I don’t know about you, but I feel incredibly motivated right now. I feel motivated for the both of us and I want 2016 to be a great year for you and I. I want us to actually achieve our health and fitness goals this year and so I’m sharing my top ten tips on how to keep your New Year’s Resolutions to get in shape.
1. Be realistic
Firstly, make sure it’s a goal you really, genuinely want. Sometimes we can be swayed by others when setting New Year’s Resolutions and think that we should copy one of their goals. Set goals that you want to achieve more than anything, not goals that you think you should have. Secondly, make sure they are SMART goals. Read my post Life Goals: How to Set SMART Goals to guide you through setting SMART goals.
2. Plan ahead
When setting out to lose weight, it’s important to plan ahead. Plan your meals and plan your workouts so that you are not caught short and have to eat convenient junk food or miss a workout. Schedule your workouts like important meetings in your diary that you can’t miss. Plan and prep your meals so that you have healthy meals available. My post on How To Meal Plan for Beginners + Free Meal Planner will help you to get started.
3. Make yourself accountable
Put your goals out there. Tell a friend that you’re working on losing weight, share your workouts and healthy meals on Instagram and Twitter, start a blog like I have. By making your goals public, you’ll make yourself accountable and it will be difficult not to keep your New Year’s Resolutions.
4. Commit to 3 weeks
When starting out in January our motivation is on a high, but that can soon be replaced with intimidation. A whole year sounds daunting but 3 weeks sounds much more achievable and easier to stick to. Experts say it takes 21 days to form a habit so promise yourself you’ll commit to 3 weeks, give your all for 3 weeks and once you’ve got into the swing of things, increase the time. You can do this.
5. Track your progress
Weightloss isn’t always noticeable until you compare before and after pictures or your measurements. It’s so easy to obsess over the numbers on a scale and it can ruin our whole day if there isn’t a change. Instead I prefer to go by body fat percentage, measurements, how my clothes fit, pictures and my fitness level. It’s great to do a fit test or pick a fitness goal to measure your progress with. How many push ups can you do? How fast can you run a 5k? What weight can you squat? Pick your goals and measure your starting point now, so that you can look back and see how far you’ve come.
6. Get back on track
Don’t let the occasional slip up derail you. It’s OK to not be perfect, it is absolutely normal to not be perfect. So what, you missed a workout, are you going to cancel your gym membership now? So what you ate an unhealthy meal, are you going to stop healthy eating now? Weight loss is never a smooth ride, we have ups and downs, we make good choices and bad choices. What matters is that we keep pushing forward and keep trying. Get back on track and stay committed, you can do this!
These are the tips I’ll be following this year. I’ve already made my meal plan, prepped my food for the week, taken my measurements and before pictures, promised myself I’ll commit to 3 weeks and I’ll keeping myself accountable by sharing my progress with you guys.
I love the three week theory, I am absolutely giving it a go, hopefully it’ll stick!
Great post!
Allie | Rush & Teal
Author
Good luck Allie! You can do it :) xx
Love what you said about setting realistic goals! I set a goal to lose 20lbs by July 1. Eventually, I would like to lose a little more, but I know that I have to be able to sustain the weight loss, which is always the greatest challenge. I’m planning to reward myself along the way to keep myself motivated. Happy New Year, and thanks for the encouraging post!
Author
That’s a great goal Lex. Make your goal even smaller by just focusing on losing 2-3 a month and write down what your rewards will be when you achieve each monthly goal. Set yourself other goals each month to help your weight loss and keep you motivated, like ‘this month I’m going to try HIIT workouts’ or ‘this month I’m going to make 3 new healthy recipes’. Good luck Lex! xx
Brilliant post. Your right, if you get the mind right the body you want will follow soon after. I love the part about making yourself accountable. It is so easy to make excuses even though there are almost always ways to work around them :)
Author
Thank you Gerald!