Lifestyle Changes for Improved Well-Being
Exploring daily practices that will support us in making desired changes in order to live more nourished, balanced, and satisfied lives is what we do at Green Mountain at Fox Run.
We offer opportunities to explore how practicing small changes on a consistent basis can really have a considerable impact on sustaining our hard-won behavior changes.
Based on over 40 years of experience helping women make small, impactful changes in their lives, here are 10 tips to help you on your journey of making healthy, positive changes each day.
1. Have healthy snacks ready.
Set up vegetables, cheese, nuts, and fruit as possible snacks to have on hand as easy options between meals.
If helpful, set up snacks in sandwich or quart-size closable bags to build in a stopping point where you can be reminded to check if you’re satisfied. If you aren’t, you can always take another bag.
2. Plan to get out.
Get of your room or your home and go to the library, the gym, the park, a gallery opening or some other event from time to time in the evenings.
When you return, get a shower, brush your teeth and head to bed. Write in your gratitude journal and turn the lights out.
You may find that this routine gets you out of the evening patterns at home that may have become habitual (and often involve mindless snacking and overeating).
3. Practice Mindful Eating.
When you’re eating, be mindful about what you’re eating.
Avoid multi-tasking. Just enjoy the food you are consuming and be aware of when you have reached satiety.
If you’re eating for emotional reasons, assess why you may feel the need to eat, and begin to identify the emotions or thoughts associated with the urge to eat.
4. Surf the urge, and see if you can ride it out.
Sometimes if we just give ourselves some deep breaths, a short walk, a warm bubble bath, or even a phone call to a friend, we no longer have the urge to eat (or partake in other unhealthy coping habits).
We may not need to eat as much as we need to connect with others.
5. Reflect on your actions and challenges.
Celebrate when small changes are occurring and you’re making progress toward healthier habits. Celebrate the process of change.
6. Remember self-kindness and self-compassion every day.
Develop a dialogue of self-compassion, self-motivation, and self-kindness.
Don’t beat yourself up. Don’t feed and care for the negative dialogue that may be chattering in your inner mind. Let it come, let it go, and choose to focus on your positive strengths, your goodness, and the opportunities for growth that are before you.
Allow for suffering if that is what you’re feeling, but do so with self-compassion and gentleness.
Then, at some point in your suffering, encourage yourself to find that positive voice of self-encouragement. Get up and get back to the processes of change that are supporting you in living a healthier lifestyle.
7. Expand your measures of success beyond the scale.
For instance, how are you healthier and more mindful today as compared to your recent past?
Remember, you are making progress and having successes in the process of change. Don’t forget that.
And celebrate the successes along the way, however small. Something is better than nothing when we’re moving the needle toward greater health and well-being.
8. Work on developing a growth mindset and reducing your stress through cognitive reappraisal.
What is the positive in the situation you are facing? How might you feel grateful for the challenges that are before you?
Lean into the strengths and great skills you already have with regard to being successful in your life.
You’ll be able to handle the challenges. Maybe not all of them right now, or even today, but a good night of rest will set you up for greater success tomorrow.
9. Focus on the process goals and not the outcome goals.
Have you given your best to the situations you’ve faced today?
If not, be kind to yourself. Give yourself a pep talk on how to re-engage in practices that will help you do better tomorrow.
If yes, then that is all you can do. What the outcome will be is not within your control. Show up, do your best, listen to your body, keep a positive frame of mind, be grateful, and don’t worry about the outcomes.
Just live well in the processes that will bring you greater health and well-being. The outcomes will take care of themselves.
You did your best, embrace that, and be satisfied.
You are more than enough. And you are kind, gentle, and self-compassionate. You are in the process of change, and what a challenging, yet wonderful, journey to be on.
10. Make connection and practice gratitude every day.
Connect with supportive friends and people as part of your daily living practice. You need connection in order to take good care of yourself.
Heighten your experience of connection through a daily practice of gratitude.
You can contribute to increasing your psychological and physical well-being and your sense of connection to caring others through your daily gratitude practice, whether it is gratitude journaling, or simply mindful being grateful throughout your day.
With these 10 daily strategies, I hope each day you will begin to see the positive impact that small changes can make to your overall health and well-being.
Remember: no matter how small, change is change and don’t miss opportunities to celebrate it. Celebrating change keeps you mindful of how you’re becoming healthier, one small change at a time.