Latest / Chub Chat With Mary / Stop Setting Impossible Health Goals. Try This Instead!
Transcript
- mary: Episode two. Stop setting impossible health goals. Try this instead. I'm Mary and I'm so glad you're here. Have you ever decided you were going to completely change your life on Monday? Of course we have. New diet. Five workouts a week. Drink a gallon of water. Go to bed early. Everything. By Wednesday, you're eating cookies in your pajamas, wondering what happened. Yeah, me too. I did it too. So today we're going to talk about why we set impossible health goals and what to do about it instead. Have you ever set a health goal so big that just thinking about it made you tired? Yeah. Me too. If your goal requires a color coded spreadsheet, three apps. And a personality transplant. Maybe we're making this a little too complicated. Guess I did get carried away just now, but you know what I mean. We're not trying to win the healthy living Olympics. We just need to make choices we can actually repeat next week. Challenge last week was I want you to ask yourself one question before you make a food or health decision. And Then you're supposed to say, is this helping me take care of my my body? Or am I punishing myself? When I exercised, I really felt like I was taking care of my body. And then, you know, after I exercised, I wanted to buy a treat. And I said, Why? It's not healthy. And I did not buy it, but I came really close. What a difference my decision making was for eating healthier. Glad I really am going through this. In the past we We spent so much time on all these different diets. And the focus was always on what we can't have. Now that we are making healthy choices, we focus on what we can have. Simple as that. Change your mindset. And yes, this makes a huge difference. Goals we make should be realistic enough to live with, not just survive for two weeks. Come on. It's doable. It's not that I haven't cared. All these years, I've just struggled with the wrong diet mindset. Big goals are absolutely achievable, especially when we break them down into small steps and stay consistent. You have to stay consistent. Earlier in my dieting career, I made the mistake of setting unrealistic goal goals. For example, I would tell myself I had to lose three or four pounds. Every week. Every week. That was basically setting myself up for failure. And that's how I felt, 'cause I didn't achieve it. I might do everything right for the first couple of weeks, but if the scale didn't show the number I expected, I would get frustrated, quit and eventually gain back what I lost. That's when I realized something. Maybe the problem wasn't that I couldn't reach my goal. Maybe I was setting the wrong kind of goals. Instead of focusing on how quickly I could lose weight, I started focusing on small, healthy actions. I could actually stick. That makes sense. That's where the SMART framework can help. Let's look at how we can use SMART goals to create healthy habits without falling into that all or nothing diet mentality. So the SMART framework for setting goals specific for the S. Focus on adding healthy goals instead of cutting things out. I will add more vegetables to my day, and this goal is doable, measurable. Track the consistency of the positive action, not a number on the scale. I'm adding vegetables to my dinner three times a week. Achievable. Avoid the all or nothing diet mentality by starting incredibly small. Build confidence. Eating one vegetable at dinner three times a week are relevant. My body feels healthier eating vegetables, and it's only three days a week. That's why it's doable. And T, time bound. I will try this for two weeks to check in on how my energy levels feel. Instead of asking, What do I need to cut out? I started asking, What can I add to support my body? And I like to make break my goals into two month chunks. Why? Because two months gives me enough time to build habits, see what's working, and make adjustments. without feeling like I failed. Because I don't have to be perfect every single day. Here's what my goals look like. One, lose one to two pounds a week. I look at this as a general goal, not a pass or fail test. Scale is just one measurement of progress. Two, I want to get at least 150 minutes of exercise each week. Which is doable for me. I want to do strength training three times a week. I've been doing that and Pay attention to my macros each day. Protein, carbohydrates, and healthy fats. It's really kinda tough to get the protein in, but I log my food in my fitness palette so I can see what I'm actually eating. Like I said before, I like my fitness palette. And then at the end of every two months, I check in with myself. What's working? What is it? What have I learned? Then I tweak my goals for the next two months. I don't start over, I adjust and keep going. That's the difference between setting a goal and creating a lifestyle. Not trying to be perfect for two weeks, building habits I can keep doing month after month. That is a great goal for me. And my three main long term goals are pretty simple. Eat healthy, stop emotional eating, and get toned. Those are goals I want to work toward long term. But here's the thing about long term goals. They can feel really big. Maybe you do great for a week, maybe even two, but when the goal feels too big. It can start to feel impossible. But achievable goals are different. They're goals you can still do on a busy week, a stressful week, or even a tired week. For example, instead of saying I'm going to lose 30 pounds, maybe the goal is I'm going to walk for 10 minutes three times this week. And instead of saying, I'm never eating fast food again, maybe it's going to cook dinner at home