Six Tips For Sticking To Your Goals This Easter
For anyone with health and fitness goals, holidays and family get-togethers have an extra layer of stress as we think about either totally ditching our goals for the weekend or having to spend the celebration hiding from our favorite foods.
But I have good news! You don’t have to worry about either of those things.
Instead, you’re going to head into the holiday with healthy habits and positive mindset tools to help you enjoy the celebration of our Risen Savior without the Monday morning, Reese’s-white-chocolate-peanut-butter-egg-induced hangover.
Move your body!
Start the day with a workout. EVERY day is better when you start it with a workout! Don’t think of this as “earning” your calories for the day. You’re giving your body the balance that it needs on a day that will likely consist of some more indulgent foods. When you make a healthy decision like starting off your day with exercise, you head into the rest of the day equipped with that positive mindset and will feel more ready and excited to make more healthy decisions throughout the rest of the day (like grabbing just one piece of almond pastry instead of two!).
End the day with a walk. It is always a good idea to get a little movement in after the last meal of the day as well. Take a few minutes to walk outside, enjoy the new-life reminders of spring, and reflect on the day with your family.
Remember what the day is for.
We tend to center our holiday celebrations on food, when really that’s not what it’s about at all.
Easter is not defined by deviled eggs, cheesy potato hotdish, jelly beans, or cream-cheese-frosted carrot cakes.
Keep Christ at the center of your heart and enjoy celebrating with the family that He blessed you with. Everything else is just gravy (pun absolutely intended).
Grab a water.
This tip is two-fold and helps to keep us from eating food that really doesn’t do anything for us.
Have you ever been at a party and been shocked by the realization that you’re STILL eating even though you’re already miserably full? Or sat down to your favorite holiday meal and realized that you can’t even really enjoy it because your stomach is already full of appetizers (that you didn’t really even like)? Holding a drink helps to keep your hands busy with something other than picking another deviled egg off the plate.
It’s easy to confuse feelings of thirst and hunger. That craving you’re having might be curbed by a refreshing drink instead of another handful of Cadbury eggs.
If plain water is not your jam, mix it up with a little sparkling water, fruit infusion, or a True Lemon drink mix!
A similar trick is to make sure that you’re giving your body the nutritious foods that it needs in addition to the treats.
Load up on the good stuff!
Eat a healthy breakfast in the morning.
Add an extra serving of vegetables to your dinner plate.
Go crazy on the egg quiches, honey butter carrots, and fruit platters.
Filling your body up with the good stuff helps keep cravings at bay. When you “save your calories” for the special treats, you’re likely to eat even more of the stuff that is not-so-great for you because you’re SO HUNGRY. And that is going to leave you feeling not-so-great the next day.
Load up on the healthier options and take smaller servings of your favorite treats.
Enjoy your FAVORITES – guilt free!
Instead of going all out on every food being served, choose a few favorites that you really want to enjoy, and leave the stuff that doesn’t get you super excited.
If your grandma only makes her mashed potatoes and gravy once each year, you’d better take seconds!
If it’s tradition that you eat mint-chocolate-chip ice cream for dessert with your grandpa, don’t you dare skip that!
If your absolute favorite dessert is the lemon cake that you know your sister is bringing, grab a piece!
But don’t take a big scoop of Jell-O salad just because it’s there. And maybe don’t grab a second dinner roll for the sole purpose of cleaning the gravy off your plate (unless, of course, this IS your favorite part!).
Whatever you choose to eat, ENJOY it! Live it up in the moment and be thankful. Don’t sit there thinking that you’re “failing” your diet by eating the cake. That’s not a healthy thought process and it totally takes the fun out of it.
Move on – with a grateful heart.
Don’t dwell on your holiday food choices on the way home. Be grateful for the opportunity to celebrate Christ’s resurrection with family and for all the blessings of the day.
Your next diet does not need to start on Monday.
A healthy lifestyle is not something that you turn on and off. In every moment of every day, we make choices that bring us closer to (or further away from) the life that we want to live.
The healthy lifestyle that you actually want probably includes some wiggle room for special occasion indulgences.
Be grateful and be mindful - this Easter weekend and all the other days too.
Happy Easter!
P.S. For more tips and reminders just like this (delivered straight to your inbox!) subscribe to the For More Of What Matters weekly newsletter! I can’t wait to chat more with you, friend!
