Want to make this your best year yet?

Wanting to change yourself and better yourself is a beautiful and inspiring thing to do. Setting goals is really about changing yourself for the long-term. Goals aren’t short-term, quick-fix things; they are fixed destinations that show the world who you want to become or what you want to achieve.

Yet just because it’s a new year doesn’t mean you or your situations will automatically change for the better. If you know that you constantly break promises to yourself (polls show 88% of resolutions fail within the first month), even though you’re so geared up to make changes on the first of January, it’s time to think, plan and prepare to ensure more chance of success.

Here’s what we consider to be the most important things to actually change your behaviour for a better you:

Pick only one resolution

Sticking to more than one resolution is near impossible for your brain to handle. Instead, analyse everything you’ve thought about to change and pick the one thing that’s most important for you. Motivation gives you an initial spurt of energy to get up and get moving, but it’s just not sustainable. Many resolutions are based on what you think you should be doing, rather than what you really want to be doing. Then, let go of everything else.

Make your goal measurable and realistic

The more specific they are, the better chance you have of succeeding. Resolutions should be clear and focused and require an actual plan of action. Maybe you want to be fitter but how are you going to do it? How many times a week will you exercise? What exercise will you do?

Take baby steps – make it a tiny habit

Now that you’ve picked one resolution, make sure to break down as far as you can, to the simplest task possible. Clearing out your cupboards to start living healthily is not good for you physically or mentally. Creating a drastic shock to your body and lifestyle will only make you crave all of the things you’re trying to leave behind. Find ways to include elements of your intended goal into your life slowly by removing unhealthy items gradually. Set yourself a challenge to complete within 30 days to start with and build it up from there.

Hold yourself accountable for what you want to change

Tell others (who you know will support you) or write it down. This will have a significant impact on your behavior. If you tell some of your friends and family about the new habit you’ve created, you are much more likely to stick to it. Writing it down also makes you more likely to succeed and increases your overall happiness.
Focus on the carrot, not the stick – positive feedback and rewards increase your chance of success
Reward yourself for any progress towards your goal, preferably with something that won’t set back your progress. If you’ve worked hard and lost 5lbs in weight, indulge in some retail therapy or a candlelit bath, as payment, not a piece of chocolate cake.

Realise you may well fail at some point but keep at it

Some people lack belief in themselves and in their potential. In their mind, if they fail, everyone will think negatively of them. We all have times when we eat the wrong foods, but it is important to be aware of your response to this initial failure. At this point, many individuals think, “What the hell, my healthy eating goal is already ruined for the day, I may as well enjoy dessert for lunch!” Instead of responding to this “what the hell” effect, correct the behaviour and make a healthy choice. It’s so much easier when you are aware of your emotional responses. You can achieve anything you set your mind to. Believe in yourself and your abilities and others will, too.

Quick tip

Strong willpower is not a character trait

One very important and comforting last fact is that having strong willpower is not something we’re born with. So just like our bicep muscle has to be trained in order to grow stronger, so does the prefrontal cortex in your brain. The key is to not try to start lifting too heavy too soon.

Do you have any New Year’s resolutions? How are you planning on approaching them? We’d love to hear your thoughts and/or progress in the comments.

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2015
Alison x

Is fructose the real villain?

There is so much confusion around fruit and sugar that I decided to unpick some of the misinformation.

What is sugar?

Sucrose (table sugar) is made up of 50% glucose and 50% fructose. All sugars are made up of different combinations of glucose or glucose plus fructose. Glucose is a very important sugar for us humans and is contained within most foods, and if not included as for example in meat proteins, it is still eventually broken down in our bodies to provide glucose for us to use as energy.

Fructose is sweeter than glucose which is a manufacturers dream in the sweet stakes. Drinks are marketed to us daily, using the useful fact that fructose is from fruit! Checking the facts we know that fruit juice e.g. apple or orange from concentrate, has been stripped of the beneficial fibre and nutrients leaving pure sugar (fructose), primed to rot our teeth, and cause a huge insulin spike. Research shows that the consumption of sugary soft drinks has risen in parallel with obesity statistics. I often wonder how quickly obesity rates would fall if everyone drank water instead of sugary soft drinks.

Fruit contains fructose, but also contains fibre and a host of beneficial nutrients. However to stay under the recommended 10 teaspoons of sugar a day (World Health Organisation WHO), it is better to keep your fruit to two pieces a day plus a minimum of 3 portions of vegetables.

There is much hype around sugar and there is no doubt about the evils of the sweet stuff. Consuming sugar causes tooth cavities, and it is an excess of sugar which is the problem. There is not as yet definitive evidence that sugar causes cancer, however some nutrition experts believe strongly that this is so. It is however clear that eating too much sugar can  lead to weight gain and obesity which is strongly suggested to increase the risk of cancer.

As we have discussed in previous posts and community emails Alison and I have both found cutting out sugar for 30 days, helped us not only reduce sugar cravings (in a major way) but also increase our energy levels. Some studies have looked into how sugar (particularly when combined with fat) light up our brains reward system, which makes complete sense when we reflect on Palaeolithic man, sweet foods were rare and synonymous with high energy thus we could gorge on these foods without getting full too quickly (then we wonder why it is so easy to eat the whole packet of biscuits - we are not weak, we are made to do so). 

However it is dangerous to demonise an ingredient as happened to fat. We the consumers demanded low fat foods, as emerging studies including the famous Ancel Keys study 1958 found some evidence to show that eating fat makes us fat, (questionable as some have strongly suggested research cherry picking!) in response to this the food industry reduced the fat and increased the sugar, pulling the wool over our eyes completely.  The truth is, it is the combination of sugar, fat and salt which are used in the food industry to entice us into overeating leading to weight gain, lethargy and obesity. Hence eating naturally and steering away from processed foods will make all the difference to your health and waist line.

Each of us reacts to different foods in various ways. It is part of our journey to find out the best way of eating to suit ourselves ensuring that we consume the nutrients we need to have a healthy long life free from illness and disease.

To lower your sugar intake reduce the usual sugary drinks and snacks. However there may be a few items that contain hidden sugars you were unaware of for example a nutrigrain bar is marketed as a healthy product, however it contains approximately 4tsp of sugar per bar! This is only just less than an average chocolate bar of the same size. As a general rule recommendations are that a food is healthy in terms of sugar levels when they contain 5g per 100g. Check the list I have included to help you lower your sugar levels.

- Low fructose fruits include avocados, lemons. Limes, melons, figs, grapefruit and blueberries.

- Fruits highest in fructose include apples, pears, mangos.

- Low fat or fat free yoghurts can contain 5 teaspoons of sugar per 150g serving. Check the labels and opt for yoghurts with less than 5g of sugar per 100g of product.

- Jars of pasta sauce can contain upwards of 3tsp (13g) of sugar per 100g. Check shop bought sauces they often contain high levels of sugar, e.g. cranberry, salsa, mint sauce.

- Cereals are shockingly high in sugar, frosties and coco pops being two of the highest, however you may be surprised to find the following so called healthy cereals contain high levels of sugar:

* Branflakes 4-5 tsp/20g per 100g

* Special K  3- 4 tsp/17g per 100g

Check your cereals nutritional information - carbohydrates of which sugars, is the sugar content.

I hope you have found some of this information useful. Sugar is such a minefield and manufacturers have kept a theme of adding sugar and fat whilst trying to hide them in various forms to keep us buying products. Please leave a comment if you have a question or if you have found the information of use.

Have a wonderful Christmas enjoying time with your loved ones.

Lots of love and hugs,

Kelly x