Staying Motivated: Keeping those Healthy New Year's Resolutions.

Amanda Shaffer — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 18:22:12 -0600

2008 is already almost three weeks old, and the holiday season is fading fast into our collective memories. As the ordinary day-to-day routine reclaims our lives after weeks of traveling, shopping, and eating, sticking to those fitness resolutions that you made a little over two weeks ago might be getting a little bit tougher. As the novelty of new work outs and diets begin to wane, I surfed some fitness-centric blogs written by women who are not only successfully sticking to their plans, but were also gracious enough to share tips with the rest of us slackers:

1. Never skip more than 1 day.
2. Find a fun exercise.
3. Go with your body’s schedule.

The Happy Life offers these tips, and more, in her most recent entry about sticking to her fitness plan after working out for more than a month. In addition, she's taken on the enormous goal of meeting 101 life-changing goals, one per week until 2010. Visit her blog for more inspiration and helpful hints.

Blogger and author Dr. Sherri Colburn has been updating a regular series on staying motivated to continue healthy lifestyle choices. One of my personal favorite tips is below:

Keep track of your progress, and reward yourself.
If you have already started an exercise program and are having trouble keeping it up (especially if you’ve previously been one of those 50 percent of people who drop out within the first six months), there are a few things that you can do to keep yourself motivated. Set realistic exercise goals or milestones to keep track of your hard work, and set up rewards for yourself when you meet them. Who says that stickers and treats are just for kids? If it works for you, use a sticker chart or some other visible record of physical activities that you accomplish each day and then give yourself frequent reinforcement with “tokens” or “treats” (preferably noncaloric ones) when you meet your goals. Maybe you can promise yourself an outing to somewhere special, the purchase of a coveted item, or anything else that is reasonable and effectively motivates you to exercise. Helpful recommendations for physical activities, activity logs, and other motivational tools are also widely available.

Last but not least, Running for the Prize offers her own take on self-accountability in the diet and exercise departments:

...Where I used to be able to do not even one real push up, I can now do sets of 15. I used to only use 8-10lb dumbbell for chest presses. Now I’m up to 25lbs. Etc, etc…It’s exciting to see improvement like that in a short amount of time (started at the gym in late October 2007).

And take my word for it, once you start getting into a regular workout routine that really pushes you, you think twice before eating unhealthy food. You certainly won’t want to undo what you just did at the gym. It’s a great kind of self-accountability.

For more great motivation on keeping your healthy resolutions, check out the following BlogHer articles:

Good Health-A-Thon, Week 1 and Week 2

Stop Eating So Much and Get Moving

Healthy Living and the Great American Health Challenge

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Staying Motivated: Keeping those Healthy New Year's Resolutions.