As 2024 continues, fitness centers and gyms are bustling with motivated individuals trying to achieve their dream physiques and make a difference in their health. People have realized that it’s finally time to do something about their deteriorating health, but expect that change to happen overnight. They go to the gym, work out somewhat intensely, try to diet, track their macros, and when progress isn’t seen in 2 weeks, they give up.

To have the most positive change in your health, extreme dieting and working out for a short period of time isn’t going to cut it. Change occurs gradually. Consistently. Having small, sustainable changes to daily routines will have a profound, more positive impact. Sustainable change will also lead to the development of the necessary habits that will help achieve a healthy life

Big aspirations for exercise and healthy eating don’t usually work as individuals aspire for drastic and rapid change leading to slight obsessions. This leads to unstable activities such as extreme dieting or intense workouts, which might not always be better.

On the journey of getting results, people push themselves past their limits, both in the kitchen and gym. They restrict too much of the food they love, and train way too hard in the gym with improper technique and recovery. This leads to physical and mental burnout. The starting enthusiasm towards the journey fades away as the body struggles to deal with the overtraining and restrictions.

Also, the obsession with fitting in with society and its norms affects one’s motivation to overtrain and diet, leading to a lack of motivation to keep going. The pressure to fit in with unrealistic standards can lead to even more obsessive training and dieting due to impatience with results, fostering increased dissatisfaction and inconsistency. The unrealistic expectations you expect to reach in a short period hinder the development of good habits, making the journey worse for your health than better.

To draw the fine line between your aspirations and obsessions, its crucial to think smaller. People tend to set resolutions that are too big and take one too many steps to achieve them, so creating smaller goals can be more sustainable in the long term. 

When trying to change your eating habits, for example, instead of switching to a whole new fad diet, changing parts of your diet at a time or switching out various foods with healthier alternatives will be more beneficial when starting the journey. Easing yourself into the change instead of overwhelming yourself with too much is more beneficial.

Change is hard, and many goals individuals make involve what we should do, not what we want to do. We need to ask ourselves why. We need to dive into the personal reasons for our goals. If we want to eat healthier, is it because we want to feel healthier or because we want to look healthier?

If people know the reason for wanting to change their diets and overall health, then they can find more enjoyable and satisfactory ways to achieve them. With this, it’s much easier to deepen your conviction with your goals, making them a must, leading to more sustainability and consistency in the long term.

 By approaching health and fitness with a balanced and patient mindset, creating sustainable practices ensuring enthusiasm, and fostering healthy habits you can create consistency in your diets and fitness journey and overcome all the challenges to achieve the healthy life you’ve been dreaming of.