Tips to Achieve Your Health Goals

Set Your Goals 

You first have to start by being honest and realistic with yourself. There is nothing worse than setting unrealistic goals, trying to accomplish them, and later finding yourself disappointed because you were not able to reach your goal. A healthy way to reach your lifestyle goals is by setting realistic attainable goals. Write them down, tell your family, tell your friends, why? Telling your friends and family will hold you accountable for the goals you have set. Make sure these goals are specific and you break them down. Have short-term and long-term goals, for example: In the next month I will lose 2 pounds, in 1 year I will lose 10 pounds. These are realistic but broad goals, now you must be specific, you need to ask yourself how you will achieve these goals, you need to write down how you will accomplish this in two months and in one year. For example, I will start going to the gym next week 2-3 times a week and in 3 months I will start going to the gym 4-5 times a week to accomplish my weight goals. Setting specific and attainable goals is crucial to your success to achieve your health goals.

  

Have a Healthy Sleeping Routine

 

 What does a healthy routine mean? Our bodies follow a circadian rhythm which helps us maintain a balance between our 24 day and night cycle. When your circadian rhythm is offbeat your sleeping pattern will be off, your sleep quality won’t be great, you will probably start feeling the aftereffects next morning when you feel sluggish. It might not be the easiest task to always go to bed by the same time but if you are able to keep it within the same two-hour range every night your body will thank you! If you know your body is out of whack and has bad sleeping patterns, then a great way to reboot your circadian rhythm is by going to sleep and waking up at the same time.

 

Exercise 4-5 Times a Week

It is understandable work, school, and life in general get in the way and do not allow time for exercising. However, I would like to remind you that exercising is an investment in your health, an investment to the future you. By setting aside at least 30 minutes of your day to dedicate to yourself, you will accomplish lower stress, reduced health risks, and even help with improved sleep. Often times we allow time for things that do not serve much purpose in our lives, such as scrolling pointlessly through social media, or staying stuck in traffic for an hour after work. Perhaps you should consider beating rush hour and enrolling in a gym near work and go to the gym straight after work! By the time you head out of the gym, traffic will be light, and you won’t have wasted a whole hour of your life in traffic, you have now turned this pointless time into something valuable. And just like that, you have now found a way to be motivated to go to the gym or your nearest park every day after work.

 

Create Healthy Relationships and Friendships

 

We tend to underestimate the impact our loved ones have in our lives. Choosing healthy relationships is essential for your own life to remain healthy. Friends and partners should be people that will push us towards growth, to be better in life, they will always challenge us but for our own good. Friends and partners are people around us that encourage us to change patterns that are not serving us in our life. If you engage in unhealthy behaviors such as binge drinking your partner, or your close friends will most likely be the first to notice. A healthy friendship or partnership should be one that acts and helps you see your fault and try to counsel you. We always have a choice when it comes to the people we allow to come in and out of our life.

 

Record Your Progress

What better way to stay motivated than to record progress? Recording your progress does not mean it will all be written in a journal, say it is a fitness journey, taking pictures is a great way to track your physical changes throughout the months as the scale is not always an accurate way to measure progress. Journaling daily is also a great way to track the way your mental health journey. Recording progress will allow you to see details you might miss as the days and weeks go by; our brain plays tricks on us, and we do not always see things as they are.