Building New Healthy Habits

What a year (or two!) it has been!  From hoarding toilet paper, to staying home, and changing routines, many have found themselves struggling to reunite with healthy habits.  Perhaps you were one of the few that used that time to build healthy habits from the start, but many of us have failed at our health and maintaining it--miserably.  


I always find it interesting when people complain of how sick they get during cold and flu season or comment that they are always sick around the holidays.  Have you ever stopped to think why?  During cooler months, we spend more time inside (not moving), snacking, and bingeing on food.  We start our cooler seasons with a candy holiday, followed by a giant food binge, followed by weeks of sweets and then a booze holiday.  This is cold and flu season...it's sugar poisoning season! 


No worries though!  Your Ames Spine & Sport team is here to invite you to join us on a 30 day Building Healthy Habits challenge.  You'll find our 30 Day Healthy Habit Tracker below and also in our office Facebook group.  We are dedicated to creating new habits of our own and also providing motivation and encouragement for you to create new or better habits for yourself.  


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Our challenge to you is to create a 30 day goal and then find 5 habits (maybe they relate to the goal, maybe they don't) that will help you establish a healthier lifestyle.  The hardest part is always getting started and your Ames Spine & Sport team is here to help and support you!


Here are a few ideas on what I will likely be putting on mine:

1) No caffeine.

2) 96 oz water daily.

3) 45 min of mindful movement daily (NOTE: this says mindful movement.  This could be exercise, but exercising 7 days a week at a higher intensity does not allow adequate time for your body to recover.  This could be a 5-6 day resistance training and cardio split with 1-2 days of yoga or walking too)

4) 10K steps/day

5) 120g protein daily.  (Should be higher, but I know that 120g every single day will be a challenge for me, but can be done)

6) Sprints daily (:10 on, :50 off x10 min).  I'll spare you my nerdy literature on HRV and how I'm playing with mine and recovery right now, but nonetheless it's something I want to do. 


I have posted a file in our Ames Spine & Sport Community Facebook group as well and myself and our staff will spend the next 30 days providing tips, advice, progress updates and more.  Click here if you are interested in joining.