Feeling Defeated with Your Health?

Have you ever felt like your health was in a complete rut?  You absolutely know you’re not living your life as healthy as you should. For some of us, health is an “all or nothing” mentality.  If you are eating healthy, you are exercising and drinking enough water.  If you are eating fast food and surviving on caffeine and alcohol, the last thing you want to do is workout.  At Unite, one of our trainers, Brittany, says this when feeling totally defeated by the state of your health, “Pick ONE thing you can change right now, for me, it’s stop what I’m doing and drink a glass of water.  We all know how important this is, it’s easy to do, and immediately, I feel like I’ve done something good for my body.”

When you’re feeling really defeated, really crappy, and you don’t know where to start to dig yourself out from where you are, just start small.

7 Tips to Start Feeling Healthier Right Now

1. Jot down a few goals- Just for the day.  Think about a couple simple steps you can take to make this one day a little healthier.  Go back to Britt’s suggestion about drinking more water, add to that, by eating a healthy salad for lunch or dinner.  Maybe just for today, instead of watching TV while laying on the couch, get up and do a few jumping jacks, try some push ups and sit-ups.  Make a couple of simple goals- just for today.
2. Strive for progress, not perfection: You cannot go into this seeking a perfect new you. Nothing and nobody is perfect. Instead, strive for progress. Progress can serve as a great source of motivation; every time you notice your muscles are more defined, or wake up feeling good from your workout the day before, you’ll get a little boost of confidence and motivation to keep it up.
3. Start your day with breakfast, preferably a healthy breakfast.  This will set you up for a better day and a healthier day.  You won’t feel the crash at noon which leads to a day of lethargy.
4. Go to Bed Earlier.  When you get a solid night’s sleep (a recommended 7-8 hours) you feel healthier. And you’ll feel even better when this becomes routine.  Trust me, your body will thank you.
5. Take a walk outside and if you can, jog.  Getting your heart rate up will give you a boost like nothing else will.  Don’t feel like you have to run a marathon or do this everyday, just get out today.
6.  Nothing happens overnight: You can’t expect to look different and feel great immediately following the initiation of your changes. Progress takes time. Try your best not to get impatient; stick with the healthy changes you decided to make—you made them for a reason and soon enough, you’ll be feeling and seeing progress.
7. The journey to getting healthy is riddled with good intentions and epic fails.  Changing your lifestyle is not a piece of cake- or else we’d all be in perfect shape.  You will probably cave somewhere along the way, resort back to some old habits, and feel guilty afterward. But don’t beat yourself up. Every journey comes with some roadblocks and bumps along the way to the destination.  You have to accept that and when you do fail, pick yourself up and persist.
8. Make a cup of tea, sit somewhere that’s quiet where you can be alone and reflect on where you are, where you want to be, and come up with three ideas to get there.  Write down what you are grateful for in your life right now, meditate on the goodness in your life.  Sometime gratitude can immediately give you a boost and you’ll start feeling healthier in no time.