three nights this week. See, that's It's a really good goal. Those goals may sound small, but small goals build consistency. That's what we're after. Consistency. And consistency matters more than doing something perfectly for a short period of time. Don't you agree? I think that's where so many diets go wrong. If you focus on fast results instead of helping us create goals we can actually live with. We're not trying to change everything overnight. Building a healthier life, one goal at a time. But if small, achievable goals work so much better, why do we keep setting these huge, impossible goals? Well, I honestly I think most of us have done this. We wake up on a Monday and think, This time I'm going all in. How many times have you said that before? Suddenly we have this huge list of everything. We're gonna change like no sugar, no eating out, exercise every day, drink a gallon of water, lose four pounds this week. Come on. How unrealistic are these goals? And then by Wednesday we're exhausted. By Friday we're discouraged. Then we tell ourselves we failed. The problem wasn't us. The problem was trying to change our entire life overnight. Come on. By Wednesday we're exhausted. By Friday we're discouraged. Then we tell ourselves we failed. Gotta quit doing that. Problem wasn't us. Problem was trying to change our entire life overnight. Healthy goals don't usually fail because they're too small. They fail because they're too big. When you expect perfection, one bad meal feels like the end. When your goal is consistency, one bad meal is just one meal. That's a huge difference. Something I had had to learn was that the scale isn't the only way to measure progress. Have you ever had a week where you felt better, you had more energy, you slept better, your blood sugars improved, your clothes fit better, but the scale barely moved. That's still progress. Sometimes your body is changing before the scale shows it. Here are other victories to celebrate. Drinking enough water, walking more. You'll get some exercise in. Having more energy because you're drinking the water and you're walking. Sleeping better. Cooking more meals at home. That's when I really have to concentrate on. Eating more fruits and vegetables. Feeling stronger because you're doing all these things. Saying no to giving up. Those are wins too. Here's something I wish someone had told me years ago. Miss Cynical doesn't mean you failed. It means you're human, right? If you plan to work out three times this week and only made it once, that's one workout you didn't have before. So come it that way. Celebrate that. Then ask yourself, what got in the way? Maybe work got busy. Maybe you were sick. Maybe you were exhausted. That's information, that's not failure. Healthy people don't have perfect weeks. They just keep starting again. How many times have we all said I'll start Monday? Next Monday. Next month. After vacation, after the holidays. There will always be another Monday. Best time to start is right now. Today, even if today's goal is simply drinking one extra glass of water instead of asking, What do I want to lose? Try asking, What kind of healthy person do I want to become? Someone who drinks water, moves their body, plans meals, and gets enough sleep. Yes. When you become that, Person, person who makes healthier choices, consistently, the results eventually follow. And I know this because I've made plenty of mistakes along the way, but I'm still here. Here are three of the biggest mistakes I've made. Sure you can relate to it. Trying to lose weight too fast, giving up after one bad day, and thinking I had to be perfect. Looking back, every one of those mistakes taught me something. I learned that I don't need to be perfect. I need to be consistent. Be consistent. Don't you agree? Now my goal isn't perfection. My goal is to become healthier than I was yesterday. That's a great and if you're listening today and you've started over more times than you can count, you're not alone. Stop trying to become a completely new person overnight. It's not gonna happen. Build a healthier version of the person you already are. And every healthy choice you make matters. Every every glass of water, every walk, every fruit and vegetable, every workout. You feel so good after a workout. Every meal you plan, one healthy choice at a time. And this week's challenge is complete one simple nourishing habit each day. That isn't about doing everything perfectly. It's about showing up for yourself one small step at a time. Each day focuses on a single healthy habit water, protein. Movement, color, sleep, nightfall. And a moment to celebrate how far you've come. Work through the days in order, or in whatever order fits your schedule. There's no wrong way to begin. And at the end of the week, you'll reflect on what's stuck, what was hard, and what you want to carry into the week ahead. And definitely don't ask, did I lose weight? Don't ask that. Ask, did I keep my promise to myself? How do I feel? What did I learn? What's my next small step? And that's your Chuck Jat challenge for this week. Now I want to hear from you. What did you think about today's episode? Did anything we talked about hit home for you? Share this episode with a friend who might need to hear it too. And if there's a health topic you want me to chat about, let me know. I'm always looking for ideas for future episodes. And remember, you don't have to do this alone. If you need an accountability partner, reach out and let me know. Leave a comment on my website, chubchatwm.riverside.com, or email me at chubchat.26 at gmail.com. Please have a healthy week. See you next time on Chub Chat for episode three. Habit a stacking explained. Habits that stick.