To begin this is going out early because today is Superbowl Sunday and I am sure that each of you has a date with a television be it in your own home or someone elses. I will be at my cousin’s house with my niece, nephew, their spouses and my great nephews cheering the Giants to a win and for one of us to win the many Superbowl pools we have entered.
And; by the way, I will be working from home tomorrow as I am sure many of you will.
This week’s blog is on what are we doing and how are we staying motivated in watching our health, what we eat, how much we exercise? This is about the time that many individuals drop out of their New Year’s “fitness” resolution and revert to our old habits. Generally it has to do with the weather getting very cold and snow on the ground; however, this year we do NOT have that excuse. In the month of January the weather was almost 5 degrees warmer than it is supposed to be and we only had one snowstorm which gave us anywhere from 3 to 8 inches of snow. So really there haven't been adequate reasons for us to have an excuse not to follow a healthy regime.
Maybe you need a gimmick – are you competitive and need that edge to continue to stay motivated? I know that I do – I am highly competitive (STOP the snickering) and whether it is against someone else or my personal best I need something or someone to tell me how I am doing.
A Club Fit friend of mine recently introduced me to the Fitbit (www.fitbit.com) – have you heard of it? This device will track: number of steps taken, number of floors climbed, calories burned, calories consumed – should you set a goal for weight loss it will tell you how you are doing towards the number of pounds you want to lose. I have had my Fitbit for about a month – and I am always looking to do better than the day before whether it is the number of steps I took or the calories burned. It will also give you a badge every time you either climb stairs more than 10 times in a day or take more than 10,000 steps. You may think that each of these is quite doable – EXCEPT – try it and you will realize how much of our time is spent at our desk or in a car; sedentary. The Fitbit is $99; you can purchase it at a Brookstone store or order it through www.amazon.com.
You will appreciate that it will also note your activity by hours and minutes and categorize it as lightly active, fairly active and very active. Weekly it will email you a graph of how you are doing. What better way to stay motivated than that!?!
If competing against yourself is not enough then you can join a group and see how you are doing against the group. I have not done that; but, I am sure if I did I would be high-tailing it all over the place. I know that in a few weeks North Shore – LIJ will be kicking off a healthy initiative for their employees and the winner will receive a week’s vacation for two to Paris all expenses paid. There will also be gift certificates and cards to Broadway shows and to restaurants for dinner. I will certainly be doing my darndest to win one of those prizes.
This reminded me of when Pfizer did their walk program and you chose the trail you wanted: Appalachian, Great Wall of China, etc. and daily you would put in the number of steps you took – the goal was to do 10,000 steps a day and I would need to walk my neighborhood around 4 times each evening to make that. The gift was a $50 Visa gift card and if you did so many trails in a given period of time you could win multiple ones – I received 3-$50 gift cards. I also competed against two of my friends so you can see that healthy competition can lead to a healthy life.
The other item that the Fitbit will track is your sleeping habits. It will monitor how long it took you to fall asleep and how many times you woke up. I know that many of us suffer from sleep issues and this may help you get a real view of your sleep patterns and if you need to start to do something differently.
So whatever it takes to get you back on the bandwagon or to “up” your activity level – go ahead and do it, it is an investment in yourself and your life.
To Your Best Self.
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