6 Easy Steps To Healthy Habits
Effortless and easy to maintain changes to become a healthier and happier you!
So far 2021 hasn’t turned out as we expected. Despite deep hopefulness, the return to lockdown and all the challenges it brings has had us running for cover (only a 5km run though!)
As we try to navigate each day we rely on routines to get us through the uncertainty and to keep us on our path to achieving personal and professional goals. This has not been easy! With last year being one of the hardest in memory we have seen good habits slide and bad habits creep in. So it is incredibly important as we move into 2021 that we adopt a fresh mindset and cultivate daily habits which can help us through the tough times, leaving us healthier, happier and more energized. Ready for when the good times roll around again.
The Declaration!
We have all been there, be it New Years Day or Pancake Tuesday, swearing that we will give up junk food, exercise every day, sleep 8 hours a night and drink tons of water. But…unfortunately for us life gets in the way. Everyday stresses build up and our energy, will power and motivation goes down. Worst of all we start to feel bad about ourselves for not being able to achieve these unrealistic goals and so we give up.
Health Snacks
The solution lies in breaking down our larger, long term goals into small, achievable habits and then integrating these into our daily lives.
Dr. Ranjan Chatterjee has written extensively on this topic in his fabulous book “Feel Better in 5”. His theory is that in just 5 mins, 3 times a day, true and lasting change is possible. In the book he introduces the idea of ‘health snacks’ - small practices for ‘mind, body and heart’ which we can incorporate easily into our daily lives but which can bring about lasting positive change.
In reading this book I felt overjoyed! The pressure and expectation associated with big changes was replaced with a feeling of excitement, enthusiasm and the possibility of achievement. All I had to do was to listen to myself and make a list of small, doable daily practices and habits which I knew I could integrate into my current lifestyle and situation.
Dr. Chatterjee recommends completing 3 health snacks a day with each health snack focusing on a different aspect of your health: Mind, Body and Heart. Each daily snack works to support your:
Mind - by reducing levels of stress and anxiety
Body - by getting you to move more
Heart - by strengthening your essential connections.
Who would have thought something so powerful and effective could be so simple and easy to implement. The idea made so much sense to me that since I started my health snacks a few weeks ago I have been able to move consistently towards my health and wellness goals while feeling happier, better about myself and really enjoying it! Hallelujah for Health snacks!
The Top 6 tips for making it stick!
The key challenge with any change is how to turn to good intentions into lasting habits. You want your new behavior to become automatic and there are several ways you can support yourself in this.
1. Start small and make it easy
This is crucial. Bold statements such as ‘I’m going to do a HIIT workout five days a week’ or ‘I’m going to meditate for an hour every day’ all sound good in the moment but they are often not sustainable when it comes to our everyday lives. The key is to set small, achievable goals instead and build from there. Leading behavioral experts agree that when starting off with building new habits our goals need to be easy. Instead of working out five days a week, try 15 mins of exercise twice a week. And yes dancing around your kitchen counts as exercise. Instead of trying to meditate for an hour every day, try 5 minutes of focused breathwork 3 times a week. This might seem very small and counterintuitive but believe me it works! The smaller and easier the better. Completing small goals gives us an immediate sense of achievement and so we are much more likely to stick with it.
2. Connect the health snack to an existing behavior
This one for me has been life changing. For a long time I have said to myself that I want to spend more time outside first thing in the morning, without this change actually happening. I decided that in order to make this into a habit I needed to integrate a new small behavior into my morning routine. So now while I let my tea brew each morning, instead of standing in the kitchen or looking at my phone, I pop outside for five minutes and drink in some early morning fresh air and sunlight. Bingo! It has worked brilliantly and my little health snack has now become a daily habit.
3. Go with the flow
It is important that we allow ourselves fluidity and not be rigid when trying to integrate new habits. By aiming to incorporate our health snacks into a time of day that suits us best, it allows us to forgo the unnecessary stress and pressure of having to do a certain activity or practice at a certain time. Instead we see how this new behavior can fit naturally into our lives. So for example, if you want to start a meditation practice but it’s just not happening in the morning then do it in the evening or before you go to bed. If you are working late and missing those Instagram Live Workouts that you love, see if they are on their IGTV and do them when you have time. Weaving the new habits around our own lives makes it much easier to achieve them.
