The majority of us know we should put that phone down and pay more attention to the people around us, but often we don’t.
Why is that?
Again, most of us know that leading a long and healthy life involves regular exercise and attention to the food we eat and we know, that in most cases, weight loss is eating less and exercising more. So why don’t we do it?
As a younger athlete and personal trainer I started out as a student of exercise science and sports performance. The bulk of my early years were spent looking for the answer to weight loss and physique change in the physiology of exercise and nutrition. I studied and searched for the perfect number of reps and sets and the exact combination of carbs, protein and fats, that would get both myself and my clients the results they were looking for.
With time, experience, and plenty of frustration I realized that there are a couple of key pieces of the puzzle missing – the skills of behaviour change and understanding that no two people are exactly the same. It’s our habits and our lifestyle – those external influences in our environment - that make the difference to our success in reaching our goals.
Back to the question: If we know what to do, so why don’t we do it? Well, when it comes to changing your health and fitness it involves changing habits. We need to create new positive habits that move us toward our goal and eliminate old negative behaviours that keep us from successfully changing.
In my experience, most of us view behaviour change and habit development as something beyond our control, we either have an inherent ability, a genetic gift, or we don’t. Like having blue eyes and blond hair, some of just have it and others don’t.
This is a mistake. Changing habits, changing our lifestyle, changing our behaviour is a skill.
Born lucky? I think not!
A skill was taught, practiced and then put to use.
If you’ve ever struggled to improve your health and fitness - tried the latest keto craze and lasted a couple of days, or joined a gym and never went, it can create a negative belief system. An image in our minds of someone who can’t succeed in changing their health.
Realizing a goal of improving health or fitness starts with the understanding that each component is a skill that can be learned.
We can learn how to set effective goals, recognize those sources of influence in our life that can help or hinder, and we can develop the skills and strategies of behaviour change.
With a deeper understanding of ourselves, our personal, social and environmental abilities and motivations we can formulate a plan that involves changes to our activity and nutrition that fits into our lives. A change plan that we can be confident in achieving, a plan that can evolve and grow as we celebrate the small victories along the path to the successful realization of our goals.
But it starts with the understanding that change is a skill be learned, practiced and honed over time, no different than running, swimming or weight lifting.
ABOUT SEAN HAWTHORNE:
Sean Hawthorne is the owner and operator of OneLife Health and Wellness, Kelowna’s first and longest running private, personal training facility. While working in Dubai, UAE as a Contracts and Project Manager, Sean decided to leave his successful career in Civil Engineering Technology and pursue his passion for health, fitness and helping others achieve their goals. He returned to Canada in 2001, taking formal education in Exercise Science and starting his career in the field of health and fitness. Working in collaboration with their clients, Sean and his team of health and fitness professionals strive to continually improve their skills and to help everyone reach their goals.
Contact Sean: