When reading this quote, from Anon, I had to think of how applicable it is to food, diet, nutrition, exercise and being physical active.
Most of us have a reasonable good idea what we should and shouldn’t eat, drink in terms of food and beverages or what we should and shouldn’t generally consume ( e.g. cigarettes, excessive alcohol or various other drugs). I’m always astonished how we, or better our mind, is able to trick us into eating or consuming things we 100% know are not good for us.
Or …. are the food producers tricking us into this, adding ingredients i.e. sugar (often labeled different) and other additives that can be addictive and make us buy those foods and goods over and over again. I guess the whole area of marketing and advertising psychology plays a huge role. As we get promised if we eat this bar or that yoghurt it’s going to help us with X, and makes us feel happy (see all those smiley, young and fit looking people on the packaging) etc. etc..
The claims on food packaging can often be very misleading and are wide open to interpretation. In the one year long Nutrition & Health Coaching Course, I just completed, we spend a whole weekend on food labeling, learning how to read and interpret food labels, and also got two assignments going into lots of detail and assessing claims, packaging, nutritional values etc.. It was a fascinating assignment.
Coming back to my initial point …. all this raises for me the omnipresent question “How can we get ourselves to actually apply, day in day out, what we know is good for us in terms of nutrition, diet, food and exercise?”. This is one of the main questions I try to find answers to since I started to work in the health, fitness and well-being area in 2002. One of the main areas is raising awareness, educating clients and passing on knowledge to enable them to be self-sufficient in their quest to be a fitter and healthier person.
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Before we educate, learn and start we ideally identify our BIG – WHYs, our reasons for, wanting to be healthier, fitter, trimmer looking, more energetic etc. and what those things allow and enable us to do or be in our life. These BIG – WHYs can then be used as motivators, when we sometimes are in danger of falling of the wagon.
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Action Steps – Lets get you started (this will only take 5 minutes):
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(1) What health and fitness areas do you want to improve in? Make at note of three to five areas.
(2) Jot down three to five goals or objectives for those areas?
(3) Write down one or two specific actions you can take in the next week to get closer to achieving these goals (do this for all goals). Keep it simple and make it easily achievable, set yourself up for success.
(4) Take your diary (paper or online) and schedule a date/time when you do these tings.
(5) Get started now and progress step by step over the coming weeks.
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I hope this helps to get you that little bit closer to be healthier, fitter and happier.
Let me know how you get and what you think about these ideas.
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Martin
Some of my current south Dublin (D14, D16, D18) based personal training clients or fitness and Pilates class participants might know that I’m attending a 