Start Off 2016 With Five Easy Promises to Yourself

In a few weeks, people will begin making their resolutions for 2016.�A year ends, a year begins and we examine our lives and we ask ourselves what we can do better.�Then we set ourselves lofty and difficult to attain goals, only to fall off the Resolution Wagon in only a matter of weeks.�What if we didn't, though?� What if we set ourselves goals that weren't so impossible that, every day, we felt stress to stay on target?�Lowering the bar to a more human standard, rather than attempting Herculean feats, may just be the answer to the droning hamster wheel that is the tradition of New Year's Resolutions.

Resolution Number 1: EAT YOUR HEART OUT.�
If your New Year's Resolution is to lose weight, do it smart. Eat food.�Don't starve.�Don't set yourself up to fail by deciding to cut out all sugar, remove all dairy, eat no wheat or cut out carbs.�It's too big a task to start with on January first.�

Instead, try this: change one thing in your dietary intake per month; do it for a year.�In January, decide to remove the sugary drinks from your pantry.�In February, switch all the potatoes in your diet for sweet In March, agree to eat no fast food. In April, remove the processed foods from your food plan. You can take this plan throughout the entire year and, twelve months later, you will find you are eating healthier than you ever have before.�

Resolution Number 2: GIVE IT A REST.�
None of us get enough sleep There aren't enough hours in the day to do all that we need to do.�Have you heard the expression 'running on empty'?�How about "running on fumes'?�That's us. The thing is: most of us treat our cars better than we treat ourselves.�

Own that you must do something for yourself; be a little self-centric and tell yourself and the world that you are unavailable.�Go to bed earlier.�Sleep in.�Take a nap. Every single bit of good health begins with sleep.�The body is capable of anything, with enough rest.

Resolution Number 3: WALK IT OUT.�
It may be difficult to find time in the day to get to the gym for an hour of cardio and an hour of weight training.�You might have lost that opportunity to use your body and keep the conditioning going but you don't have to lose the chance altogether.�Use your body, during the day, every time you can.�Take the stairs instead of the elevator.� Walk to the corner store instead of driving. You've been sitting at the computer all day, you need the activity. If you actually use your body to do everyday tasks, those missed workouts won't hurt so much.

Resolution Number 4: TURN IT OFF.�
There is a growing trend in this country to being unplugged.�We don't notice how little activity our bodies are getting because all we do is sit or stand, looking at our phones, tablets, laptops, PCs and whatever other devices.�Unplugging is about more than not being rude to the people around us: it's about being good to yourself. The stress put on our heart and brain from all the information being fed into us is detrimental.�The stress being put on our eyes is epic.�It is a fact of life that we must look at these screens of varying sizes and take in this information of varying import more hours of the day than not.�So why not limit the amount of stress by simply knowing when to take some time off?�It will give your eyes, your brain and your stress filled heart a rest, however brief.�Hey, it might even strengthen your relationships a little more, too.

Resolution Number 5: CHOOSE YOURSELF.�
Don't make a resolution for the wrong reason. Make your resolutions to make your life better. Make your resolutions in a way that will be easy for you to succeed.�Change one small thing at a time: one food change a month, one extra hour of sleep a night, one walk upstairs or around the block a day, one meal without a phone a day -- all these small changes will add up to a changed feeling and attitude after awhile; and when you start to feel those changes, it will be easier to take the change to the next level. Know with each change, that you did this for yourself.�The changes we make to better our lives are us telling ourselves that we are worthy of living happier, healthier lives and longer lives, too.�Choose yourself, every day in the New Year.� Then check in with me in twelve months and let me know how your feel.