THRIVING DURING THE HOLIDAYS
We are heading into the holiday season and the end of the year. While this time is filled with fun festivities and lots of opportunities to socialize with friends and family, it is also a time when people find it hard to keep up with the healthy routines they have cultivated all year. Today we’ll provide some tips to help you maintain your healthy habits, continue eating well, and continue to move throughout the day.
Fight the “F*** It” Mindset
The holidays can be fun, busy, and stressful. Often entire weeks can be filled with family or social commitments that make it hard to eat well or fit in your workout. It can be easy to just let those things go (or say “F*** it”) and tell yourself you will pick up those habits after the holiday or when things slow down. We know you’ve been around long enough to know that picking it back up isn’t as easy as you think it will be.
Have fun, attend your commitments, spend time with loved ones, and get those holiday and end of year tasks done, but don’t give up on what is important to you. Make time to squeeze in some movement before or after an event. If you are doing a lot of shopping, park far away and walk. Walk between stores if possible, rather than driving. Cut your workouts in half, but don’t skip them. Stick with your nutrition goals. If you are working on avoiding sugar and alcohol, allow yourself to indulge once a week, or at a specific party, not for the whole season.
This may sound hard and not fun, but showing up for yourself and maintaining the commitment you made to yourself will feel so good. Especially when you do fully dive back into your nutrition and fitness programs- you won’t have lost progress, and you won’t have to make up for weeks of unhealthy choices.
Make a Plan
With a busy schedule and a ton of commitments, making a plan for how to eat well or fit in a workout will ensure you keep up your routine. We work with all of our clients on how to plan for this busy time- you don’t need to plan alone (schedule a call with us)!
Some planning tips:
Decide how much time you can commit to your fitness routine while still having fun and meeting holiday commitments. This may look like working out twice a week instead of four times per week. It may mean cutting workouts from 30 minutes to 15 minutes. It may mean a coffee date with your friend becomes a coffee and walk date with your friend. Look at your commitments, then determine when you can fit in that movement. Your body will thank you.
Plan when you want to indulge. Does your friend make the best holiday cookies? Or do you really want to enjoy a cocktail at the boujee restaurant hosting your company holiday party? Great! Plan to enjoy those things! Make sure you are enjoying the holiday (and delicious food that goes with it) and partaking in the things that are important to you. The rest of the time, follow your normal routine. If there are cookies in the break room, you don’t need to eat them. A holiday lunch with your team? Choose a healthy option instead of overindulging. Remind yourself that it is not a requirement of holiday events that you need to give up your healthy habits. Allowing yourself to indulge when it is important to you will help maintain a commitment to yourself and keep you in your healthy habit.
Try an Exercise Snack
One of our favorite ways to add in movement throughout a busy day is by adding in exercise snacks. Exercise snacks are small bursts of movement, typically lasting 45-60 seconds, done a few times throughout the day. Some good exercise snacks:
45-60 seconds of air squats
45-60 seconds of reverse lunges
60 seconds of pilates arms
10 bird dogs
10 push ups
Exercise snacks can be done between meetings, while you cook dinner, in the minute before you leave the house to run errands or go to a holiday event. The thing we love about exercise snacks if that they aren’t long enough to make you sweaty, but when completed 5-10 times throughout the day, the benefit really adds up! We bet you can find five one-minute intervals in your day to add this in.
Find an Accountability Partner
Our last tip for you is to find an accountability partner to help get you through the holiday season. We act as an accountability partner to all our clients, which is helpful during this busy time. If you aren’t working with a coach, reach out to a friend, your spouse, or a family member. Tell them your goals, and ask them to check in. When someone else is supportive of what you are doing, it helps keep you accountable to your goals.
Happy holidays!