KIT Fx - Week 1 Goals

Week 1 - Goals  

  http://kidsintraining.com/kitfx.htm   

Every year I see my cousin Richard at the Holiday gatherings and, in unison, we look at each other with thumbs up and announce the following year, “2010! That’s my year!”. We have been doing this since the 80’s when staying in shape suddenly became… well…. difficult. Both of us were athletes throughout our childhood. Richard mostly played volleyball and football and I played volleyball and softball but we were always at the beach, water or snow skiing or playing tennis. I remember I could eat 2 Big Macs for lunch or share a Little Caesar’s Pizza Pizza with my best friend Christine (which means we each ate a whole large pizza) followed by a pint of Haagen-Dazs and never see the ill effects.

Then adulthood came and with it a much more sedentary lifestyle. Instead of daily exercise we may have squeezed in a couple of days a week of some sort of physical activity. And this is where the goal setting started. Richard would always have this certain amount of pounds he was going to lose and mine was usually just to be comfortable in my jeans again. Ok, maybe I had dreams of ripped abs too and looking skinny in my white jeans. The thing is we would almost always meet this goal at some point in the year, usually right before summer where we would have to be on that beach in little nothings that showed off our efforts. The problem was we always ended back at square one by years end.

I have the feeling many of you are nodding your heads as you too may have faced this problem as well. Why can’t we meet and keep our goals? Is it because they are not reasonable or we should not expect to have such goals as we get older? I believe we cannot keep our goals because we focused on the end result rather than the effort in attaining it. I believe it is better for us to focus on changing our lifestyles in a healthier way than to focus on the way we wanted to look in the end. If we focused on, say, eating more vegetables or cutting the amount of fat and sugars in our diet or getting daily exercise in a way where we accomplished the task at hand, I think we would have felt better and had found a way to keep the extra pounds off.

So that is my challenge for you all and we will call it the KIT Family Challenge or “KIT Fx”. Let’s set a goal to make our lives better in every way. That is our Big Goal; Where we want to be at the end of the year. But we need to make little goals as well, daily, weekly and monthly ones, in which we tackle the issues that block our ability to sustain a healthy lifestyle. I have a plan and invite you to try it. It will address issues with our nutrition, physical and lifestyle fitness. Each week we will tackle a goal and sustain it for the year. They may seem like small goals to some, huge challenges to others however you will need to conquer that goal before moving on to the next goal of its kind. That way you deal with one issue at a time in a manner that can be handled and therefore, sustained. You can start today, tomorrow or when you feel it’s best but make sure you start soon.
maylene

KIT Fx - Week 1: JOURNAL

We need to see where we are today, in the beginning, to appreciate what our efforts will change in the future.

The Task: Start a journal. It can be hand written, a homemade excel spreadsheet (sample here) or a software program. Keep it simple so that it takes no more than a few minutes each day.

Make sure it has the following basic information:

• Day 1 - Measurements. Can include health status, weight, size, mood, habits, level of activity, whatever you would like to see change in. Place this information on a back page and once it’s listed do not look at again until instructed to do so.

• Daily –
1. Nutrition Intake. List all that you and your family eat and drink, including time and approximate amount.
2. Physical movement. Did you take a walk, bike, play or go to the gym? List activity, level of intensity and measurement such as time or distance.
3. Lifestyle changes. What is your mood and what might have caused it? Did you try something new today and if so, how did you feel about it?