Steps to Change

How to take the steps towards change for a better life. 

The last few years have been enormous for me and my family, losing my husband and daughter in the car accident has completely changed my life forever and I have worked  hard to build a new life and move forward with my family – always taking the time to be grateful for what I do have in my life.
 
But this change was not planned and it was forced out of the blue on my family; we had no choice but to quickly find ways to adapt and to continue to live.  Not an easy task and some days have been harder than others but we are slowly getting there and life is moving forward.
 
Recently I have been starting to think about making some new changes in my life, which is scary and exciting all at the same time – but these changes are ones that I want to make for myself for some time in order to continue and move forward with my life and hopefully reach find a new way to grow and be happy.
 
Change can be incredible difficult to make even when you know that it can have such a positive impact on your life – there are so many emotions that we feel around change, fear, anxiety, excitement – in fact it can feel like a roller coaster ride as we weigh up the pros and cons of making any life change. 
 
In fact I’ve been sitting at the cliff edge for such a long time ready to take a giant leap for change but something keeps holding me back and now I realise it is me.
 
Feeling this way has me think about how many people also feel when they are on the edge of making health and fitness changes no matter how small or large the change is – making a change in your health and fitness is life changing and can produce a wide range of feeling and emotions around it. This is why we spend so much time and energy thinking about it, planning it and waiting for the right conditions to arise to make the move forward into a better lifestyle with exercise.
 
For so many people starting to exercise and make nutritional changes can be so overwhelming especially if you have never done it before or you have had a break for a number of years.  Often we can lose confidence in our bodies, fear injury, fear judgement from others, failure and for some fear of success.
 
Here are some steps to making change:

• Know what you want rather than what you don’t want – no matter what, you have to decide what you do want so that you have a goal or task to move towards.
• Cultivate the belief that it’s possible – in order to achieve what you desire.

 
Steps to cultivating a belief that anything is possible:

• Cultivate the motivation to succeed – some people naturally are motivated to make their goals and aspirations happen – but for many of us this is not always the case and we need to find and develop ways to get our motivation and maintain it.
• Change your pattern and change your life – I love this, especially when you relate it to health and fitness as the end result permeates into all areas of your life, more energy to enjoy home life, to get involved in activities and better productivity at work.
• Reinforce – Reinforce – Reinforce – make your changes part of your everyday life and turn them into new positive habits – you can only performing over and over again.

 
This week I say let’s jump off the cliff and start to take the steps towards change for the better especially with our health and fitness goals - we can take small steps but we just need to keep moving forward to change for a better life. 
 
‘So take a walk around the block, walk up the stairs instead of the elevator, grab the kids and head to the park in the afternoon and have a game of cricket or even join that gym you have been talking about for so long’