How to Make a Habit
September 10, 2009 by August
Filed under Blog, Family Fitness
In case some of you that are reading this don’t get our monthly newsletter I am going to post the information I wrote about forming habits. I think this is important information that will help you get into the groove of a healthy lifestyle.
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Did you know that it takes 3 weeks to create a habit? Here are some things you can do to help form new habits.
1. Know what you want. Sit down as a family and discuss it. Come to a conclusion together and talk about things you can do to get where you want to be.
2. Hold each other accountable and be okay with it. Allow your spouse or kids to remind you of what you want as a family on the days that you aren’t feeling like ‘doing what it takes’. Don’t get upset when that person reminds you.
3. Make a poster with your goals and come up with a way to track your progress. Make it fun for your family. Maybe you use stickers to track progress or small rewards when short term goals are met.
4. Tell everybody you know about your goals and what steps you are taking to reach them. It helps when everyone is asking how it is going. And who knows, maybe they will be motivated to do the same thing!
5. Start slowly. Don’t make your goals so big that they are unreachable. You can have a ‘big’ goal but add in smaller goals as well. We all feel good when we reach a goal and the more you feel good about what you are doing the more motivated you will be.
6. Make a list of all of the benefits of creating the habit. Put those benefits someplace where your family can see them. This will help to remind everyone on a regular basis why you are doing what you are doing.
7. Get rid of the things that are making it difficult to create the habit. If you are working towards eating healthier-get the junk food out of the house. If your goal is to exercise as a family instead of watch TV or play video games-unplug the TV, turn off the cable or pack the video games in the closet. It doesn’t mean those things can’t come back in moderation however, getting them out of the picture during the habit forming phase makes a big difference!
