It’s a little later than planned, but this last blog in the series looks at how we might go about educating people on ‘how’ to achieve wellness.
A coping strategy would ideally be a personalised one, and there is one simple rule to follow.
To do the ‘what’ we have to first make time. The ‘how’ is simply to make diary space. Whether this is to create the opportunity for a healthy meal, go on a walk or meet your trainer, we have to manage our time.
Simple right? Well, not so much. We cram our lives with commitments, both social and work related and there is always tomorrow, ‘I’ll start tomorrow’ or better still ‘I’ll start on Monday’. By the way ALL healthy eating regimes and exercise programmes begin on a Monday, never a Wednesday or Saturday, always a Monday!
The real challenge is people actually believe that they do not have time. We all have busy lives and typically, our time is consumed with behaviours that are detrimental to our wellness, since most are most are sedentary in nature.
So, if we do not have time and we may not genuinely have the ability to create time, we must remove our sedentary behaviours and replace them with active ones. This is ‘how’ we facilitate our ‘what’. It’s the same when it comes to nutrition, we need to create time to purchase and consume healthier food options.
To be successful though we must start small, find out how we can do something and do it consistently, day after day, week after week, month after month until both the how and the what (the action) are ingrained behaviours.
We all know ‘what’ it is we need to do, however, it is when we understand the ‘why’ and facilitate the ‘how’ we can and will want to maintain these behaviours.