It’s that time of year again that everyone dreads, the time of post-holiday pressure to lose those extra pounds that made their way onto our hips on over the last couple months. Here’s the thing: if you are wanting to lose a few pounds to feel better and improve your health, it doesn’t have to be as daunting or difficult as you may think.

One thing that everyone can agree on after a month of indulging is that putting effort into getting healthy after a long day of work can seem impossible. The trick is to set a goal for yourself and get excited about how great you are going to feel over the next few months of winter, leading into spring. It might not be easy at first to find your routine again, especially if you’re on the road a lot, but it will be worth it in the end.

As I lead our participants through the Healthy Fleet Challenge in January & February, here are some of the simple steps and challenges I will be putting them through to help them get back into a healthy routine:

  1. Cut out alcohol as much as possible! Sound tough? That probably means you need to do it! Alcohol is one of the most unhealthy things we can consume, yet it makes its way into our diets far more often than it should. Cutting back, or ideally cutting it out, could be one of the most simple ways of improving your health and reaching your goals.
  2. Cabinet Clean Out & Stock Up! Time to ditch all the left over holiday goodies you have laying around the house (yes, this includes your truck too). Out of sight out, of mind is the idea here, as your taste buds and body have become so accustomed to indulging whenever you want, that it becomes much harder to resist those treats in January. You’re not doing yourself any favours by keeping them around, so toss them in the garbage or donate them, and fill your cupboards, fridge, and truck with healthy, delicious choices instead. You’ll be surprise how much the cravings go away after cutting sweets out of your diet.
  3. Eat Your Favourite Healthy Meal! Healthy doesn’t have to mean flavourless, try something like roasted chicken w
  4. ith sweet potatoes and your favourite veggies. Or maybe for you it’s a big bowl of fruit with a dollop of Greek yogurt. All it takes is one healthy meal to set the tone for the rest of the week, so why not kick start the “New Year New You” with something healthy and delicious? Your body will thank you. Be sure to keep vegetables on hand that you enjoy the most, as you’ll be more likely to eat them. Eating healthy isn’t about eating food that you don’t like, it’s about eating the healthy foods you DO like, and slowly training your taste buds to love healthy food.
  6. Do Your Favourite Workout! Sensing a theme here? Good! Just like eating healthy food, do workouts that you enjoy, as you’ll be more likely to keep doing them consistently! Getting back into routine is always hard, and can also be hard on your body. Ease back in by doing your favourite workout, whether it be going for a light jog, using your truck as leverage to do push ups, do extra laps around your truck when doing circle checks, or using the truck step to do step ups.
  7. Stick To a weekly Schedule! Missing a workout here and there may not seem like a big deal, but it will have an overall impact on your routine, and may cause you to never get back on track. Bad days happen, we’re all human. For that reason, it’s important to plan and stick to a weekly schedule rather than daily, ensuring that you get everything done in a week that you have to. That means if you plan to workout 3x a week in 2020, 3 workouts have to get done every week at some point. Planned to work out on Monday but didn’t end up having time? That’s okay, just know that you have to make up for it another day so you get those 3 workouts in!

It can be easy to get off track in January, so be gentle on yourself, and never throw in the towel. Change can be hard in the beginning, so pick a routine that works for you and adjust accordingly as you go. You CAN make 2020 your healthiest year yet, but you must CHOOSE to do so every single day!