Define Your Values to Form Long-Term Healthy Habits
From learning how to cook homemade meals to eating a daily kale and salmon smoothie, any new healthy habits take a fair amount of energy and time. But if they are not related to what you believe in, you will not be able to develop important habits that are simple and straightforward.
Your values, your priorities are what, deep down in your soul, you sincerely consider important to your life. These values are of course not limited to your health – they can include family, career, money, fame, skill development, or all of the above. What you value can, in fact, predict whether you will actually do your best; or feeling stressed, anxious, or simply selfless while trying to form healthy habits. And that’s, frankly, the difference between being successful at forming good, healthy habits; or fall on your face while trying.
This concept comes from Brian Cran, a personal fitness trainer who says:
If someone simply does not see the value in improving their health or losing weight – say, the doctor “told” him to lose weight – he will fight not only with big changes, but also with little things.
They say that habits require smaller, manageable steps, but if you don’t value what you have to do , even the little things will suck. Instead of asking yourself, “What’s the best …?” and when trying to do what you think you “should” do, start asking, “What is really important to me?” and find out if your priorities, behavior and how you spend your time align with your values.
Why Healthy Habits Don’t Work | Brian Crane