More Choices . . .

Happy Tuesday everyone!

One of the things I did while on vacation was begin working my way through "Dr. A's Habits of Health" and the just-released companion guide, "Living a Longer, Healthier Life." One of the exercises I did from the companion guide was listing 10 daily choices that support my health right now and also listing 10 daily choices that don't support my health. If you've never taken the time to do an assessment like this, I highly recommend it!

When I made a list of the daily choices that don't support my health, two of the things I listed were staying up too late (I am a self-confessed night owl) and not incorporating regular strength-building exercise into my life. Once I wrote them down, I realized that there was a direct connection between the two.

Because I am now self-employed, I often find myself staying up WAY too late. It's not uncommon for me to be up well past midnight, checking e-mails, surfing the internet, writing a blog :-), or sometimes watching TV (TLC, HGTV and Food Network are my late-night favorites). Because I stay up really late, I end up sleeping until past 8:30 in the morning. Sleeping that late means I often don't have time to get to the health club and work out before my work day begins. Despite good intentions, getting there later in the day rarely happens, so days (and days and days) go by without any exercise other than perhaps a walk.

Once I saw my list and saw the connection between staying up late and not exercising, I realized that I needed to make a change. As much as I like being a night owl, I realized it wasn't really serving my best interests any more. Because I've made the primary choice to pursue optimal health in my own life, I've realized the need to make secondary choices to support that. I've decided to set my bedtime at 11 and set my alarm for 7 AM, which will give me time to do the things that are important to me (spending time reading my Bible and praying, followed by exercising) before jumping into the rest of my day.

Monday morning was my first day of my new routine, and it felt good! I wasn't that excited about getting up at 7, but I knew that I needed to get up then if I wanted to get everything done before a 10:30 appointment that I had. Do you know what? I did it and it felt GREAT! I walked out of the health club after a good workout with a wonderful sense of satisfaction that I'd truly organized my morning around the things that were important to me.

The rest of yesterday was crazy-busy and had I not gotten up when I did and gotten my morning routine started at 7, things would have fallen by the wayside - I KNOW that wouldn't have gotten in any exercise.

Every day we face choices that will either support our goals for a healthier us or will take us away from those goals. Those secondary choices aren't always what we really WANT to do, but because they support our primary goals, we do them anyway. For those on Take Shape for Life/Medifast 5&1, that means foregoing certain foods right now; you may not feel like not eating those things, but you do it anyway because staying on plan supports what you REALLY want - a thin and healthy body. Or it may mean that you exercise, even when you don't feel like it, because it's part of moving you towards the healthy body you want. Or, in my case, it means turning off TV and shutting down the computer and going to bed, so I can get up on time to start my day off right.

It's going to take time for my new routine to truly become a habit, and I'm guessing that I'll have to fight the temptation to stay up too late, but if I stay focused on what I REALLY want, those are choices (and sacrifices) that I'm willing to make.

What daily choices are you making right now that support your health? What daily choices aren't supporting your health? Once you identify your choices - the good AND the not-so-good - you've taken another important step towards a healthier you!

One healthy choice I hope all of you are making today is the choice to stay on plan :-). Who's committed to an on-plan day today?