Is Healthy Living for Lent or for Life?

Almost one week into the period of lent and how are you doing?

Today is day 7 of the 40 days during which many people aim to give up something, typically something they like and enjoy.

Last year I wrote a blog about how to make giving something up easier:

4 Top tips for making lifestyle changes

Something else to think about is whether or not the things you try to give up or alter in your food routine are for lent of forever.

The reason people choose to give something up for lent is that they feel their consumption of the item in question, whether it be coffee, chocolate, cake or alcohol, is out of balance with where they'd like it to be, and they want to prove they can live without this thing in their life so they set out to avoid it completely for 40 days.

But while it might be useful to set a challenge like this and complete it, do the changes we make for 40 days have any lasting impact?  Sometimes they do, but more often than not we return to the patterns of eating we were familiar with before lent began.

Would it not be better to moderate consumption of your chosen 'vices' in the long-term and avoid 40 days of feeling deprived and 325 days of feeling guilty because you've overindulged?

Here's a 3-step plan for ensuring balance and enjoyment of your food routine in the short, medium and long-term:

1) If you feel something is out of balance in your routine, keep notes on how much you're eating and drinking, and how often
2) Decide what would be a more desirable balance in relation to your health, energy and lifestyle priorities
3) Be specific about the timing and quantity of this revised balance.  Understand what items you'll be eating, when you'll be eating them and how much of each item you'll be consuming.

Choosing in advance what you'd like the balance of your food routine to look like is much easier than trying to second guess yourself in the middle of a busy day.  If you have a clear plan, you'll be surprised at how easy it is to follow.  Every decision on food and drink that you currently make can be put in the context of your chosen plan which will save you time and energy.

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4 Top tips for making lifestyle changes

The period of Lent begins tomorrow and, whether you're religious or not, it's a time when many people choose to give up something for the duration - 6 weeks.  Someone sent me a note today that prompted me to write this blog:

'I'm not religious at all but as of tomorrow I'm giving up:

Chocolate
Caffeine
Bread
And...
Cake

Hope I can do it.'

My first thought was I wonder which will be the biggest challenge.  Turned out it's going to be cake.

For some people, the idea of giving up all of the above would be daunting.  Others seem to take on such challenges with ease.  We know because we've worked with many of them.  So I thought it worth sharing some thoughts on what makes people successful with removing certain behaviours from their life, whatever time of year they decide to do so.

1. It helps to have an alternative or substitute for each of the items that you're trying to remove from your routine.  Feeling as though you're missing out is a sure-fire way to send you running straight for whatever it is you're trying to avoid.  For the example above, this person could snack on nuts instead of chocolate, drink herbal tea instead of coffee and they'll need to plan carefully what their lunch options are if they're trying to avoid bread.  Salads will go so far but they'll also need some rice, pasta and potato options.

2. Be very clear about why you are making your chosen changes.  Remind yourself regularly throughout the day of the good reasons for sticking with your choices.  This is crucial.  Without this context to change your behaviour, you'll quickly fall back into old routines.

3) Acknowledge your progress regularly and very quickly your chosen new behaviours will become as well practiced and easy to follow as the habits you're replacing.  Tick off each day you complete as you intended according to your new plan and after just a few days you'll never look back.

And one last thing.  Those that succeed with lifestyle changes usually adopt the inner thoughts of, 'this is easy, I can do this, I want to make this work' rather than the thoughts which can limit success of others such as, 'this is so hard, I wish I hadn't started this, I'd kill for a coffee / chocolate bar / drink right now.'

Think seriously about what you want to change and when the time is right, commit to it and never doubt your ability to succeed.

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