Five Ways to Find Success in Achieving Health Goals

You can’t hardly spend five minutes on a social media site without being bomabarded by someone’s idea of how to make better choices for food, activity, or other wellness goals.  If you have a health and wellness goal, how do you achieve it amidst all the food and nutrition chaos around us?  After last week’s post on setting your year up for success, here are the next five things that should be on your health and wellness “to do” list for 2015:

1. Figure out your health and wellness personality. Understand what your needs are and make a list of simple steps to take with a timeline on achieving them.  Try choosing one simple thing per month to get started, such as getting more activity every day, taking the stairs instead of the elevator, or adding one more serving of fruits or veggies a day.
2. Tell people what you are doing so they can support you.  Let your friends and family know that you mean business.  If you go out to eat at a restaurant or friend’s house, it will be easier to stick to your goals if you let people know what’s important.  This way, your friends know why you only have one helping of their delicious dish.
3. Don’t let unqualified practitioners drive your decisions.   When it comes to your health and wellness, be sure that the people informing you are educated in nutrition, licensed in your state where required, and are the right fit for your style of learning.  The last thing you want is to receive erroneous information that harms your health insead of helping it.
4. Integrate health and wellness into your overall experience. Don’t segregate your choices.  Choosing healthier choices or managing a health condition like diabetes isn’t a separate task, it is how we live.
5. Don’t try to be everything to everyone. Pick your health and wellness goals wisely, and stick to it.  Focus on small, specific action steps, and knock them out of the park.  Find existing resources in your community for more inspiration, and don’t forget to have fun and allow for a few choices that are just about the food and social aspect of eating.