5 tips for achieving and sustaining healthy habits

We often have the best of intentions when it comes to kicking out bad habits to the curb and replacing them with healthier ones. But when life gets in the way we find that we go right back to our unhealthy habits again. In order to make these habits stick here are 5 things to keep in mind.

1. Think in terms of small, daily commitments. Keeping a journal is a great way to set your intentions for the day and reflect at the end of the day as to whether or not you stuck with those. Keep your intended actions small and celebrate these successes by writing about them in your journal or tell a supportive friend about your accomplishment. Journaling and reflecting are great ways to identify any self-destructive patterns that you hadn’t noticed before.

2. Be realistic. When determining which habits you’d like to break and which ones to adopt, make sure it’s something that you have the resources (time and money) to do. If it’s not economically feasible or takes too much time out of your day, you’ll likely give up before you’ve had a chance to reap the benefits.

3. Find ways to hold yourself accountable. Enlisting the help of a supportive friend or a group of friends with similar goals is a great way to hold yourself (and each other) accountable.

4. Focus on the positive. By thinking about the benefits that you will gain instead of what you will be missing out on, you are setting yourself up for a greater chance of success.

5. Believe that change is possible. If you truly don’t think that you can break a habit, you won’t be able to do it. Once you set your mind to something, you need to power and mindset to actually follow through with it. Surrounding yourself by positive people that uplift you rather than bring you down is a good way to empower yourself to do anything.

Depending on how extreme the habit change is, it could take weeks of conscious effort for daily changes to become a new habit in your life. It may seem difficult at first to adapt to the change, but as time goes on it gets much easier. Hang in there and kick that bad habit once and for all!