4 Ways to Keep our New Year Resolutions Throughout the Year
Content Courtesy of the Forever Young Podcast with Christiana Egi and Cherrie-Marie Chiu.
We sure hope our listeners and readers are easing into the New Year well. Like Cherrie, there is no doubt that some of us are having difficulties keeping up with our new year’s resolutions. It is surely easy to make goals and work towards them, but even easier to let them slide through. Joining us for our podcast this week, we had the honor to welcome back Dr. Uche Odiatu to give us some tips and tricks at being successful at our resolutions. He shares 4 ways to keep our new year resolutions based on mindset, diet, diet hacks, and exercise adherence. You may remember Dr. Odiatu from a few podcasts back when we spoke about managing our eating habits during the holiday season. Dr. Odiatu is the author of “The Miracle of Health”, a professional member of the American College of Sports Medicine, and a practicing dentist in Toronto. He is an internationally acclaimed speaker and has been invited to over 400 radio and TV shows from Atlanta to Alaska. He is also an NSCA certified personal trainer and certified boot camp instructor!
1. Mindset
Cherrie’s resolution is to limit her intake of sweets, whilst Christana’s is to find more time for herself (she is a very busy woman!). Both revealed that they have been trying to keep their resolutions going, but they are only finding themselves floating farther and farther away from them. Dr. Odiatu tells us that famous author and doctor Dan Pink, admits that the right way to set up your new year’s resolution is to simply focus on doing whatever it is you want to do. In his book The Obesity Code, he states that whatever it is you want to limit or improve, it may be easier to begin following your resolution on only the even days of the month. Thus, this means that Christiana would want to prioritize self-care time, every few days that are of even numbers. Or for Cherrie, this would mean allowing herself to have a small sweet on these days, as opposed to having several per day.
Mindset is a heavy subject within our podcast this week, as Christiana believes that mindset is the foundation of success. Because without a strong mindset, nothing is possible. Dr. Odiatu reminds us that mindset is a key tool to help us be successful in our resolutions. “Our thoughts are like seeds, and our end results are the fruits” he states. Many people like Cherrie however, are picking at the fruit first, when they should be reaching for the seeds that eventually lead to their goals. After all, words always spring forth from what we talk to ourselves about. For example, instead of telling yourself disparaging comments when looking into the mirror, focus on how strong and great of a person you are. When you start consuming positive reinforcements, you begin building the foundation of believing in yourself. Dr. Odiatu continues to mention that this is important because once we begin thinking of something as important, we instantly take better care of it. Seeds are like the habit beginning, thus, if you begin at the seeds, your life will be much easier.
2. Diet
Olympic Swimmer Micheal Phelps is known for eating 12,000 calories a day. (Yes, including your favorite store-bought cookies, bread, and rice). Many may wonder how it is possible for such a successful athlete to keep fit while eating an extensive amount of food per day. Dr. Odiatu says this is simple; we just have to increase our activity level instead of our food intake. He mentions that by doing this, it is amazing how much you could enjoy those treats without any guilt. The best part, it is as easy as taking a walk to the corner store for a lottery ticket, and back. This amount of physical activity is enough to earn yourself a cookie of any kind. Because Micheal spends 8 hours training in the pool per day, his activity level is so high he earns himself all 12,000 of those calories. Only limit your food intake if your activity level is not high enough, as moving more leaves us less worried about the calories coming in.
3. Diet Hacks
Most people say that they are going on a die at the beginning of every new year, to try and better their own well-being. However, depriving yourself of fatty and salty foods will never work. The best way to approach our diet according to Dr. Odiatu is limiting the number of times you eat in a day. Dr. Jason Fung reveals that the average family ate 2-3 times a day in the 1970s, published in The Obesity Code. Today, families will average on eating up to 5-6 times a day! This is almost three times more than the regular in the ’70s. Noting that then, the obesity rate was only 8%, and has skyrocketed to 42 percent of adults today. Dr. Odiatu acknowledges how difficult it can be to stop yourself from any food cravings, or emotional eating. But, he states that a major part of people losing control in dieting is eating too many times a day. If we are eating less and less each day, we begin developing a passion for our goal. When we get lost in our journey, we will always end up finding ourselves stuck in keeping all unhealthy eating habits.
4. Exercise
A common question Dr. Odiatu receives in his practice, is how can we include physical activity in our days when everything is closed down, due to COVID-19? Well, exercise does not only require a gym to complete, fitness apps are widely available to us all to use on our devices. Apple Fitness, MyFitnessPartner, and Runkeeper are all easily accessible, and simple to use. The beauty of a fitness app is it can track what you have been doing physically, during the day. If you work in an office from 9-5 and are seated at your desk a majority of the time, these apps will constantly remind you to get up and move every hour or so. Outside of apps, Dr. Odiatu mentions that building inconvenience into our days is key to getting yourself moving. You can count on yourself to potentially park further away from the mall entrance, giving you the opportunity to walk and get some fresh air at the same time. Building muscle is also a great tactic to use against gaining weight. As the muscle is the highest metabolically active tissue in the body, the more you build, the more glucose you can store. Let’s be honest, anyone could use a little resistance or weight training, right?
Bonus- Christiana’s 4 Steps to Making our Cupboards Healthy:
Be able to picture and imagine yourself at your final weight goal. If you cannot see it, it will never ever happen.
Make plans to do simple steps, like not buying junk food at the grocery store.
Eating something even every 5 days is very powerful. That includes one apple or one banana!
Regift every dessert, candy, a box of chocolates given to you. Do not let them enter your home, as they likely won't make their way out
*The Forever Young podcast is created and produced by Christiana and Cherrie Marie Chiu. Produced and engineered by Elisse Hill. The podcast represents our opinions and those of our guests. The content should not be taken as medical advice. It is for informational purposes only. Please consult your health care professional for any medical questions. If you like our show, please tell your friends and leave a five-star review on Apple Podcasts. New episodes are available every other Wednesday. Have questions? Email us at ourforeveryoungpodcast@gmail.com