4. Design your environment
Much of our behavior is influenced by our environment. Understanding this, Dr. Chatterjee encourages us to ‘set up our environment in such a way that makes the habit we want to engage in as easy as possible’. So if you want to do daily exercise then keeping your runners at the door or your yoga mat where you can see it will act as a visual trigger and remind you of the new behavior you want to incorporate. If you want to change your diet then organizing your shopping list, kitchen and food cupboards to support healthy food choices will make all the difference.
5. Speak positively to yourself.
Be kind to yourself and encourage yourself as you make the small changes necessary to move towards better health and wellness. You can do it and you can support yourself along the way by being your own biggest cheerleader.
6. Celebrate your success!
As Professor BJ Fogg PhD, author of the fascinating book ‘Tiny Habits’ and founder of the Behavior Design Lab at Stanford University tells us “The feeling of success is what wires in the habit, it's not repetition. Emotions create habits. And in particular with tiny habits it is the feeling of success”. What a discovery! There is no doubt then that emotion is a powerful tool in helping to reinforce our habits and create lasting change. By their very nature small, achievable goals set us up for success and so give us the opportunity to celebrate! Allow yourself to enjoy moments of positivity and achievement from even the smallest steps.It will give you the motivation to repeat the behaviour and also the momentum to keep going when you hit roadblocks along the way.
Change is a marathon not a sprint so let's celebrate each lap.
My favorite health snacks
Below are some of my favorite health snacks that I am enjoying during this lockdown and how they are turning into habits. Bon Appetit!
Mind
One of the most powerful ways we can support ourselves to better health is to take care of our minds. Dr. Chatterjee gives several great options in his book of 5 minute Mind snacks from simple breathing practices to activities like knitting, painting or reading which help to access our natural flow state. The one that I have chosen and consistently integrated into my life over the past few weeks has been to have a ‘Brain Boosting’ Smoothie every day.
With the smoothie it was something I enjoyed from time to time but had never been part of my routine. This time I have connected it to my daily exercise routine and Bingo! It has now become a habit. Not only that but instead of daydreaming while I am drinking it I have started to use that time to nurture and encourage myself with positive thoughts and intentions.
Yippee! One health snack down!
Body
Cultivating positive and consistent movement practices for our bodies can be challenging. Often we feel shame and guilt for not looking a certain way or beat ourselves up for not being able to find the time or complete demanding workouts. The secret, Dr. Chatterjee explains, is to ‘move regularly’. It doesn’t have to be long, it doesn’t have to be hard but it does need to become part of our lives and is an essential practice for our health and wellbeing.
In my own case, I’ve been out for a walk or done some form of cardio I enjoy every single day without fail since I started health snacking. This has been life changing. Instead of feelings of guilt and failure I now have feelings of success! And not only that, I have added in an extra bonus ‘heart’ snack by taking my 4 year old son with me on my walk so we get to enjoy our time out together. At first this seemed an impossible task as he is seriously not into walking but the appearance of a bicycle and Voila! his daily cycle has now become my daily walk.
Hooray! Another health snack!
Heart
With heart snacks Dr. Chatterjee reinforces the healing power of connections - to ourselves and to others. With social isolation growing steadily over the years due to technology and exacerbated by our current lockdown status we need to nurture our human connections more than ever. He encourages the practices of forgiveness and gratitude as ways to nourish our heart and reconnect daily to positive thoughts and feelings.
The most beneficial heart snack for me over the past few months has been to phone a friend. It has proven to be such a brilliant and consistently enjoyable way of dramatically boosting my mood whilst catching up on all the gossip! If you don’t do this one already then I highly recommend it.
The other has been to do something that I love for 5 mins a day. For me this has been catching up with a good book. Instead of saying to myself I need to read for an hour (which is really hard to do with a four year old around) I just take 5 mins to focus on my book and lo and behold I am now reading daily!
Wohoo! Snack attack!
Health Snack Takeaways
The key to progress is to do things a little and often while celebrating each step along the way. Break big goals down into manageable bite size pieces (snacks) so you don’t get overwhelmed and you don’t lose momentum.
