Practice healthy habits — most of the time

As you adopt health, diet and active lifestyle habits, expect there to be days that you will stray. There will be days that you just don’t feel up to exercising, there will be an event where you eat a bit more than you normally would.

Guess what? That’s OK. That is more than OK. That is living in the flow of not being rigid into an all or nothing way of life, which we know is not realistic in the long run.

Before you begin a diet-and-exercise program, tell yourself that no matter what happens, rather than abandoning your new lifestyle completely, you’ll resume your healthy habits as soon as you can if you fall off the wagon.

It always makes me laugh when I get the Monday calls. Clients who want to “wait” until Monday to begin living a healthier lifestyle. Why Monday? Or even Jan. 1?

Here’s a thought … why not start with your next meal? You always have an opportunity for a fresh start to get right back on track with your healthy habits and continuing to move toward your weight loss goals.

Regardless of how frightening the process is, whenever anything is that important to you, you will take the step and begin. Changing old habits can be difficult, but, extremely rewarding!

Healthy habits of diet and fitness are most successful when you think of them as success or failure. It is progress and not perfection.

Practice healthy habits more times than you don’t practice them. Think in terms of the 80/20 guidelines — 80 percent of the time, you eat according to your healthy nutritional program and are active; 20 percent of the time, you relax your guidelines a bit. This allows for balance and living your life in a healthy, easier mode of moderation.

When it is important to you, do something healthy that will lead to positive results! Enjoy the journey.

Natalie Dreger is a certified fitness professional and can be reached at nataliedreger.com.