Healthy Lifestyle
Awareness
Awareness Leads to Goals
Developing a healthy lifestyle can be accomplished at any stage of your life but no matter where you begin, it all starts with awareness. Awareness is the all important first step in any change process. It has two elements: fact finding and storage of those facts. One of the first things you'll be asked to do is use the
Healthy Lifestyle Awareness Worksheet.
(pdf reader required;
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) to begin the fact finding part. You'll be using this worksheet to record health habits you'd like to work on. You could also do the same for any bad health habits you'd like to break. We'll call these habits "target behaviors." Keeping your own journal is another option if you don't want to use the worksheet. Whatever you chose, it's a good idea to put things in writing. Writing them down will help you make the transference from ideas to actions. Also, when you write them down, you're creating a valuable memory tool that you can use throughout the entire change process.
It's a good idea to write down your ideas. Writing them down will help you make the transference from ideas to actions. Also, when you write them down, you're creating a valuable memory tool that you can use throughout the entire change process. Use the worksheet to list one health area you'd like to change. You can be as general as you wish. For example, you might say that you want to get more exercise. So you write 'get more exercise' under the Broad Statement heading. Next, list how much exercise you're getting at the moment. You'll want to use that information as a baseline. Keep listing all other behaviors that either contribute to or detract from your intention of getting more exercise. Some of the behaviors might be, 'watch TV during the evening', 'work at computer', drive the car 1 mile to work'. The object of this first exercise is to get you to start thinking about the specific behaviors you want to change. Once you have the behaviors you want to change in mind, then you want to ensure that those thoughts stay in your immediate conscious for easy recall. The key is to keep thinking about the change you're going to make. Take a look around you each and every day. What do you have to do fit more activity in your life? How are others doing it? What kinds of activity would work best for you? When you drive to work, during commercial breaks, when you're brushing your teeth, keep thinking about your activity level and what you can do to bring it in line with what you want it to be. Do what you have to do; make banners, post notes, send yourself emails and text messages but never lose sight of the fact that you're going to to get some more exercise in your life.
Awareness Leads to an Action Plan
Now that you've written out where you want to go, it's time to look at where you are. For example, if you wrote that want to 'get more exercise' then you'll now want to focus on how you're spending your time. How much exercise are you getting now? What are you doing now that prevents you from getting more exercise? If you wrote that you want to 'get more rest' then focus on how much rest you're getting now what is keeping you from the rest you need.Much of what we do, we do through habits. Habits are great energy savers and we're fortunate to be able to rely on them to save us time and energy every minute of every day of our lives. We're unfortunate in that we pick up bad habits just as easily as we pick up good habits. It's hardly surprising that we've become so adept at developing habits. We're human, after all. And, isn't it human to gravitate toward the "path of least resistance?" Why expend the energy when a habit will do, right? Could you imagine just how long it would take you to prepare to go to work in the morning if you had to think about each and every little thing you did before you left? To get an idea of the enormity of developing healthy habits, just think about one routine you do every day. Look at your "getting dressed" routine. Note how you currently do things, for example when putting on a shirt, blouse or coat with buttons which button do you start with first? Which shoe do you put on first? Which foot do you start with when putting on socks/stockings? Now try this simple exercise. Write down 5 similar behaviors that you do during your "getting dressed" routine. Then try to do them differently for 3 days in a row. How successful were you? You probably found that habits have a stubborn side and that you really had to spend considerable energy to change old habits. Most people probably fell by the wayside by the second day. Why? Change requires vigilance and when you're vigilant you're prepared for action.
Awareness Leads to Change
A big reason for not being able to break bad health habits is failing to remember that you made a decision to change in the first place. Awareness is an absolute must if you want to be successful in setting up new habits for a healthy lifestyle or for changing any behavior for that matter. You have to remember to do something before you can do it. Habits are wonderful little conveniences that allow you to go about your daily routines without having to spend a lot of energy on thinking about what it is you're doing but there's a down side. If you've picked up some bad health habits then it's going to take a conscious effort to think about the behaviors that have been running on autopilot for a long time. In other words, you need to maintain a constant awareness for what you want to change and what kinds of new health habits you want to develop.Awareness comes from noticing what you're doing and when and where you're doing it. Hopefully, you used the Healthy Lifestyle Worksheet to record some new health behaviors that you'd like to begin practicing. The left hand column should have some general change statements that you've set for yourself. Take a look at those statements. What are you doing now that is preventing you from reaching those statements. For example, under the section titled Exercise you might have written something like, "I want to be more physically active". What are you doing now that prevents you from being more physically active. What patterns do you see? Do you see activities like, 'watch television', 'work at computer', 'nap', 'read', etc. Note how often and how much time you spend on these activities each day. Jot down your notes in the margin or in your own journal. Once you're finished here, you're ready to move on to Step 2. Go to Skills
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