How to Stay Motivated With Food, Exercise, & Healthier Habits

The question I hear the most in my community and when new clients start working with me is: How do I stay motivated?

You know how it goes — you start off gung-ho with your goals and then motivation wanes as the weeks go by (just think: New Year's Resolutions). 

So what’s the answer to this motivation conundrum? There’s a few pieces to the puzzle, but the big one is digging deep to uncover why this is actually important to you. 

Sounds simple, right? Simple, but not necessarily easy. It’s like peeling back an onion. 

I’ll tell you a little story about a previous client who we’ll call Marci—

When Marci came to me, she wanted to lose some weight and get back into exercising consistently. She wanted to feel comfortable in her clothes again and confident when she got her picture taken rather than hiding from the camera. 

For the first few weeks, Marci started out strong—she was full of vim and vigor eating nutritious home-cooked meals and power walking through the neighborhood like nobody’s business. She lost a few pounds and was feeling good right out of the gate. 

Then self-sabotage started to creep in and the stress of her job led to another health scare. By working through this together in our coaching sessions, Marci discovered that her true motivation for making a change was a little different than what she initially thought. Her “why” went much deeper than just losing some weight to look and feel better. 

It was to be there for her family, for her kids. It was realizing that intensely focusing on her career was drowning out everything else that mattered and wasn’t serving her anymore the way it used to. She wanted to feel FREE. 

When she got really honest with herself to find what her true motivating factors were to make a change, it moved her forward again. 

People get really caught up in “should.”

I “should” lose weight.
I “should” eat the salad.
I “should” go exercise. 

But when you’re trying to make a life change and basing it all on “should” and outside expectations, it eventually wears off. 

Instead, maybe you could try on something like “I should go exercise, not because I have to, but because I’m making my body stronger and more resilient every time. And when I’m stronger and more resilient, I’m able to care for my family and be a good role model for my kids.” 

Which of those feels more empowering? 

Everyone has goals, but the path to achieving them is rarely linear. The people who make goals and actually achieve them have a deeper motivation driving them and get reminded of it regularly. 

Which leads me to the next piece of motivation: support.

Sometimes you just need guidance, a proven method, and accountability to get there.  

Unsure what deep driving factors are underneath your goals? Or maybe you tend to forget about them and veer off course? If so, then working with a coach could be just what you need.

If you’re struggling to stay motivated and make progress on goals around food, exercise, and a confident mindset, I’d love to invite you to a free intro coaching session. It’ll help you get started in the right direction and see what all is possible. 

When I work with my clients to help them make a big change in their life and get their health back on track, we do it in an approachable way. You don’t have to drink green smoothies and workout 7x a week in order to be healthy. You can take much smaller, more manageable steps to get there and still feel amazing. 

You can find out more about how I work with clients here. 

So here’s my question for you: If you took “I should” out of your vocabulary, what’s one thing that matters to you that drives you to want to make a change? 

Want to take the conversation further? You can schedule a free intro coaching call with me here.