New Years Resolutions(Part 2)
How are you doing on your New Years Resolutions? We are now entering the 3rd week following New Years and this is typically when most people fall off their intentions. In fact, 92% of people fall off their New Years resolutions within 3 weeks after January 1.
Just Do One
I hope that my blog last week on “Just Do One” has helped you re frame your resolutions and stay on track with yours. This simple mindset has helped thousands of people stay on track with their New Years resolutions. In case you missed it, you can access last weeks blog – An Easy Way To Keep Your New Years Resolutions here :http://kevinbradyhealth.ca/an-easy-way-to-keep-your-new-years-resolutions-just-do-one/
This week I am going to talk about 2 other secrets I use personally to ensure I stay on track with my health commitments. These are the “80% rule” as well as “Baby Steps”. I sincerely hope that these two mindsets along with “Just Do One” will help you stay on track with any health commitments you have made for the upcoming year.
80% Rule
I have a rule that I try to live by called the 80% rule. In simple terms, this means that I aim to “be good” from a health standpoint 80% of the time. I am not sure about you but, when I relate this to grades in High School or University, I was elated if received a mark of 80% as it didn’t happen often (or ever)!
My theory is that the reason most resolutions or diets fail is they are so strict in nature and they don’t allow any room for cheating or messing up. Think of so many diets out there that are “Rules” based. I believe that the reason many of these diets fail people is that they are so rigid that when people go a little off track they feel like they have failed and go right back to their behaviours prior to the diet.
To follow my program is very simple: try to lead a healthy lifestyle 80% of the time. Think of a person that perhaps is not living a very healthy lifestyle from a dietary standpoint. If this person then starts consuming healthy meals 80% of the time, this is an 80% improvement over what they were doing which will lead to amazing positive health outcomes.
The 80% rule allows one to go off track or cheat and be ok with it. This could be looked at on a daily basis or on a weekly basis. Those that know me personally know that I like to have a good time on weekends. So my personal strategy is to try to eat extremely well during the week, work out daily and try to live an overall healthy life. I then allow myself to have some fun and give myself permission to go “off track” on the weekends and feel ok about it. My justification to go off track and have some unhealthier options on weekends is that I have been extremely good for the rest of the week.
Keep Track For Success
I keep track of my food intake, exercise, sleep, alcohol consumption and general well being every night. This allows me to summarize my day and keep track of everything I have consumed so I know where I stand. So for instance, if I go off track on a certain day, that is ok as when I look at the rest of the week I feel good about it. As the old saying goes, “We accomplish what we measure”. I wrote a blog on The Importance of Keeping a Log a few years ago and if you would like to access it you can access it here:http://kevinbradyhealth.ca/the-importance-of-keeping-a-log/
So I encourage you to put your own 80% rule in action as it will lead to some amazing health outcomes and will also give you permission to go off track 20% of the time.
Baby Steps
Another mindset I try to live by is the “Baby Steps” principle. I find that people generally try to take on way to many changes at once especially with New Years Resolutions. I believe this is sets one up for failure as it is too much to take on and once one resolution goes off track they go 100% back to previous behaviours.
A good friend (lets call him Mike) recently shared with me his New Years resolutions for 2019. They were as follows:
- To eat vegetables based every meal
- Exercise 4 x per week.
- Read 25 pages every night before bed.
- Get 8 hours sleep per night.
- Zero drinking on weekdays
- Meditate for 20 minutes every morning.
When Mike shared his resolutions with me, I really quickly introduced the “Baby Steps” mindset to him. With Mike trying to accomplish all 6 of the resolutions he set out to do, he is setting himself up for failure. It is way too much to take on and I would predict that if Mike goes off track in any one area, he will then throw in the towel so to speak and entirely throw out his New Years commitments.
In my opinion, a much better approach is to take “baby steps” and only tackle one of these resolutions at a time. Think of a year where each month you make one small change from a health standpoint. Over the course of the year if you were able to accomplish 12 positive health changes, think of how excited (and healthy) you would be at the end of the year.
Therefore, when Mike outlined to me what his resolutions were I suggested that he pick just ONE to start with and once that one was nailed then he could move on. I suggested that he pick one to start that has been bugging him and one that was relatively easy to accomplish.
Mike thought the best place to start that was relatively easy to accomplish was to get 8 hours sleep per night. He said that many nights he was just watching TV until 11:00 p.m. and then goes to bed and it would be relatively easy for him to shut everything down an hour earlier. I outlined to him that once he does that habit for a month then he would move on to the next “Baby Step”.
I believe with this approach and accomplishing each health transformation on a monthly basis it will set Mike up for an amazing year in health. At the end of the year, if he can look back and say he implemented 12 positive changes in health behaviour, that is an amazing accomplishment (not to mention how much healthier he will be).
So if you have already set your New Years resolutions I would suggest you reframe them and for those that have not set any, I would suggest this is a great time to incorporate one or more of these strategies for your success.
- Just Do One – start with a low bar to set yourself up for success
- Live by the 80% Rule – allow yourself to go off track 20% of the time (therefore being successful 80% of the time)
- Take Baby Steps – just tackle one health transformation at a time for a positive outcome
I wish you all the best in your New Years Health commitments.
Wishing you and your family all the best in Health and Happiness in 2019,
Kev
1 comment
Hi Kev,
Thanks for the advice. For some reason rather, I didn’t set any resolutions for the new year. Being blind at 85 years of age, my lifestyle seems to be a little different than the norm. However, I think I am healthy and I know I am happy most of the time. I do wish however that I could develop a better pattern for sleeping. I am giving this. A great deal of thought. And I intend to purchase a small CD player so that I can listen to the audio tapes that you and barb had bought me. (I know I have at least one CD player somewhere, but can’t find it.)
Thanks Kev.
Love,
Marge