So in my last blog I talked about habits and how we can get better in any area if we change our system on how we meet those habits. Building on that, it’s important to understand that to change a behavior we have to be aware that the behavior exists before we can make a change. If a habit is just something you do, without being aware of it, then you won’t be able to improve it. You need to make it something you think about regularly to make a change. One way to effectively change a habit for the better would be to keep a scorecard. Start by making a list of your daily habits. Decide whether it’s a good habit or a bad one or neutral. Your scorecard could look something like this… Morning Wake up = Hit the snooze - Weigh myself + Check my phone - Night Time Eat a healthy dinner + Walk the dog + Check email - Go to bed = This is a very simplified scorecard but here’s how it works. Let’s say this is mine and I’m always running late for work. Waking up is neutral because, well let’s face it, we have to get up eventually so that gets an equals sign. Hitting the snooze and checking my phone are bad habits because I’m always late for work. They get a minus. However, because I’m trying to lose weight, weighing myself in the morning is a good habit so it gets a plus. Same is true for my healthy dinner and walking the dog. These habits are good because they are helping me with my weight loss. However, if I’m staying up too late checking my email this could be why I’m hitting the snooze so this would be a bad habit. Identifying your habits and bringing awareness to your behavior is important for making change. Unless you can see how you are currently handling things in your life, you can’t make a conscious change to improve things. You need to ask yourself, “Does this behavior help me become the person I wish to be or does it interfere with that process?” If you are trying to stop a bad habit, say it out loud so you can hear what you are about to do. This is something I need to do when it comes to ice cream… “I’m about to dive into the container of ice cream. This is going to hurt my progress of trying to cut body fat!” Hearing it and acknowledging what I’m about to do makes the bad habit more real and makes me think about what I’m going to do before I do it. Obviously, Frank would need to padlock the freezer until I get a handle on this bad habit, but you get the idea laugh. Understanding how the outcome of my action will interfere with my desire to be a healthy athlete makes the bad habit easier to change. The goal here is to simply notice. Pay attention! Good habits can be better and bad habits can be changed or eliminated. Give it a try! Coach Liz 
