One Small Thing

Happy New Year, friends!

January is full of hope and possibilities, a chance for a fresh start, renewed energy to go after our goals and dreams. You may envision better health, more wealth, love and joy for yourself in 2019. But HOW do you get there? How do you keep the spark alive to continue putting one foot in front of the other when the tendency is to fall back into old habits? It's helpful to know that your conscious brain wants to keep you safe and it wants to conserve energy. This is why change is so hard for us! Makes sense, right? So you need to be strategic when setting new goals and create an environment that supports the changes you want make. For example, if you decide to eat more nutritious, whole foods and continue to bring canned/bagged/boxed food into your home then it will be very difficult to follow through with your goal. In those moments when you're tired and fantasizing about some "fast" food, your brain will not want you to drag out pots and pans and a dozen ingredients to prepare dinner.

There is a process that pretty much guarantees success when you fully commit to it and go step-by-baby-step. Your brain will not freak out as much when you make small changes over time. Remember that part about energy conservation? When you do something consistently (read: daily) your brain gets the message that this new thing is really important and in order to save energy it gets tagged for automation. This is the secret to lasting change, and the totally beautiful part is that you can apply it to ANY area of your life. I'm so excited for you to try it. Think of something you really want to change. It can be something small like drinking more water, getting 100 extra steps in or 30 minutes of extra sleep. Decide what you want to do and make a plan for achieving this new goal, then take action every day and celebrate your success.

Water - The general recommendation for water intake is 1/2 your body weight, converted to ounces. So if you weigh 120 lbs. you would need about 60 ounces of water per day (or more if you're sweating a lot). If you're not getting enough, you may consider drinking a few extra ounces each day and it will get easier over time.

Extra steps - If you have a fitness tracker you can see how many steps you take each day. To increase you can take an extra lap on your walk, park farther away from the store entrance, or go up and down the stairs a few extra times.

Extra sleep - Begin shifting bedtime by turning the lights off 10 minutes earlier than usual for several days and keep adjusting until you are getting just the right about of shut-eye.

The possibilities are endless, really, and EVERYONE can do this. No excuses. Now I want to hear from you! What's your one small thing? Please share, inspire and support others.