Motivation is a powerful FORCE! The motivation for staying healthy ebbs and flows naturally and that's ok! HEALTH just can't be our top priority every single day. EHFix programs are designed for REAL PEOPLE living REAL LIVES! My programs are all about creating an EASY TO FOLLOW HEALTHY LIFESTYLE.
Recognizing and naming some of your health GOALS is one way to find some initial MOTIVATION. Along the way, you should be developing MANY additional goals to keep you moving forward. My most successful clients are the ones with the MOST MOTIVATION to stay on track!
Keeping your motivation high all the time is difficult, even for me. It's ok to have some days and weeks when you just don't want to put in as much effort. In ACCELERATOR, we focus on simple basic meals on purpose. You don't have make gourmet meals daily to stay on track. Eggs and bacon are simple, perfect nutrition. A turkey sandwich on a low carb wrap works great too! LETTING SOMEONE ELSE DO THE WORK helps when you feel less motivated. You can order in or eat out and still stay on track with ease. Sharing responsibilities with your partner or beginning to teach your kids how to make simple healthy meals is another option. On days when you're REALLY not feelin' it-- consider a fasting day or just broth for the day. Allowing your body to CATCH UP with it's processing of nutrients is often the EXACT reboot you need to RENEW YOUR ENERGY AND MOTIVATION!
Self-motivation can be hard enough, but motivating loved ones to improve their health is even harder! This is a FRUSTRATION I hear about often! I GET IT! YOU FEEL GREAT and you want EVERYONE YOU LOVE to experience the same! We can all relate to this feeling of DESPERATION! We all have a friend or family member we wish we could MOTIVATE!
For those people who absolutely don't want to hear your message or are downright ANNOYED by it, I have one piece of advice: LET IT GO! They are not ready! Just continue to LIVE BY EXAMPLE and do your own thing (but also, don't hide what you do!). Save who you can and know, unfortunately, you can't save everyone....
Example: when my husband wasn't interested in learning about life without pizza and bagels (NOT EVEN A DAY or TWO!!), I switched from nagging him to ignoring him. Instead, I started doing this with supportive friends who WERE interested in getting healthy with me. As we got happier and healthier and leaner and more excited about everyday life, guess what? Suddenly hubby hopped on board😁! Keep moving forward people! Don't let someone else's baggage become your anchor!! Hubby was my number one target ALL ALONG! The health of loved ones can be an ENORMOUS motivator, but sometimes you have to take a YOU FIRST approach!
Building this SNARE TRAP of surrounding your loved ones with a bunch of motivated people is just ONE WAY to motivate! Let me give you some additional ideas for how to fuel some interest, PERK UP some ears, and get others around you to hear your message. Surprise! Different age groups tend to respond to different motivation:
Kids less than 11: This age group aims to please and loves to show off. Teach them to be the healthy LEADERS in the family. Have them participate in making the meals, cleaning, chopping or sorting the veggies, showing off their knowledge of macros to grandma, etc. Remind them over and over how a healthy diet supports ALL OF THEIR MANY TALENTS!
Kids 12-18: this group is only motivated by peers. They love to be seen eating CRAP and they are the TARGET of manufacturers peddling said CRAP! They also SECRETLY want to LOOK perfect! This is your biggest weapon parents! TEENS need to hear the message - YOU ARE WHAT YOU EAT! If you want to LOOK GORGEOUS, you need to eat a gorgeous, healthy diet! As a parent, make it clear that YOU can help them achieve their SECRET goals-- you have the MONEY to buy the HEALTHY DETOX FOOD and you have the KNOWLEDGE they need (armed by EHFix!) to look and feel great! BYE-BYE pizza face! Hello beach body! And parents, when that KNOW-IT-ALL teen won't listen to you, send them to ME!
Young adults 19-30: READ kids 12-18😂! Beach body motivation doesn't change much here! However, THIS IS THE MOST DAMAGING TIME OF LIFE in terms of health for most Americans! Young adults begin to SOLIDIFY their likes, dislikes, and habits during this time. AGAIN, they are targeted by adds that lie! Young adults drinking beer in commercials look happy and fulfilled and NEVER have beer bellies! So many problems at this age: no more HEALTHY FOOD OF HOME, lots of eating out, no more GROWING UPward, lack of movement (no more gym class), sedentary jobs, college cafeteria food, video games, weekend warrior attitudes.... ALL CONTRIBUTE to a terrible downward spiral in health! Also, many start consuming a lot of liquid calories in the form of ALCOHOL. This is the AGE GROUP I SEE THE LEAST IN MY PROGRAMS-- WHY? because everything is JUST FINE right?
Young parents 31-40: Everything is "just fine" until it's not! But in this age group, we tend NOT TO BLAME the diet, but THE CHILDREN! Again, an infrequently seen age group in EHFix- WHY? most are too busy raising the kids! BUT OH! so much to teach this group to stop the weight gain and development of disease! Not the least of which-- BREASTFEED IF YOU CAN, STOP CLEANING THEIR PLATES, STOP INSISTING YOUR KIDS EAT WHEN THEY ARE NOT HUNGRY, STOP GIVING IN TO FOOD DEMANDS. Boy do I wish I knew this stuff when I was trying to get the BABY WEIGHT OFF! THAT ALONE would have been motivation enough for me! But I definitely could have used some extra energy at that time as well!
Age 41-65: the "I think I'm getting old" age group!! NEWFLASH! If you feel old in this age bracket you are EATING WRONG! YOU ARE NOT OLD! The vast majority of my clients are in this age bracket. WHY? We have just begun to feel the long term effects of a poor diet-- weight gain, worsening fatigue, chronic pain, indigestion... and we are beginning to receive DIAGNOSES-- high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, heart disease, cancer, kidney disease... The quick reversal of ALL OF THESE THINGS making us FEEL MUCH OLDER than we are is the CHIEF MOTIVATOR in this age group.
Age 65-105: SIMPLE WISDOM is the chief motivator here! This age group KNOWS it's never to late to improve your physical and mental health! They are well aware of the USE IT OR LOSE IT concept. Seeing the suffering of friends and family members who have not taken steps to protect their health is a big motivator. We should all strive to live well into old age! Is going low carb and including some fasting difficult for this age group?? NOPE! I'm basically reminding them to eat like when they were kids! To them, this is like a trip down memory lane. And they ABSOLUTELY love learning it definitely WAS the OLDER GENERATIONS who knew what they were doing after all!
Still need more MOTIVATION! Here's a very eloquent young guy talking about HIS MAIN MOTIVATION for learning how to eat and live healthy! Many of us share this SAME motivation! You may recognize many of the dietary and lifestyle habits he mentions for prevention of dementia are EHFIX CORE PRINCIPLES! Keep at it friends!! YOU ARE WORTH EVERY EFFORT!