed?
It can help to use a journal to keep track of this. It’s easy for us to move the goalposts if we keep these ideas in our heads alone. Seeing things written down in black and white anchors us to our goals and reminds us how we felt and what we wanted to achieve when we set these goals.
In addition to writing down our initial goals, we can make notes each day (or as close to each day as works for us) to note how our new habit is making us feel and how we’re progressing.
Decide on your daily action to reach your goal.
Going with our example of walking to work in an effort to exercise more, our daily action might be (in addition to the walking of course) to get up half an hour earlier, to take a reusable water bottle with you, and to make sure you have clean socks and practical shoes to walk in!
If, one day, you missed the alarm or just couldn’t face walking in the rain - remember that that’s ok! We can’t be perfect all the time and trying to be will only make us feel like we’re failing if we can’t stick to uber-high standards. Every time we take steps in the right direction, we are making the effort to better ourselves and it’s important to remember that!
Try Habit-Stacking
Habit-stacking is a great trick for making new habits second-nature. How it works is to take a habit we already have and piggy-back a new one onto it. For example, if we wanted to remember to floss our teeth, we could put the floss on top of the toothpaste so we remember to do it before we brush our teeth.
Going back to our walking to work example, we might fill up our water bottle and put it with our packed lunch. Maybe we have our walking shoes ready for us by the door each day so if we can’t find them, we’re not tempted to stop looking and just drive in.
When we habit stack, we remove one of the obstacles - forgetfulness - out of the way so we’re that much likelier to get the job done.
If the new year has you feeling inspired to feel better in, and about, yourself, you can’t go past the Everyday Wellness Pack. Designed to elevate our baseline for wellness, it’s loaded with high quality, bioavailable ingredients that help to fill the gaps left by modern day diets, improve our gut health and provide our body with the nutrition it needs to fight inflammation. When we are nourishing our bodies with essential vitamins, minerals, and herbs - it touches all cornerstones of health and we can start to see improvements in sleep, energy, mood, digestion and more.
In addition to a multivitamin, probiotic, and fish oil, for a limited time the pack comes with a 30-day Change Challenge and an An Ordinary Life journal to make sticking to habits a breeze. The BePure community is all about lifting one another up to live better lives, every day whether that’s on January 1st or the middle of September, we’re here to make life a little better every day, together.
