Mid-January is where we tend to feel like we failed again, another year of resolutions down the drain. I’ve been thinking about how I want to approach this month’s blog. Hopefully by now you know I do my best to not shame or chastise my community, but to approach these antiquated ideals of body shame, diets, punishment and fear with a change of mindset instead.
Today we will discuss why resolutions really don’t work. Let’s begin with our intentions. Every year on January 1st you begin with the statement or thought that this will finally be the year that I will put myself first! Then usually around this time of the month you either haven’t started, weren’t able to stay motivated or just plain gave up. I think it’s so important to stop setting yourself up for failure. You don’t have to proclaim every year that this will be my year! You are putting too much pressure on yourself. Plus, I wonder if you’re just thinking in the short-term anyway which is another reason why resolutions are so unrealistic and impossible to sustain.
In my opinion, New Year’s Resolutions equate to punishment for what I think I “should’ be doing for myself. Every year without fail you see the newest diet and how happy these people are eating food out of a cardboard box or you see people on social media and their bathing suit bodies are glistening. How nice that these people’s resolutions are going so swimmingly, but of course you feel like a downright failure and start thinking what’s the point?! The first piece of good news is that there are absolutely NO QUICK FIXES! I know it might not seem fair that you can’t lose 10 pounds in 3 days and keep it off, truth bomb its only water weight!
Instead, let’s think about approaching your well-being long-term and start smaller. Whatever your goals are: eating more Whole Foods, moving more, meditation, working on yourself, stressing less. Try and pick one thing. Let it be easy. It may seem so overwhelming at first, because none of us like to change, we fight it because we are comfortable where we are. I am reminded all the time that change is going to happen whether I want it to or not, so I do my best to stay open to it. Interestingly enough, all of the good things that we want for ourselves inevitably go hand in hand and soon begin to follow one another. When you start feeling better about yourself, the more you start doing the things you need to do to stay happy, healthy and peaceful.