[clickToTweet tweet=”80% of New Year’s resolutions fail by February and only 8% of people who set resolutions, actually achieve them!” quote=”Did you know that 80% of New Year’s resolutions fail by February and only 8% of people who set resolutions each year, actually achieve them? Did you also know that 45% of Americans surveyed last year, said they would like to ‘lose weight or get in shape’ in 2018?!”]

It seems with statistics like that, the odds are stacked against you! So what can you do to increase your chances of success?

Instead of making New Year’s resolutions, create new habits and set goals which take into account “the bigger picture”.

Do you want to lose weight?

Instead of, “Never eat chocolate again” try “adding more protein to each meal.”  Instead of “lose weight”, try “eating until 80% full”

• By eating more protein, you will likely feel fuller, longer, which helps to diminish those pesky cravings that seem to sneak up on all of us now and then.
• Eating until you’re 80% full, means that you aren’t depriving yourself of foods you enjoy, you’re just making a conscious effort to pay attention to how full you are.

Since weight loss occurs when we are in a calorie deficit, eating until you’re “80% full” will not only help you lose weight, you’ll do so without even feeling like you’re trying!

It is easier to follow through on difficult or “big picture” goals when you start creating habits. Habits take time to develop, but they also require that we pay attention in order to make them lasting! Focusing on a single habit each day (instead of trying to change twenty things all at once), is another way you can accomplish your goals.

If you want to know how likely you are to accomplish your goals for 2018? Click on the link to my fun quiz and find out for yourself!

 Habit principles

• Habits are a sequence of feelings, thoughts, and behaviors that are automatic.
• Habits are usually supported by the social and/or physical environment.
• Habits are often much stronger than conscious thought or “willpower”.
• Habits are designed to make cognition more efficient. They’re meant to be shortcuts.
• Habits often want to make us feel more safe and secure and to avoid discomfort and distress.
• Habits can be both “bad” and “good”.

Simple habits are single actions that you can change readily because they only require one or two actions to accomplish. Some simple habits might be: Walking 20 minutes each day, Planning ahead for meals, packing a lunch, cooking at home. Our brains operate best on “shortcuts” of repetitive actions and outcomes! Tasks that you don’t do daily take longer to become “habits”, not because they’re difficult, but because our brains have a catalog of “pre-recorded responses”, if you will, to each and every experience we’ve ever, well, experienced!  Sometimes those responses are useful and beneficial and other times they’re not and sometimes our responses are so ingrained in our behavior, we don’t know where to begin to change them! (This is where hiring a Health & Wellness Coach can be helpful). 😉

Starting healthy habits and working on them each day, will help set you on a path to success.

• Decrease or cut out sugar?
• Exercise daily?
• Cut out alcohol?
• Manage your portion sizes?
• Cook more meals?
• Make better choices?

Once you get the hang of things, there won’t be anything you can’t accomplish!

Here are a few tips for kicking off the New Year in the right direction, along with some healthy habits you can implement to help you lose weight!

Eat-in More Often

This year, make eating at home 80% of the time a focus. As busy as we are trying to juggle career-demands. kids, after-school sports and family time, it’s easy to fall into the routine of relying on take-out or eating out. In fact, dining out can become more of a habit than eating in. If weight loss is your goal this year, make a commitment to make more of your meals. Don’t try to overhaul your current routine all at once, but instead, focus on change one meal at a time. If you’re constantly grabbing an egg-Mc-something and a cup of coffee to go, plan ahead and make your breakfast at home. Some ideas for breakfast can be something as simple as Greek Yogurt and berries, or bake-and-take frittatas.

If dinner time is where you struggle, trying new recipes with your family or loved ones is a great way to connect. Create memories that your children and spouses will have for a lifetime while you all develop healthy habits together. Family dinners encourage communication and keep families more connected. Not sure how to get started? Sign up for my 10-day Guide and learn how to make healthy meals a part of your family’s routine.

Establish A Morning Routine

A healthy morning routine will help set the tone for a positive day.

Start the new year by beginning each day with positivity, self-love, and focus.

Begin each day by giving yourself a few moments of self-care. Get up a few minutes before the rest of the house does so you can have a few minutes to get your mind in the right place. Focusing exercises performed first thing in the morning, Bible studies or devotionals, or even just a few quiet moments of self-reflection or observation can help start your day on the right foot.

If you’re not a morning person, you could ease into the morning with a quiet walk, prayer, meditation, a rejuvenating bath, or listening to music.

If you’re more energetic or ready to greet the day with enthusiasm, start your day with a mini-morning workout, power walk or jog. Jumpstart your morning by increasing blood flow with a quick routine that perks you up and gets your muscles in the game too.

 Be On Time

Being routinely punctual can also positively affect other areas of your life! Getting places on time is a tough task for many of us! We either try to do too much, too late, or we don’t plan far enough ahead! Being chronically late is a tough habit to break. We get so busy in our lives that it is easy to let just a few minutes accumulate. Being punctual requires two things: “mindfulness” (or awareness of multiple things happening at the same time) and “intention” (making purposeful choices in order to manage your time). Both can help boost your skills, when it comes to developing healthier eating habits (how often do you eat “mindlessly” or eat whatever comes your way)?

How do you fight back against the habits that make you late?

Remember that it is selfish to be late. It says that you don’t value another person’s time or that your goals are not your first priority.

You aren’t like that! Forming habits that help you to consistently be on time will not only increase your productivity, it’ll make you feel like a rock star!

First, make it a priority to set a time to be out the door for whatever it is you need to do.

If necessary, put away your phone.

Figure out how long it takes to get to where you need to be and add a ten to fifteen-minute buffer, set a timer and make it a hard deadline for getting out the door.

When the timer goes off, it’s time to go–even if your eye makeup isn’t done or your jacket isn’t done the drying. No exceptions.

The alarm goes off and it is time to load up…now.

GET RID OF CLUTTER

You might not think that clutter has much to do with weight loss, but getting rid of “clutter” actually helps free up space in your mind to focus on other aspects of your life.

The New Year is the perfect time to declutter. If you find your mind is in a fog at times, you might need to consider your physical surroundings. Clutter can weasel its way into a mindset and keep us from the clarity we need to see what we want or need. Messes give us excuses to be distracted. Start this new year by removing the clutter and clearing your mind. Get rid of old clothes, the junk drawer, and clean out the garage. The less you have around you in boxes or on shelves, the less your brain has to make the effort to care for those things or protect them. If you haven’t used it in a year, if it is old and tattered, if you are not positive you want to keep it…get rid of it.

Everything you own should have a specific home and it is up to you to make sure it gets there every time it is used. Imagine your dining room table acting as a place of gathering rather than a place to gather belongings, or your kitchen counters acting as a place for food and meal prep only, instead of a repository for bills and mail. When everything you own has it’s very own place, your mind will be more capable of focusing on the more difficult tasks at hand without worry or distraction.

This year is going to be fantastic! Let’s kick it off with a mindset of abundance and clarity. With a little effort, you are going to form healthy habits that last the whole year rather than resolutions that only last weeks.

Comment below and tell me what habits are you going to form this year?